New Study Finds Mentoring Cuts “Quiet Quitting” Among Gen Z Graduate Interns

Introduction

Quiet quitting describes employees who stay on payroll but withdraw discretionary effort, doing only what a job strictly requires. Siwela and Tebele (2026) note that despite its viral framing, the concept has roots in older constructs like disengagement and withdrawal behavior. Most prior research has catalogued the causes and consequences of quiet quitting rather than identifying what might counteract it—particularly among Generation Z, often described as most susceptible. This study positions line manager mentoring and coaching as a potential buffer against this, drawing on the Job Demands–Resources (JD-R) model, which treats mentoring as a developmental resource that fuels motivation, and social exchange theory, which frames mentoring as an inducement employees feel obligated to repay through effort. The authors also test job insecurity as a boundary condition, since internships are time-limited and often carry uncertain prospects—asking whether that uncertainty changes how much mentoring matters.

Methods

The study surveyed 264 graduate interns in fixed-term programs (12 or 24 months) across South African organizations, recruited via LinkedIn using purposive and snowball sampling. The sample skewed female (61%) and predominantly Black African (70.5%), spanning financial services, government, IT, manufacturing, and retail. Four validated instruments were used: a 12-item mentoring and coaching scale adapted from Helber (2015); the nine-item Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (Schaufeli et al., 2006); an eight-item quiet quitting scale from Anand et al. (2024, one item later dropped for weak fit); and a three-item job insecurity scale adapted from Låstad et al. (2015). After confirmatory factor analysis and a check for common method bias, the authors used the SPSS PROCESS macro to test mediation (Model 4) and moderated mediation (Model 14).

Results

Interns reporting higher-quality mentoring reported lower quiet quitting, both directly and through work engagement. Mentoring and coaching had a significant direct negative association with quiet quitting and a significant positive association with work engagement; work engagement, in turn, was significantly and negatively associated with quiet quitting. Mediation testing confirmed that engagement partially explained mentoring’s effect. The more novel result: job insecurity strengthened rather than weakened this protective pathway. The indirect effect of mentoring on quiet quitting via engagement was significant at all levels of job insecurity but grew stronger as insecurity increased—consistent with the JD-R “boosting hypothesis,” which holds that job resources become more consequential under stress. Mentoring’s protective value appears amplified when interns feel most uncertain about their future, which is the situation most graduate interns face.

Discussion

The authors interpret results through both theories as complementary: JD-R explains why mentoring increases engagement, while social exchange theory explains the psychological mechanism—interns reciprocate quality mentoring with effort. The finding that insecurity strengthens mentoring’s effect runs counter to conservation of resources theory, which predicts effort-conservation under threat; the data instead favor the boosting hypothesis. The cross-sectional design precludes causal claims, self-report measures carry bias risk, and LinkedIn-based recruitment may skew toward socioeconomically privileged interns, limiting generalizability.

Implications for Mentoring Programs

Organizations running internship programs have reason to treat line manager mentoring as core infrastructure rather than an optional extra, particularly in fixed-term or precarious roles. Because interns facing the greatest job insecurity appear most responsive to mentoring’s benefits, training managers in career support, psychosocial support, feedback, and role modeling may be especially valuable during periods of contract uncertainty.

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