I created ‘Bare minimum Mondays’ — Gen Z’s latest low-effort work trend
viral trends
March 2, 2023 | 7:37 p.m
Coined by TikToker Marisa Jo Mayes, “Bare Minimum Mondays” is the latest trend for corporate workers.
Tiktok / itsmarisajo
You’ve heard of “quiet quitting” – now get ready for “the bare minimum of mondays.”
It’s the latest corporate trend taking on TikTok, coined by Marisa Jo Mayes after experiencing an all-too-famous burnout at work.
The hashtag #bareminimummondays has already garnered 2 million views on the platform, with videos of users participating in the seemingly effortless trend.
Frustrated with her job at the company, 29-year-old Mayes turned to self-employment, but recognized the problem she still faced: she was a self-proclaimed perfectionist.
“I would wake up on Monday, really burned out, really unproductive,” Mayes, who has more than 154,000 followers on TikTok, told The Post. “And because I was so dissatisfied with how unproductive I was, I made a long list of things to do.”
At the end of the day, she was so overwhelmed by the self-imposed pressure that she felt “fucked” from barely being able to complete her duties. She feared Mondays so much that her weekly “Sunday creeps” would cripple her — and her work ethic.
“Every Sunday night, I stayed up very late because I knew that the earlier I went to bed, the faster Monday would come,” said the Phoenix, Arizona-based creator. “Then on Monday I would sleep in as late as possible, knowing that the second I wake up the stress will come back and the second my long to-do list will come back.”
Keyword: Bare minimum Mondays, a “burnout prevention strategy” in which employees try to do as little as possible on the most dreaded day of the week.
“It’s more of an opportunity for people to take a step back from the hustle and bustle until American companies catch up,” she said. “The tide is turning and I feel like employees are tired of trading their well-being to perform well at work.”
The day Mayes decided to lower her self-imposed expectations, she was more productive at work, she claimed—the seemingly insurmountable peak of tasks became more manageable when they were kept to a few. Now she said it changed her life.
“It completely overhauled my relationship with productivity and work and how I think about myself,” she added.
Gen Z-led movements like Great Resignation and Acting Your Wage stem from young workers who resent being overworked, underpaid and, most importantly, unhappy. In fact, earlier this year workers took the “quiet” part to new heights — by quitting on a dime with no two weeks’ notice.
But Bare Minimum Mondays are another representation in the same vein: Young workers are focusing on their autonomy.
“I think for so many years, people’s callings have defined their lives and not the other way around, and that’s why I think people really like the idea of taking control of their schedule and workload,” says 21-year-old Avery Morris, a senior influencer marketing manager, told The Post, adding that Gen Z is “reclaiming” their work-life balance.
In fact, the Atlanta-based TikToker, which is “prone to Sunday creep and burnout,” is celebrating the trend. A bare minimum of Mondays, she told the Post, “alleviates” the anxiety she endures at the start of the week and revels in her “slow mornings” rather than “jumping right into the stressful chores.”
In a viral clip, Morris weighed in on which work trend she prefers: “Mondays the bare minimum” or “Fridays done by 2pm.” But her joyful video sparked some negative feedback.
“You guys are going to have us all sent back to an office seriously,” one user ranted, while another snorted, “The same people are wondering why management is making them come back.”
One person even nudged everyone who boasted about his low effort online, claiming the antics would “ruin it for everyone.”
But other burnt-out TikTokers also adored the newfound trend, which allowed them to ease some of the self-imposed pressure. Mayes believes this could be because there are people who are “stuck in jobs where the bare minimum is doing more.”
“I absolutely love this concept because every Monday I feel like I’m putting so much pressure on myself to accomplish so many different things — and then I inevitably burn out and feel kind of drained for the rest of the week,” the actor said Model Angiela Naris in a TikTok clip.
Another user named Celeste credited the productivity hack as key to her efficiency, saying it made her “prioritize my time effectively.”
It’s not “cheating,” she gushed, because she “exceeds” her boss’s expectations.
But the positive online reception hasn’t made Mayes immune to criticism from corporate bosses. She claimed she’s receiving frantic messages from professionals “in an uproar” about the productivity hack asking what to report to their bosses.
“When companies email me and say, ‘What the hell are you doing? Our employees all do it!’ – well, then look in the mirror,” she said.
“The more we start prioritizing our well-being and treating ourselves like real people, the more companies have a problem with that,” Mayes mused.
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