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Its not new news, the effects of Generation Y on the workforce are often not as good as we’d like. GenY has tons of potential; the challenge now is discovering which ancillary benefits, corporate culture, and management style works best for them. As the baby boomer generation retires, GenY is being asked to backfill the shortage, but it has become ever apparent that this generation is very different from the aforementioned. Its like taking a round peg out of the hole and trying to force a square peg back in.
I recently held a lengthy discussion with others over on Brazen Careerist about the issues surrounding GenY (and the bad rep so easily bestowed on them). My initial comments were narrow sighted and after mulling over them more, and receiving additional insight from a professor of mine, Wayne Kirschling, I wanted to write this post as a culmination of these thoughts!
My logic based on Peter Drucker
Having a new found fanship for Peter Drucker, my initial comments on GenY and its relationship with management were as follows.
· Management exists to motivate workers to do work.
· In doing so, management must respect the worker as an individual.
· As individuals, management must change its style and activities in order to cater to each “demand” of individual workers.
· If workers demands are not met, they are de-motivated, do less work, productivity drops, wheels come off.
As an example, a GenY worker might want to play their own music on an IPod or stream it through the internet, through headphones while they work. This generation has been known to be multi-taskers on crack. Existing policies might not allow the use of headphones in the workplace, or listening to any radio or music. While this isn’t a motivator for GenY, it will become a de-motivator once it is not allowed. GenY doesn’t see rules as simply rules and will always ask why.
Theory X, Theory Y Douglas McGregor
This logic of mine, based around Drucker’s thoughts in The Practice of Management, is much like management theory X. Theory X was created by Douglas McGregor, in the 1960’s. Theory X assumes that workers are inherently lazy, will choose to not work if they can, and need to be constantly monitored in order for milestones to be achieved. In my case, I’m assuming that workers will not work unless they are motivated somehow, and by being de-motivated, these workers will essentially revert back to their original selves which Theory X calls laziness.
To be honest, I really don’t have this view of people. I feel like everyone wants to do their best, contribute, be a part of a team, and make their mark on this world. This is what Theory Y is all about; that we are motivated on our own and management acts more as simply a guide to getting work done.
Employee Customer Relationship
I bounced these ideas off of my professor and prayed he had the time to offer me some additional insight which I could use to spur more insight within myself. He presented the idea that employees are essentially internal customers of the company. The company has to present an offering to them so that they will continue working there just like the company must present an offering or value proposition to its customers through their products in order for them to be worthy of purchasing. Summarized points are as follows for the customer relationship.
· Business creates a product around a value proposition that will entice customers to purchase it.
· It is impossible to fulfill the needs of every customer.
· Therefore, not every customer is going to be our customer.
· At the most, business can create products with different value ranges, to reach out to different groups of people. (Luxury line, economy line, early adopters, etc)
· Marketing is used to determine what the customers want.
Applying the same points to the employee relationship as viewed as a customer:
· A business creates a culture and set of benefits that will attract certain people to its workplace.
· If these benefits were created individually there would not be enough resources to satisfy everyone.
· Therefore, not every body will be able to be employed by the business.
· At the most, business can adopt a few management styles to attract and serve a few different groups of people.
· Market research can be used to find out what motivates workers these days, which groups of people would work best in the business, which incentive systems make sense, etc. This research is done to lure more of the right people to the company.
Quick Analysis
In application of these ideas to GenY in the workplace, we must first accept that not every job is a good fit for the typical GenY worker. Business must change, or risk becoming obsolete, but they do not need to change for the sake of changing. This would most likely result in a lot of unhappy workers!
When business is experiencing a high turn-over rate of GenY, then they must step back and look at their offering and change it to accommodate GenY. By doing this, they are viewing GenY as a group of individuals. They will take into account as many individual characteristics as possible, but try to generalize their offering so that it will be large enough to bring in enough people for their current needs.
Unlocking team potential with employee “mix”
I think that it is important to consider the appropriate “mix” of employees and not simply hire people that are exactly the same as each other. This “mix” could only be based on experience but by having some people further away from the norm I think that a team, or business can go further. These people that are different disrupt on a small scale the activities of the business, and can spur change. If everyone is the same, other perspectives and ideas might never enter into the workplace, thus hurting innovation and the product offering. So I would urge you to embrace diversity as a way of disrupting the group in a positive manner to produce better results.
