Are you a 'personality hire'? The internet is convinced that slackers with soft skills are still critical to the office ecosystem.

The term refers to an employee beloved for bringing a positive attitude to work — usually to compensate for a lack of productivity.

• 'Personality hires,' employees who excel in interpersonal dynamics, are being celebrated on TikTok.
• Even those who can't relate say it's a valuable quality in their colleagues.
• One 22-year-old creator went viral encouraging Gen Z to be more 'playful' at work.

Corporate workers are discovering whether or not they're "personality hires" as the term has gained steam on social media in recent weeks.

Bella Rose Mortel, a 22-year-old social media strategist at newsletter platform Beehiiv, went viral this week labeling herself a personality hire, and suggesting that other Gen Zers might embrace a more "playful" attitude at work.

The term "personality hire" refers to an employee beloved for bringing a positive attitude and seamless interpersonal skills to the office — usually to compensate for a lack of hard skills or productivity.

In a viral skit with 6.2 million views shared last month by the creator @viennaayla, two coworkers stress over a looming deadline, whereupon the personality hire arrives to work late and offers to call the CEO, who promptly offers her an extension — and a lunch invitation.

Even those who couldn't identify cheered the group as being essential to the office ecosystem.

"The personality hire is also the client whisperer," one top commenter, with 12,500 upvotes, wrote. "Omg I may have been the personality hire at several jobs," another viewer added. "I once went shopping with my boss' wife. Mid work day."

"I'm the opposite of a personality hire," a third commenter wrote. "I'm unapproachable but I get stuff done lol."

In her series of TikToks, Mortel suggested Gen Z viewers might lean into a more playful approach at work. She said she interacts with her managers by using slang terms like "Hey king, "Slay," and "Y'all ate." (Being a startup, she acknowledged to Business Insider her workplace is a bit more lax than most. She also said she built rapport with her manager first, and now he's even started to reciprocate, greeting her with, "Hey queen.")

In another video, Mortel emerged from a meeting where a 48-hour deadline was set wondering why everyone had been so serious. "Why didn't we hang out longer? Why didn't we laugh enough?" she said in the video, which has 373,000 views.

"Another reason I know I'm not old enough to be in the workforce," she said.

"Being a personality hire is tough work but someone's gotta do it," the TikTok account for Microsoft 365 commented. (Mortel insisted to BI she brings a solid skillset to the table in addition to good vibes.)

After the video blew up, she shared it with her manager, who thought the whole thing was hilarious. "In a team call yesterday, he was like, 'Before we get started, Bella Rose, do you want to set the vibes today for our call?'"

"A lot of my previous managers have told me that they really like the energy I bring," she said, "and that's the nicest compliment I could ever get in my whole life."