TikTok's 'anti-work girlboss' is going viral advocating for people to get 'lazy girl jobs'

• Gabrielle Judge was really burnt out in her last job, so she quit and got a "lazy girl job."
• Now she coaches her 113,000 followers on how to do the same, and told Insider about it.
• The idea is to stop thinking of a job as an identity, and be clear what you want out of it, she said.

In the spring of 2021, Gabrielle Judge suffered a concussion. She was already really burnt out in her consulting job and felt she couldn't get ahead. So she quit, and found "a lazy girl job" instead.

Now, Judge coaches her 113,000 TikTok followers on how to do the same.

Judge told Insider her aim was to transform how people think about work. "It's not your source of self-identification or happiness or anything like that," she said.

Judge is 26, on the cusp of being a Gen-Zer or a millennial, so she understands what it's like to be judged for your career goals, and assumptions about how hard you're working to achieve them.

With her Lazy Girl Job Program she hopes to show how people stuck in careers they hate can find well paying roles that are low-effort enough so they still have energy to invest into the things they really care about.

"I'm just trying to challenge people to understand life can happen outside of work," she said.

When she was in college, Judge was told never to have career gaps and to avoid job-hopping. When she started working full time in 2019, she stuck with those values because it was the norm.

But then the pandemic, and working from home, happened, followed by the Great Resignation, and the rise of "quiet quitting," as people started to feel considerably less loyal to employers.

"We're definitely seeing a shift," Judge said she thought at the time. "The power was more in the employee's hands."

A "lazy girl job" can be many things. It can mean a switch to a role where you can log off at 5 p.m., with time in the evening for side hustles.

It could mean fewer hours overall, or it could be finding something much less demanding, leaving energy to invest in relationships, part-time study, or hobbies.

"I want people to understand that they have autonomy in their work," Judge said. "I want people to understand that they deserve flexibility and remote working if they choose to do that."

The "lazy girl job" has become a philosophy, both for Judge, and for dozens of others who were inspired by her.

The #lazygirljob hashtag on TikTok currently has over 9 million views, tapping into both widespread employment disillusionment and the "lazy girl" persona currently popular on social media.

One creator, for example, said her lazy girl job was to "copy and paste the same emails," make three or four calls per day, take as many breaks as she wants, still in exchange for "a nice salary."

Another said she was paid a "bomb salary" to "talk to no one, take breaks whenever I want, and be the office baddie." (Nobody disclosed the actual amount they were paid.)

Judge said she tries to make videos from an employee perspective. The internet has been flooded by career coaches and experts giving advice on impressing bosses: tips for resumes or how to sparkle in an interview, Judge said.

But now people have got the message.

"I'm trying to make it more centered around the employee because it's their experience and it's their life," she said. "So I try to be like, hey, this is how you figure out if you're going to have a toxic manager or not at your next job."

In practical terms, Judge thinks more people are going to avoid corporate America, and embrace freelancing, where four-day weeks and remote working are normalized. Judge said she knows freelancing is hard, especially when it comes to taxes. But she thinks it may become necessary with AI threatening certain jobs, and people more eager to prioritize their own comfort and safety.

Judge does get some heat for her content from people who think she's literally promoting laziness. She also appreciates that it can be harder for women and marginalized communities to adopt the "lazy girl" mentality, due to how much harder it is for them to be successful in many fields.

"If I can at least get someone to think about why they think the things that they do, great," she said. "They don't have to agree with me. I really just want to challenge the status quo when it comes to our relationship with work as a whole."

Her message is also not about stopping work altogether, or "being a jerk."

"I believe if you want to go full force in something, it should be for yourself. It shouldn't be for another person's company," she said. "Don't go all in and work overtime and stuff like that if it's for someone else's dream."