- Andra Berghoff, 25, said she quit her first corporate role after a few months, and went viral.
- Her video became part of an ongoing conversation about Gen Z's approach to work.
- Berghoff told Insider why she thinks Gen Z is "pushing back on the unfair standards of work."
A Gen Zer who said she left her first corporate job after just a few months went viral online, adding to an ongoing conversation about the generation's perspective on working life.
On August 31, Andra Berghoff, a 25-year-old based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, posted a video in response to another TikToker who asked his Gen Z followers what they thought about the generation's approach to work.
Berghoff's response began with an on-screen caption that read, "Gen Z is finally starting to push back against corporate life" and she went on to explain she had gotten her first "corporate in office adult 9-to-5 job" that year, and had initially been excited about it, but realized after four months that she didn't want to do this "corporate drone thing" for the rest of her life.
In the upload, she said she believed there were people in their 40s at the same company who were earning the same amount of money as her and "struggling to get by" and she questioned if this was all there was to life. She said she kept "pushing through with blind optimism" but ultimately decided she didn't want to continue the role any longer and left for "health reasons." Although she was struggling to pay bills, she said she was "happier doing odd jobs here and there."
"So say whatever you want about Gen Z, but we're just finally putting our foot down about this corporate lifestyle, where you waste most of your life sitting in an office doing little to nothing," she said towards the end of the video, adding she would rather get the work done on her own time, and then get to live her life.
Berghoff told Insider in an email exchange that she had stayed at the job for eight months before she officially quit.
Her upload received a massive response, with 3.8 million views and over 11,600 comments, ranging from self-described Gen Z and millennial viewers who wrote they felt trapped by the 40-hour work week that consumed their lives without providing adequate financial reward.
"I got asked what my dream job was recently and I said 'I don't dream of working for the rest of my life,'" one viewer wrote in a popular comment.
"Gen Z was raised to question things and there are so many things about office work that we see are pointless or could be done differently," Berghoff told Insider. "Corporate life is soul-sucking and unnecessary with its long hours, awful dress code, pushback on disability accommodations, and higher-ups who refuse to even listen to their employees."
Some managers have said that Gen Z workers are particularly difficult to deal with, but the generation has taken to social media in response to this criticism, pointing to the reasons they don't want to work which include a lack of fulfillment in the workplace, wage stagnation, and more of a focus on a healthier work-life balance, Insider previously reported.
"Gen Z does not hate corporate work, we are pushing back on the unfair standards of work that haven't reflected the change in times for decades," Berghoff told Insider. "If I were to return to corporate work they would have to pay me a livable wage and allow me to work remotely, and now maybe even autonomously."
Instead of fully leaving their roles, some Gen Zers have taken the approach of quiet quitting, which involves still showing up to work to collect a paycheck, but establishing firm work-life boundaries by refusing to go above and beyond their job description, while others have embraced the trend of "Bare Minimum Mondays" as a way to ease themselves into the working week.
For more stories like this, check out coverage from Insider's Digital Culture team here.