What is quiet hiring?

Quiet hiring is when a business acquires new skills without increasing its headcount. This usually means leveraging your current employee base by giving them learning and training opportunities. This can lead to an increase in productivity without adding new (and potentially expensive) staff to your payroll.

Quiet hiring can look like the following:

• Promoting or moving an employee to another internal position
• Having a staff memberparticipate in an internal project from another department
• Giving employees training on new skills or programs so they can take on new responsibilities

Note that quiet hiring isn’t just adding more work to your employees’ day-to-day. When done right, it’s more like a mutually beneficial strategic decision.

Why is quiet hiring popular right now?

First, there was quiet quitting, then quiet firing and now there’s quiet hiring.

In 2023, quiet hiring emerged as a response to the growing economic downturn. As a potential recession looms, it has become clear that companies need to learn how to do more with less. Employers realize they may not be able to afford hiring new people to fill all their open roles. Quiet hiring has become a cost-effective solution for businesses to fill their skills gap without growing headcount.

The pros of quiet hiring

There are several potential benefits of the quiet hiring method, including:

• Increased productivity: By giving your existing staff new skills, you’ll likely see an increase in productivity. Your current workforce will know how to do more, and you won’t have to hire new people to fill in knowledge gaps. For example, instead of hiring a full-time or part-time graphic designer, you could teach one of your marketing team members to learn how to create graphic designs. This can be especially positive if the skills gap you need to fill aligns with your employee’s career development goals.
• Cost savings: Employers can potentially save quite a bit by quiet hiring. Instead of paying for a new full-time employee with their salary, benefits and training costs, you simply fill the open role by dividing the needed skills across existing team members.
• A quicker way to fill skills gaps: In many cases, teaching a current employee new skills can be faster than trying to recruit someone and get them onboarded. This means employers can fill their skills gaps and start being productive faster.
• Upskilling employees: When you invest in employees by offering them new training, learning opportunities and promotions, they may feel happier and be more dedicated to the organization. This, in turn, can potentially increase retention and engagement.

The cons of quiet hiring

If quiet hiring strategies are implemented loosely and without a solid strategic plan, some drawbacks can include:

• Employee backlash: Despite quiet hiring having benefits for both the employee and employer, there could be some backlash to this approach. Some employees may see this as trying to overwork the current employee base rather than invest in hiring more workers. To avoid this, you could offer employees the opportunity to learn new skills, but don’t make it mandatory. This way, you’re engaging with the individuals who genuinely want to learn and will feel this is an exciting venture rather than an obligation.
• Burnout: Companies mustn’t overload their employees, as this can lead to burnout . Employees that experience burnout tend to be less productive and use more sick days.. Ensure you check in with every team member about their bandwidth before adding more to their plate.

How to implement quiet hiring

For quiet hiring to be effective, there must be a strategic plan. If you choose to test out quiet hiring, know it may take a few months to roll out the full program. Here are the steps you may want to take:

1. The leadership team will need to identify the following:
   1. What skills are currently lacking and needed within the organization?
   2. What employees in the organization are open to learning new skills, fast learners and worth investing in?
   3. Do these employees have the capacity to take on training and learning?
   4. How long will it take to get them fully trained to start using the skills within the workplace and be more productive?
   5. How will employees be incentivized or rewarded for learning these new skills?
2. Next, a plan is created to get these employees set up for training.
3. When employees begin putting their new skills to use, consider recognizing that via simple initiatives such as a shout out, bonuses and/or a pay raise.

Is quiet hiring the right business decision for you?

If you truly understand quiet hiring and implement it ethically, this might be an excellent strategy for your business. Companies have been quiet hiring for years, even if they didn’t realize it. When it’s done correctly, quiet hiring is a policy of prioritizing internal promotions and giving employees upskill opportunities.

Ultimately, if you don’t have the budget for hiring or are finding the recruitment process is taking too long, quiet hiring can be a cheaper, faster option.

To ensure you’re rolling out a quiet hiring strategy that’s fair to your employees, avoid adding work to people’s plates who don’t want it or feel they can’t take more on. The best quiet hiring plan engages employees who see this approach as a win-win.

Frequently asked questions about quiet hiring

Should I tell my employee I am quiet hiring them?

It’s important to be open and transparent with your employees, but the term “quiet hiring” may have negative connotations for some employees. They may think they’re being given more work without a promotion or pay. You could potentially reframe the situation as “upskilling” or providing “new career opportunities.”

What does quiet quitting mean?

Quiet quitting is when an employee does the bare minimum expected of their job and doesn’t put in extra hours, take on additional work or go above and beyond in any way. The employee isn’t actually quitting, but they aren’t interested in getting ahead, either.

What is quiet firing?

Quiet firing is when a manager or company fails to provide proper training and support to an employee. Eventually, the employee feels they’re not supported and can’t do their job correctly, so they quit out of frustration.

Is quiet hiring popular?

Research firm Gartner announced that quiet hiring would be the number one workplace trend in 2023.