‘You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means,” Inigo Montoya says to his ringleader, Vizzini, who continually shrieks that an action or idea is “inconceivable!” Anyone who has watched the movie The Princess Bride will immediately recognize the quote.

Likewise, I would say people throw around modern buzzwords without any distinction between the intended meaning and the actual use.

Such is the case with the term “quiet quitting.” It’s catchy, and it’s thrown at readers and employees as if it has some great authority: the ability to define an entire segment of the population as those who are doing just enough to get by in their job while really keeping an eye open for better opportunities. Corporate-siding articles liken these “quiet quitters” to someone who keeps up appearances in a relationship just enough to quench claims of cheating while browsing online profiles for someone better. They’re the traitors who are dating one job while courting others on the side. But is that portrayal accurate?

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