Conclusion
In the coming years, GenY will be replacing the Baby Boomer’s in the workplace. The challenge will be in incorporating GenY soon enough so that a transfer of knowledge may occur before the Baby Boomer’s retire. In doing so, business must realize that GenY brings its own “demands” to management about how they want to do work. These demands must be taken seriously, or else the employee will simply leave.
Some people argue that if the employee does quit a win-win situation is created. The employer will be getting rid of a disruptive person within the company, while the employee will move to a company that has a better offering for him. I would argue that this win-win is actually a lose-lose. The employer needs to be educating their younger generations or risk losing all the intellectual knowledge and procedures found in their retiring workers. That wealth of knowledge will soon be lost.
The employee will lose too because they will job bounce, seemingly never getting indepth knowledge in anything, and risk becoming obsolete because of not being the best at something. Becoming a specialist is key as the global market increases. More and more people around the world are quickly snatching up lower level jobs and if GenY never continues to develop their skills and focus on anything, they will end up becoming another face in the sea.
When necessary, management must change to accommodate GenY. It might be necessary now.
Travis, I agree that (up to a certain point) management should adapt to accommodate employees. Management should seriously consider any reasonable request from an employee.
But don't employees also have a responsibility to adapt to the company and work culture they are employed in? There has to be a line drawn somewhere. Say an employee "demands" to only work 2 hours a week, but still be paid a full salary, should this demand be honored? Or say an employee doesn't want to come in to the office until 2:00 PM, but the office opens for business at 8:00 AM, should this demand be honored? Or an employee wants to come to work in their pajamas, should this demand be honored? Or an employee wants to bring their dog or cat to work, should this demand be honored?
I think the reason people harshly disagreed with Ryan Healy's original post and your subsequent comments is that you had an attitude of "management must honor ALL of Gen Y's demands, no matter what those demands are, or the Gen Y employees will leave and the company will become obsolete". I agree that to a certain extent that management must adapt to their employees. But the other half of that argument is that, to a certain extent, employees must adapt to management.
Jason, yeah I agree with that. There comes a point, like in some of your examples where its just rediculous to be asking some of those things...but with how the world is becoming globalized, and the interconnectivity of everyone, its becoming easier for management to allow certain things.
For instance, the employee could work from home. That way they could have their dog there, work whatever hours they wanted (so long as they were on call for emergency situations) be in their pajamas, and be on salary (despite how many hours they actually work). As long as the work was accomplished, this would be just fine wouldn't it?
I just want management and people to be open minded enough to get creative in meeting expectations of its employees.
Man, it seems like GenY (my generation as well) is a little self centered.
It's not all about an individual. Sometimes the interests of the individual and the company coincide, however what's important in a company is the team dynamic and not the individual. Would we all love to telecommute? Maybe. Would we all want to wake up at 10 and get to work around 11 in our sweatpants? Maybe. Would this work for a team? Maybe. Maybe not.
Yes there is a brain drain when older employees retire, and the company does suffer when that knowledge is not transfered, however GenY is not the panacea that some people are making us out to be. If we decide to leave the company will go on. Just because we leave, it won't become obsolete.
As far as educating/training GenY - it's not the employer's job to train people. It would be nice to do this so that there is continuity when people retire, but the employer is not obliged to *actively* look out for your professional development. GenY needs to take the bull by the horn and just do it themselves.
I don't mean to be overly critical here, but what this *sounds like to me* is "me! me! pay attention to me! hey! I have needs! me! hey! train me! feed me! play with me!" - it's kinda like those tomagochi pets from the 90s :-)
I am not saying that we should bow down to the man, wear the IBM suit (and look like agent Jones from the Matrix) and just be a mindless army of conforming employees - but at the same time management does not need to bend to our most of our whims. Like most things in life - work is a negotiation too.
I think that Travis understands that management can't cater to the all the needs/wants of every employee. He did mention, when you view the employee as a customer that "It is impossible to fulfill the needs of every customer. Therefore, not every customer is going to be our customer."
Management should fufill reasonable requests by the employees. The meaning of reasonable is up for debate, but I think that wanting to work only 2 hours a week is not reasonable. Wearing headphones as you perform solitary work, where safety is not an issue, is a reasonable request.
