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A few weeks ago, I was contacted by a reporter to discuss the current state of women’s career aspirations. During our interview, she told me about a TikTok trend she had been observing in which young people, most of them women, were using the platform to share some of the reasons that they were deciding against pursuing more status and responsibility at work.
I haven’t had any social media accounts other than LinkedIn in over three years, so the TikTok trend was news to me. However, I had just a few weeks before the interview become aware of a related trend—or a lifestyle, I suppose—gaining popularity among young women: “the stay-at-home-girlfriend.” And not long before that, I had read some articles about “lazy girl jobs” and “leaning out” culture.
If you haven’t heard about any of these things, the concise version is that some young people, and especially young women, appear to be proudly and publicly eschewing professional ambition in favor of lifestyles that elevate the importance of self-care. Of course, marketing this lifestyle particularly well could attract enough social media followers to produce lucrative brand partnerships or help successfully launch a business. So, in many cases, it’s not clear that professional ambitions have been abandoned or just adapted to a world that has been fundamentally transformed by social media.
Nevertheless, these trends have me wondering whether we’re losing ground in the battle for gender equality. On the other hand, the gender pay gap is currently the smallest it’s ever been in the U.S. So, what the heck is happening, and is there cause for concern?
In my estimation, a few different things appear to be happening. First, Gen Z seems generally skeptical about the American dream that’s been harder to come by with each generation. A common variation of that dream is to graduate college with a good-paying job, be rewarded for hard work with more money, status, and recognition, and be able to afford to buy a home before long.
Instead, Gen Z-ers are finding themselves in uninspiring, thankless jobs that fail to provide them with the meaning, autonomy, and flexibility they crave. Owning a home is a pipe dream for many of them, which means they’ve been left without access to one of the most common ways that people have historically built wealth. Considering all of this, it’s easy to understand why some Gen Z-ers are making it a point to put less effort into work and instead maximize time spent on activities from which they actually derive some enjoyment and meaning.
Next, I suspect that leaning into “leaning out” culture is more socially acceptable for young women than young men. As I’ve discussed in a previous post, men’s career choices are a lot more constrained than women’s because they are expected to show ambition and chase high-paying roles. Even in 2024, it’s rare to see heterosexual couples in which the woman is the sole breadwinner while the man has full oversight over the household tasks. Certainly, it’s hard to imagine a “stay-at-home-boyfriend” trend emerging anytime soon.
And then, operating alongside constrained career choices for men, there is the contemporary version of feminism, which is largely one of “choice feminism.” Choice feminism celebrates any choice a woman makes, as long as it has the appearance of being freely selected. But many of those choices reinforce gender discrepancies in career outcomes, which is ultimately at odds with the goals of the original feminist movement. In fact, research has uncovered what they call a “gender equality paradox”: In nations with more gender equality—as determined by women’s representation in government, economic participation, education, and health outcomes—women are far more likely to choose gender-typical careers than they are in some of the worst places to be a woman. The theory is that gender-equitable countries are wealthier, and as wealth increases, so does the freedom to choose a career to which one feels drawn.
In terms of whether we should be concerned about these trends, it’s complicated. My opinion as a gender scholar is that we’ve already done plenty to encourage women to enter professions in which they’re under-represented and that we’ll see more progress if we turn our attention to reducing the stigma associated with men entering women-dominated jobs and social roles.
That being said, as a scholar of organizational behavior, more generally, I do think business leaders have reason to worry. Corporate America is clearly failing to inspire hard work and commitment among its young employees, and without these things, its future is bleak. Moreover, organizations that are endeavoring to increase the representation of women in leadership might find few young women willing to step into these roles.
Laying out a comprehensive solution is beyond the scope of this post, but leaders should start with some of the fundamentals of job enrichment: autonomy, meaning, task variety, and feedback.
For example, employees should have some freedom over how they structure their work and accomplish their goals. Where possible, employers should relax the expectation of a 9-to-5 schedule and allow employees to work when they want, as long as they meet their goals and show up to meetings. Employees should understand the importance of the role they play in the broader purpose of the organization, and they should be provided with opportunities to learn about the impact they’ve had.
Work tasks should not be the same thing, day in and day out. When tasks are mundane and nothing can be done about it, employees can be rotated across tasks to prevent boredom. Finally, employees need regular, timely, and specific feedback so that they can continuously develop and visualize the path to more status and responsibility—if that’s something they want.
While previous generations might have been willing to muddle through without these work conditions in place, it seems like many Gen Z women will not. Who knows, maybe they’ll force organizations to be better for all of us.
