70% of U.S. workers believe RTO mandates are quit tactic – Zety survey
GUAYNABO, PUERTO RICO — A growing number of American workers believe return-to-office (RTO) mandates are being used to quietly push employees out, and not to boost collaboration.
According to Zety’s latest Quiet Firing Report, 70% of U.S. employees suspect these policies are designed to make people quit rather than fire them outright.
The survey of 1,000 workers on February 21 reveals that subtle workplace pressure, known as “quiet firing,” is increasingly common. More than half (53%) say the practice has become more prevalent in the past three years, and nearly three-quarters (73%) report having experienced quiet firing tactics firsthand.
Micromanagement, isolation among most common tactics
The most frequently reported quiet firing strategies include piling on extra work without added pay (14%), micromanagement (11%), and being cut off from key responsibilities or meetings (10%). Some even say they were excluded from team events or moved to less impactful projects.
Zety’s data also shows the psychological toll: 29% of employees say they’ve seen a colleague forced out this way, while 14% quit their own job due to such pressure. Most would prefer clear-cut action—79% say they’d rather be fired directly than quietly forced to leave.
A legal and cultural workaround for employers
When asked why companies use quiet firing, the top reasons cited include avoiding legal risks (22%), dodging severance obligations (18%), and reducing the potential for confrontation (22%). Employees believe these tactics are also used to manage cultural misfits without creating bad optics.
Employees are fighting back
In response, 53% of workers say they’d start job-hunting immediately if they suspected they were being quietly fired, while a quarter would confront their manager or HR. Just 9% would do nothing. Seventy-three percent of workers say they would actively avoid companies known for “quiet firing.”
“The rise of return-to-office mandates as a quiet firing tactic is a clear indication of how company policies can be weaponized to quietly force employees out under the guise of organizational strategy,” Jasmine Escalera, career expert at Zety, said in a statement.
“When workers perceive such policies as a means of pushing them toward resignation, it damages not only their trust in leadership but the employer’s ability to retain top talent in an increasingly competitive job market.”
