The end of the year brings end-of-year-lists from various media, and Fast Company is no different: the publication has come out with its list of 10 phrases that defined the year 2023 at work.

Vibecession was coined by TikTok influencer Kyla Scanlon on Substack to describe how the recession was being more or less shaped by how people were feeling about the economy.

Zombie brand is a brand that may look alive and well, but is really not. Two examples cited here are Allbirds and Blue Apron, which Fast Company previously described as “once-hot DTC brands [that] are hollowing out behind the scenes.”

Bare minimum Mondays describes easing into the workweek. By checking some tasks off a to-do list, rather than striving all of one’s goals, the idea is to adjust from the weekend and ease anxiety about the week ahead.

Lazy girl jobs is somewhat of a misnomer; it means working smarter, not harder. “Lazy girls” argue that “you don’t have to work 9 to 5 to earn a living.” Work-from-home jobs that pay well and offer flexibility seem to be the objective here.

Loud quitting is just that: the opposite of quiet quitting, which meant disengaging or doing the bare minimum at work. A loud quitter actively seeks other jobs and is adamantly against his or her current employer. A loud quitter may even do things to harm his current company harm their current company and take another job as soon as one is available, even if the pay was not so good.

Then, there is grumpy staying, in which workers just go through the motions.

Quiet hiring describes something that has, probably, occurred for years. It could refer to employers bringing in short-term contractors or freelancers, but often means assigning workers more responsibilities without an actual promotion, such as filling in for departed colleagues without an accompanying title change or salary boost.

Monk mode is a means to ignore distractions such as those provided by one’s phone and get all of one’s actual work done. Then one has permission to go back to Slack, Instagram, and whatever else takes up the rest of the workday.

Nepo babies are “adult children of celebrities who come by incredible jobs with little to no effort on their part, Fast Company explained. Blasted for their seemingly rigged achievements by everyone from social media users on X to magazines, these privileged ones seemed to annoy people more than ever in 2023.

Anxiety – certainly not a new word – was named 2023’s “Word of the Year” by Glassdoor. Based on an analysis of conversations on the site, mentions of “anxiety” by users were up 338 percent in 2023. Others whose use on the site rose in 2023 were ChatGPT (up 2,369 percent), RTO/return to office (up 476 percent), and layoff (up 293 percent).