I would suggest that all managers should read this book - "Why employees don't do what they are supposed to do (and what to do about it)" by Ferdinand F Fournies. It's not specifically aimed at Gen-y, but I think it offers a lot of insights.
I'm happy for GenY to be replacing Baby Boomers. But, not even a mention of GenX...?
This post may sound like another me me me. Its not the intention at all.
I think that a company can look internal and decide what they want from an employee. Then, they can do some personel marketing in order to create a business "offering" (like a product offering, value proposition) to candidates for employement in order to lure those best fitting their business. Not every employee is the right employee but businesses can actively recruit people that fit their business type, style, etc.
If an employee only wants to work 2 hours a day, and you're assuming its because of laziness, then this is Theory X. There may be situations where 2 hours a day works well. You could change the compensation scheme to be task or project based instead of straight hours. A lot of things can be done...if this is how you've decided to run your company then create a environment that attracts those types of people.
A company that educates its employees in my opinion will still be competing in the future, while others that don't wont. However, it might not be important to you, but its important to me, and very valuable. If a company wants to hire someone like me, they can use that as part of their employee offering to lure me in.
@Gen Xer - You guys are already in the workforce. I see you :) just lookin at the workforce as a whole.
Knowledge doesn't need to be transferred from Boomers to Gen Y. That would be absolutely insane. You're skipping an entire level of mid-career employees (young boomers and all of Gen X) in the process. It is much more efficient to transfer a person with more experience into those higher skilled positions. You would only really skip those people if you had a really unique situation.
Good point Lance, and hopefully this has already started happening. I think my comment was based around the belief that many people seem to think new workers should be able to come in green and hit the ground running.
Where I work we often team up a senior guy with a jr guy to accomplish projects using less money, and that seems to be a good way of also helping raise the newer workers to specialized levels more quickly.
"@Gen Xer - You guys are already in the workforce. I see you :) just lookin at the workforce as a whole."
@Travis, are you just not talking about it as a whole? Because I can't tell that you're looking at us, too, when you never mention us.
And Lance's point is right. You shouldn't be getting the Baby Boomers' knowledge. You should be getting mine. Because I'm going to be getting a Baby Boomer's job, and you'll get mine. By the time you get that Boomer's job, you'll need to know something completely different anyhow.
Focus less on learning from the Boomers, and more on learning from Gen X. That doesn't meant that you shouldn't learn from the Boomers. It means that you should actually look at the big picture, and see what your real next steps are.
@Lance - really smart comment.
@KateNonymous - thank you for writing this, it saved me some time because now I don't have to.
@KateNonymous
I think GenY views the workplace as flat and therefore wants to be able to learn from anybody. Everyone else might not feel the same way and shun them for overstepping the chain of command.
We can't assume all businesses have heirarchies organized strictly by age though so I can't agree with statements like GenY must learn from GenX only because in my current situation, there is no GenX.
Likewise, there or businesses where certain generations may excel more than others, and its perfectly likely that in some situations a GenY would be managing or directing a GenX or Baby Boomer...
Looking past generational boundaries, which are arbitrary anyways, can we agree that collaboration and learning within a workforce is beneficial, no matter who it is between?
@Travis: Did your prof have a comment on your final analysis? In one breath you state: "Running A business creates a culture and set of benefits that will attract certain people to its workplace" and "If these benefits were created individually there would not be enough resources to satisfy everyone."
This is chased later by: "When business is experiencing a high turn-over rate of GenY, then they must step back and look at their offering and change it to accommodate GenY."
I know you have a point to make. There are just find so many non sequitors I think it's lost completely.
Also, where do all of the assumptions about Gen Y in the workforce come from?
@Travis, Gen Y may view the workplace as flat, but that doesn't mean it is.
And obviously individual workplaces will vary. That's how the world works. But overall, we're ahead of you. We know a lot, and we've got more experience.
Will some of you manage some of us? Sure. But that's probably not the way it's going to work most of the time, unless you own the business.
@Ricardo - GenY, is a group. ??
@Kate "You shouldn't be getting the Baby Boomers' knowledge. You should be getting mine. Because I'm going to be getting a Baby Boomer's job, and you'll get mine. By the time you get that Boomer's job, you'll need to know something completely different anyhow."
