‘Busy bragging’ is the latest toxic workplace trait — it makes your colleagues think you’re dumb, too
They’re stressed to impress.
Boasting about how inundated you are at work might appear to convey professionalism and dedication to the job, but it can actually have the opposite effect, experts say.
Employees who “stress brag,” or “busy brag,” are more likely to be perceived as less likable — and less competent — by their colleagues, per a study published in the journal “Personnel Psychology.”
Unfortunately, the point-scoring phenomenon — call it performative anxiety — has become all too common in the corporate world.
“This is a behavior we’ve all seen, and we all might be guilty of at some point,” said Jessica Rodell, the study’s head author and a professor of management at the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business in Athens, Georgia.
“When I was wondering about why people do this, I thought maybe we are talking about our stress because we want to prove we’re good enough,” she said.
To test the effect of stress-bragging, 360 participants were tasked with analyzing statements from imaginary colleagues who had come back from a conference.
Some coworkers gushed about how much they enjoyed the conference while the busy bragger griped about how it was just “one more thing” on their plate.
“I was already stressed to the max … you have no idea the stress that I am under,” read the made-up response.
In general, survey participants deemed the corporate worrywart both less likable and competent than their more positive counterparts.
Worse still, respondents paradoxically felt less inclined to help the braggadocious stress balls, seemingly defeating the purpose of boasting about busyness.
“People are harming themselves by doing this thing they think is going to make them look better to their colleagues,” said Rodell.
Unfortunately, work stress is infectious, the research showed.
As a followup study, Rodell and her team questioned 218 real-life workers about the busy braggers at work, finding that professionals subjected to this busy signal from colleagues were merely likely to suffer from burnout and even, well, anxiety.
Rodell explained that a colleague’s busy bragging can make it seem like it’s a “good thing to be stressed,” thereby infecting the “co-worker next to them.”
“They wind up feeling more stressed, which leads to higher burnout or withdrawal from their work,” she explained. “Think of it as this spiraling contagious effect from one person to the next.”
Interestingly, this negative perception doesn’t apply to employees who are actually stressed, just the phonies who want to be seen as such, per Rodell.
Ironically, workers whose anxiety appears to be genuine are also viewed as more competent, she claimed.
“It’s not the being stressed part that’s a problem,” she said. “If you genuinely feel stressed, it’s OK to find the right confidant to share with and talk about it. But be mindful that it is not a badge of honor to be bragged about — that will backfire.”
This isn’t the first study to suggest that authenticity is the way to go — research from 2018 showed that humble braggers — people who boast about themselves under the guise of modesty — are more reviled than regular old braggarts.
