By now most Americans have heard the term “the Great Resignation.” Coined by Mays Business School at Texas A&M professor Anthony Klotz in May 2021, the Great Resignation refers to the ongoing trend of Americans quitting their jobs in record numbers. In November 2021 alone, 4.5 million people left their job. That’s in addition to the 4.2 million who quit in October, the 4.4 million in September, and another 4.3 million in August. Yet the country’s official unemployment rate stands at a very low 3.9 percent, seemingly contradicting the Great Resignation’s unprecedented effect on the labor market.
People are quitting their jobs in droves and the US unemployment rate is low, pointing to a fundamental misunderstanding at the heart of the Great Resignation. We’ve quickly fixated on the sensational numbers but haven’t been as quick to realize that the vast majority of these “quitters” are quickly returning to the workforce. The Great Resignation is not about Americans refusing to work, rather that the American worker is ditching jobs that are either low-paying or feature an inadequate work/life balance, or both, in favor of better jobs.
“I respected the bus drivers, bartenders, and construction workers very much. I identified with them,” he writes. “I have a deep reverence for work—any type of work—and have demonstrated that throughout my life. I’d held every type of manual labor job imaginable, from spreading dung in the fields of Knockaderry to cleaning out dive bars at night’s end. Even though I was working as both a teacher and an administrator, I still considered myself no different than the Mike Dowling I’d always been (I still do). But the guys didn’t feel that way. I sensed their thinking: Well, you’re trying to be above your station. Who the hell do you think you are? You’re a big deal now, are you?” (Dowling, M. 2021. After the Roof Caved In [Kenny, Charles, Ed.] First Edition. Simon & Schuster. Pg. 126)
This realization exposed a deeper, more insidious assumption shared among his old friends—namely, that despite what history has shown us, as Irishmen, his friends did not expect to be successful. And if they expected little of their own success, why should a fellow Irishman like Dowling be trying to evade what was, in their minds, just the way things were? Dowling calls this attitude “frustrating,” noting that this pivotal moment in his life confirmed in him what he always suspected to be true.
“I was aiming higher,” Dowling writes. “My Irish friends seemed to imagine the stereotypical Irishman as someone struggling, laboring, toiling at the bottom of the economic ladder. Certainly, there were Irishmen who fit that description. But I imagined the Irishman as an intellectual, literate, as a highly educated leader in business, science, education, and the arts. That’s where my eyes were fixed.” (Dowling, M. 2021. After the Roof Caved In [Kenny, Charles, Ed.] First Edition. Simon & Schuster. Pg. 127)
Michael Dowling, President and CEO of Northwell Health, New York State’s largest private employer, with more than 77,000 employees, knows a lot about what keeps some people working jobs they don’t like and what inspires some people to move on. In his new memoir After the Roof Caved In, Dowling makes the case by examining a pivotal time in his own life that saw him transition from blue-collar jobs to the world of policy and education, eventually leading him to head Northwell, a Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For two years running.
The great resignation
Northwell CEO’s New Memoir Connects Experiences with Today’s Work Challenges
"The Great Resignation is not about Americans refusing to work, rather that the American worker is ditching jobs that are either low-paying or feature an inadequate work/life balance, or both, in favor of better jobs."
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"I have a deep reverence for work—any type of work—and have demonstrated that throughout my life. I’d held every type of manual labor job imaginable..."
Dowling’s existential epiphany reflects what many Americans are realizing today. The pandemic has forced many Americans to reconsider their relationship to work and, in the end, expect better, aim higher, and feel the confidence to do so. From where does this confidence emerge? What’s different about the labor market of 2022, compared to 1970s New York, is that workers today have more access to cash.
One of the intriguing knock-on effects of the pandemic is how much money Americans were able to save while on government assistance during the lockdown. Despite the persistent myth that government assistance makes people lazy, American workers have used this money as a kind of safety net, enabling them to transition to a better job for a chance at a better life.
When Dowling moved from education to the world of policy, a similar situation emerged. Having been offered a position working on social welfare policy in Albany, Dowling was hesitant to leave his Fordham position and the security it offered. However, he was advised that he should take the position because he could always return to academia. He accepted the position, writing in his memoir that “having that safety net made all the difference.” (Dowling, M. 2021. After the Roof Caved In [Kenny, Charles, Ed.] First Edition. Simon & Schuster. Pg. 149)
should reframe what’s happening in today’s labor market as a reckoning on how more companies should follow the lead of a company like Northwell, which moved all the way up to #19 in this year’s top 100 rankings of Best Companies to Work For in Fortune. Like Dowling, Northwell respects work and the tireless heroes that are out there every day performing the jobs that make the healthcare system run.
If you’re thinking about making a change in your life, reading Dowling’s memoir After the Roof Caved In will help inspire you to work hard and dream big. With hard work and determination, anything is possible.
It was this experience, combined with growing up poor in rural Ireland, that shaped Dowling’s approach to social welfare programs and, eventually, healthcare. His first-hand experiences chronicled throughout his memoir inspired his lifelong commitment to helping others. Now, as the CEO of Northwell, he’s helped build a not-for-profit, fully integrated healthcare system that acts as a vital safety net for the population it serves.
So, is the Great Resignation a misnomer? Dowling would say so. Based on the affecting stories in his memoir After the Roof Caved In, the American worker of today is much more similar to Dowling than his old bar friends, eschewing the attitude of settling because they have been given the opportunity to make a change. Perhaps we
“Something unfortunate happened as a result of my gradual rise in the academic world,” Dowling writes in this excerpt from After the Roof
Caved In. He describes how when he began teaching at Fordham University, he continued to hang out with the friends he’d made in the Irish bars of Queens. He gradually noticed as he progressed in his education and professional career that the attitude of his blue-collar friends changed towards him. “It was subtle, but there was something different: Did I think I was better than everybody? Now, in their eyes, I was no longer one of them, but somehow separate and apart.” (Dowling, M. 2021. After the Roof Caved In [Kenny, Charles, Ed.] First Edition. Simon & Schuster. Pg. 126)
It was a painful realization, unveiling a tacit understanding of himself. To himself, Dowling hadn’t changed. It was only their attitudes towards him that had changed.
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A young Michael Dowling (far left) with friends. His educational career would lead him to teach at Fordham University.
Michael Dowling as a baby with his parents outside their tiny rented home in rural Ireland.
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