You called me previously on it so I had to bring it up. This statement makes it sound absolute, as if GenX is entitled. Nothing in this world today is this way. I would hope businesses today do not solely promote on experience alone. If you agree, then there is no way you can honestly support your previous opinion. Like you told me, there are too many factors to consider to make a broad statement like that.
@Ricardo - GenY, is a group. ??
@Kate "You shouldn't be getting the Baby Boomers' knowledge. You should be getting mine. Because I'm going to be getting a Baby Boomer's job, and you'll get mine. By the time you get that Boomer's job, you'll need to know something completely different anyhow."
You called me previously on it so I had to bring it up. This statement makes it sound absolute, as if GenX is entitled. Nothing in this world today is this way. I would hope businesses today do not solely promote on experience alone. If you agree, then there is no way you can honestly support your previous opinion. Like you told me, there are too many factors to consider to make a broad statement like that.
@Travis: So are Americans and human beings. ???
And the Rolling Stones.
A business creates a culture and set of benefits that will attract certain people to its workplace. If these benefits were created individually there would not be enough resources to satisfy everyone.
When business is experiencing a high turn-over rate of GenY, then they must step back and look at their offering and change it to accommodate GenY.
GenY is a group.
Example: It is impossible to create 1 car that will satisfy the entire population. Therefore, many different cars are built and geared towards segments of the population (their target markets). If my target market is GenY, and I don't have many GenY customers, I should step back, do some marketing and change my product offering (or in this case my employement offering) so that more GenY will stay.
Whats so non-sequitur about that?
Because the high turn over rate would be attributable to " business culture and set of benefits that will attract certain people to its workplace" that would not include Gen Y (or at a minimum certain individual members of Gen Y possesing characteristics that a business does not want).
So the question is, "why should a business change to accomodate Gen Y?" Your theory assumes that a business wants or needs Gen Y rather than the other way around.
Travis, what if your target market is not GenY?
In previous posts, you made the argument that "management must adapt to GenY's demands, otherwise GenY will leave, and then that company will become obsolete".
This argument assumes companies need GenY to survive - that may or not be true. If the company has competent and creative employees who are Baby Boomers or GenX, then that company does not need GenY to survive.
Obviously, if your target employee is GenY, then you must adapt to their demands. But this wasn't yours (or Ryan's) original point.
"why should a business change to accomodate Gen Y?"
...because they have done research into which characteristics of workers that are valuable and based on that research they know that as a group, GenY fulfills the most of those characteristics out of all the generations. Therefore, they attempt to lure more GenY to their workplace through changing their culture and benefits (their employee offering).
GenY is just the example. You could do this for anything, like wanting to hire more creative people, hands-on type people, bilingual people, etc. Whatever you've identified as key characteristics.
I've stated that I don't believe management should ALWAYS change to accomodate GenY because I don't think that GenY is the perfect fit with every company. If I want to hire a field engineer I don't pick someone that loves being behind a desk all day.
I don't know what research your are referring to, but most of what I've read constitutes wishful thinking and unverified observations than truth.
Anyway, if what you said is in fact true, then Your and Ryan's posts would serve no purpose.
"You called me previously on it so I had to bring it up. This statement makes it sound absolute, as if GenX is entitled. Nothing in this world today is this way."
@Travis, nothing is absolute--as, indeed, you can see in the next comment I made, which immediately precedes this comment by you. There, I said:
"And obviously individual workplaces will vary. That's how the world works. But overall, we're ahead of you. We know a lot, and we've got more experience.
"Will some of you manage some of us? Sure. But that's probably not the way it's going to work most of the time, unless you own the business."
See? The statement is qualified.
"Experience" isn't just the amount of time someone has spent in a job. That would be an extremely limited and inaccurate definition. "Experience" means that a person has achieved things, had accomplishments, applied knowledge over time, etc.
So, yeah, Gen X is more likely to have experience than Gen Y. I have yet to see a member of Gen Y who can do something I can't, simply because he or she is a member of that generation. There are lots of people who can do something I can't because they have specialized knowledge and skills, but that's true at all age levels.
But my original point wasn't that one group is better than another, because everyone has strengths and weaknesses. My point was that your post ignored a large group of people, as if we aren't even here.
Here's the thing: We are here.
This post is meant to present a theory for hiring, and managing workers so that you get the right ones hired and so that they stick around long enough to benefit the company.
