What is ghostworking and how is it affecting your organization? Employees are faking productivity on the job and searching for their next work opportunity on the clock, making it a trend that needs addressing.
Pretending to work and tending to your own personal tasks is not a new phenomenon, but this new HR job trend of ghostworking is growing beyond a temporary distraction. A new report revealed that many employees are faking productivity in order to keep appearances. This workplace survival strategy is becoming increasingly common with many pretending to work at their remote jobs to ensure they can continue job hunting at work.
Before we point fingers at Gen Z for leading yet another employee disengagement trend in 2025, this does not exclusively concern young workers. The problem is a matter concerning the current state of employment and the lack of investment in engaging employees. A new survey from Resume Now found that 58% of workers regularly fake work, while a smaller percentage do it every once in a while. These numbers are concerning and indicate that it is time to understand and address the issue of workers pretending to work.
The new job trend of ghostworking is a serious concern for HR teams that want to build a team of happy, engaged workers. (Image: Pexels)
What Is Ghostworking? This New Job Trend Is Growing More Concerning
Ghostworking is a new trend of workers faking productivity in order to create the illusion of being busy. The Resume Now survey of 1,127 U.S. workers found that 58% of employees regularly admit to pretending to work, while another 34% do the same occasionally. This trend of pretending is higher at remote jobs, where 43% claim to be disguising their time on the job as opposed to the 37% who do it in office.
The HR job trend of ghostworking also takes on some innovative forms. Around 23% of employees admit to walking around the workplace with a notebook to indicate that they are currently on a task and not just flitting around the office with nothing else to do. Similarly, 22% have attacked their keyboards with fervor, pretending to type in order to seem engaged. Over 15% of workers keep a spreadsheet or tab open to make them look more focused, while another 15% have held a phone to their ears with no caller on the other end.
It’s not uncommon for workers to pick up the phone to pretend to make a client call or pull out reports when the boss walks past their desks, but this current trend of ghostworking goes beyond a panicked response to the possibility of being chastised. We know that employees aren’t just lazy—they’re actively afraid of losing their jobs if there is any doubt that their presence isn’t entirely necessary in the organization. So why are workers faking it?
Some Employees Are Not Just Pretending, They Are Actively Job Hunting at Work
The ghostworking trend is not only concerning because of the lack of work being done at the organization, but also due to the nature of the tasks that employees focus on instead of work. This workplace survival strategy aims to prevent workers from being criticized for sitting idle or being assigned more work simply because they have some free time. Over 55% of workers are also pretending to be busy so they can continue with job hunting at work with 24% using company time to update their resume.
Employees fake productivity because they are unsatisfied with their current jobs and also simultaneously fear being replaced. As such, they continue to look for other opportunities to get a sense of the work that is out there and that can benefit them. Many reports have pointed out that the white-collar job market is shrinking and there is a lowered demand for educated workers. This means that many who take on new jobs do so out of desperation and with the offer of lower pay than they deserve.
With employee benefits slowly taking a backseat, workers are snatching up any work opportunity that’s made available to them, regardless of whether it’s a match. Under such circumstances, it is no surprise that workers are entirely disengaged at their current jobs, hoping something more worthwhile will come their way.
Workplace Distractions Flood Both In-Person and Remote Workers
Once we understand what ghostworking is, it’s also important to acknowledge that the work environment is rarely designed for productivity. In the office, workers complain of technical issues, extended breaks, forced corporate socializing events, chatty coworkers, unnecessary interruptions from managers, and other office noises that steal their attention.
Remote workers have their own issues with distractions, from housemate noises, internet or power outages, invasive family members, household emergencies, neighborhood noises, needy pets, and unexpected visitors at the door. We frequently hear CEOs explaining that workers are unproductive while working remotely, but the survey results show that regardless of whether employees work from home or from the office, there are distractions that take up much of their attention.
How to Address the HR Job Trend of Ghostworking?
Employees have faked their productivity in one way or another since the beginning of time, and they will likely continue to do so in the years to come. Eliminating it entirely is a tough challenge, but understanding the trend and the reasons for its meteoric rise can set you on the right track for addressing employee disengagement in 2025.
Once we have answers to the question of “What is ghostworking?” we must then shift our attention to the matter of how to bring down the frequency of ghostworking within an organization.
Simple Strategies to Build a Team of Engaged Employees
There are a few suggestions we can offer for helping employees fit in better at an organization so they can be more engaged.
- Pay fair wages and offer employee benefits that encourage workers to stay on at the organization
- Hire the right candidates for the right roles rather than pick based on workers willing to do the job for the lowest pay
- Invest in holistic onboarding so employees are fully immersed and involved in the workplace rather than feeling left out at every turn
- Regularly interact with employees to understand their experience on the job and help them feel connected with work
- Set fixed goals for employees and revisit the progress on them—adjust them regularly
- Involve employees in the goal setting and ask questions to explore their understanding of the tasks
- Seek employee feedback on the work to understand what support they need to improve their quality of work
- Engage employees in the workplace by helping build connections with colleagues and clients
- Address the distractions experienced by employees and help eliminate them as much as possible
There are multiple different reasons why employees pretend to work while on the job and they are a non-issue for the most part. However, if employees are job hunting at work, it is evident that their organizations are not doing enough to help them care about their jobs. Let’s understand what ghostworking is on a deeper level and find solutions that help workers find a more substantial relationship with their work.
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