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Glite Dictionary
🪖 Army skills 😴 Avoiding work
soldiering

soldiering

8.6
Not doing work someone should do at their job
  • noun
  • /ˈsoʊldʒərɪŋ/
  • UK
translation icon : fugarse del trabajo
  • If you're just soldiering through the tasks, you're not really contributing to the team.

Examples

  • Any form of work except soldiering.

    The Last Valley (1971)

  • We've all done enough soldiering for one long day.

    Gunga Din (1939)

  • Lectures, simulations, social interaction, and a bit of soldiering are standard fare.

    Academic text (1998)

  • He spent the afternoon soldiering instead of working on his project.

  • The team's soldiering during the busy season frustrated their manager.

Synonyms

dereliction
vssoldiering
  • Formal
16 8.4

Not doing a duty you must do

is general avoidance rather than a formally serious neglect
goofing off
vssoldiering
  • Informal
13 7.7

Avoiding work by wasting time on other things

is similar but often implies more deliberate shirking
shirking
vssoldiering
1 6.5

Avoiding work or responsibility

matches this act exactly without extra tone
goldbricking
vssoldiering
  • Archaic
1 9.6

Avoiding work by pretending to be busy

is the same avoidance but without the pretending aspect
goldbrick
vssoldiering
  • Offensive
1 9.6

A person who avoids work by pretending to be busy

focuses on the act rather than the individual who does it
slacking
vssoldiering
  • Informal
6.2

Not doing work or tasks when you should

describes the same avoidance with equal generality

Antonyms

responsibility
∞ 2.7

A duty to do something and answer for what you do

diligence
60 4.1

Careful, steady work that helps you reach a goal

How Idle

malingering
  • Formal
1 9.1
soldiering
  • UK
8.6
slacking
  • Informal
6.2
idleness
8 4.5

Surface Forms

soldiering singular
soldierings plural

Morphology

soldiering = soldier (opaque) = soldier + ing

Although morphologically soldier + -ing, this sense has undergone a semantic shift to mean shirking/avoiding work, so learners knowing 'soldier' will not reliably predict this meaning.

Etymology

Soldiering comes from soldier, which itself comes from the Latin coin solidus meaning 'a coin', because soldiers were paid for their service. A helpful way to remember the meaning 'avoiding work' is to picture someone pretending to be on duty like a soldier but quietly skipping real tasks, so the word can be used informally to mean 'shirking responsibility'.