A woman went viral after sharing a screenshot from a survey sent out by her company's human resources department asking if a pay raise or a ping-pong table would help with employee success.
The tweet, shared by Vivian or @muchnerve, received more than 36,000 retweets and 310,000 likes since May 23. The tweet can be found here.
The viral tweet was also shared on Reddit's popular "Antiwork" thread by u/turquoiseweirwood where it received more than 15,000 upvotes and 600 comments.
In January, the U.S. Department of Labor reported nearly 4.5 million Americans quit their jobs in November 2021.
New research into the Great Resignation, also referred to as "The Big Quit," found that 66 percent of employees looking for new jobs said it was because they were in search of better opportunities.
Studies also found that nearly 43 percent of workers say they feel burnt out and 74 percent believe there are better opportunities elsewhere, including a better work-life balance.
"Who wouldn't want a ping-pong table instead of a raise in pay right?" the viral post read.
In the screenshot of the survey, a question was asked about how to keep employees from leaving the company.
"Which of the following items might help an HR professional drive employee retention and success?" the survey question read.
The survey provided three answers: a ping-pong table, additional responsibilities, or a pay raise.
@muchnerve showed that she answered "pay raise" but that she was incorrect and the correct answer was a ping-pong table.
"Often when an employee leaves, it's not about the money," the survey read. "A good exit interview can help determine the real causes of employee discontent."
@muchnerve shared the survey question and answer on Twitter with the caption "sure babe keep telling yourself that," and users were quick to criticize the survey.
"Like these people would ever pay attention to an exit interview," one Reddit user commented.
"It's funny cause most of the places that have stupid s**t like ping pong tables don't give you enough time away from work to actually use them," another Reddit user wrote.
Other users mentioned that the reason they left their previous jobs was because of their pay.
"I literally left my previous companies because of the low salary??????????" one Twitter user replied. "And ofc being overworked and subjected to toxic environment, but definitely it's the low salary that gave me away."
"As a person who left a job after 5 years it was entirely the pay. I was happy with everything else," another user tweeted.
Newsweek reached out to @muchnerve for comment.
In another viral post in Reddit's "Antiwork" forum, one employee was praised for pledging not to "work for free" and resigning from her job.
"I'm glad I resigned because it showed them I wasn't going to be treated like that and be taken advantage of," she told Newsweek.
Another employee received support from Redditors in the "Antiwork" forum after they were reprimanded by their supervisor because they were 26 seconds late coming back from break.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Samantha Berlin is a Newsweek reporter based in New York. Her focus is reporting on trends and human-interest stories. Samantha ... Read more
