token effort
Half-hearted attempt made
A token effort is a minimal or symbolic attempt at something, made more for appearance than genuine impact.
The effort satisfies a formal requirement or deflects criticism without seriously addressing the underlying issue: The company's diversity initiative was a token effort—one workshop and nothing else.
The implication is that real commitment would require more.
- halfheartedLacking sincere commitment
- perfunctoryDone with minimal effort
- gestureCommunicative body movement
- symbolicRepresenting through signs
- minimalSmallest amount needed
bare bones · lackluster · insincere · going through the motions · going through motions · checkbox · lip service · bare minimum · hollow · superficial · obligatory · cursory · pretense · half measure · phoning it in · feeble · weak · show
- Empty Gestureslip service, crocodile tears, empty promise, going through motions, rubber stamp
- shoddinessslipshod, slapdash, hack job, botch job, botch
- half-heartednesslukewarmness, tepidness, unenthusiasm, going through motions
- half-measuresband-aid, lip service, stopgap, quick fix, half-step
- shortcomingsdeficient, inadequate, lacking, inferior, subpar
token effortmaximum effort
going all in · pulling out all the stops · going the extra mile
token efforttrue devotion
token, effort, tokens, tokenism, tokenistic, efforts, effortless, effortlessly, effortful