GenY is just the example given to identify a group. I could have used GenX but its not as controversial, nor did I think it applied as well to the target audience of this site.
Whether or not my company wants to hire GenY or GenX or fit people or highly creative people or old people, or cheap people, or whatever is irrelevant.
I'm suggesting businesses do some research into what types of qualities they want to hire, then try and generalize that into a group which they can then base their employee offering off of.
If I failed, its because I took advanced math and engineering courses rather than advanced english composition. :)
I agree that it doesn't take into account all situations but I think we should be learning from whoever the next level in our respective organizations are. If your boss or senior level people are all boomers, that's who you'll learn from. If they are all Gen Yers, ditto. Just saying that in most cases, companies are going to look at length, breadth and depth of experience as well as some obvious fit and skill issues.
Many times, it ends up being roughly hierarchical based on age because of these factors, not just on age alone.
If you're Gen Y, you can make all the demands you want. Doesn't mean you're gonna get any of them, if you can't show me solid reasons why you need them. Also, it doesn't stop me from demanding more from you in response to those demands.
TNSTAAFL!
I like the theory in general.
The amount a business will have to adapt will depend in part on how prestigious it is. The top law firms, the top hospitals, the top banks - the competition for open spots there is very intense. These businesses will have little reason to adapt if they can just let the poor-fit Gen Y worker go and wait till the next high performer who will adapt comes along. It is the companies who need staff more who will need to adapt quicker.
@Dr. Pepper -- "As far as educating/training GenY - it's not the employer's job to train people. It would be nice to do this so that there is continuity when people retire, but the employer is not obliged to *actively* look out for your professional development. GenY needs to take the bull by the horn and just do it themselves."
This is a very interesting comment. I think for the most part issues like telecommuting and listening to an iPod while at the office are requests, and us GenX/Yers should deal with the fact that these types of requests won't always be met (disclaimer: as I sit here in a t-shirt and shorts at home, listening to Pandora... heh).
However, I think showing an active interest in an employee's professional development borders on a requirement for my generation; if not because of our so-called gross impatience and ADD minds, then because if you don't show an active interest we can easily find someone who will. If many companies provide tuition reimbursement, training programs, and the ability to relatively easily move around the company, why would we go elsewhere?
I know we're the 'we want it all and we want it now' generation, but I think looking out for your employee's development works out for everyone. I could use my own employer as an example, but GE, Google, and Cerner come to mind as companies who embrace the challenge to develop their young professionals, and as mentioned, that's good for everyone involved.
Great points Kevin!
I just wanted to add in here that I've benefited from tuition reimbursement and training programs. I however view these as options available for the picking. My employer has never *told* me "Go get a degree in X and I will mentor you to achieve your best in Y". I just found out about the benefit, filled out the paperwork and got the tuition benefit. I had to do the legwork. There are also free company seminars that I can take if I want.
In the work environment I didn't have the kind of mentor (or micromanager) that the OP states that GenY wants. tuition reimbursement, training reimbursement and company seminars are just benefits that employees get as part of their working at a particular company. When I look for jobs I pay close attention to those benefits. My bosses and supervisors could care less what I do on my spare time because the benefits I draw upon are company wide rather than department specific. It seems to me that the attention craved here is at the micro level, not the macro level (i.e. tuition reimbursement).
I may be wrong - but that's my interpretation :-)
Good comments guys,
Personality and passion, is there any correlation? I think there is.
I'm thinking big picture and putting these things together in my post. I'm imagining a company that hires not only on technical skillset, accomplishment, experience, but also personality and passion. I think personality is what is so hard to manage and passion cannot be taught whereas book smarts can.
I think that a group of people that are passionate about something have more respect for each other, and get along better because of the shared common ground. The passion might also lead to similar traits. Like pro bodybuilders and type-a personalities.
This is the vision of the employee as the customer point of view for hiring and maintaining a workforce through proper management. You can create a workforce that is similar enough to be able to manage under one or two styles, but different enough to allow disruptive creativity and innovation. You can attract those people through marketing.
"I think that a group of people that are passionate about something have more respect for each other, and get along better because of the shared common ground. The passion might also lead to similar traits. Like pro bodybuilders and type-a personalities."
It can also lead to greater competition, which may or may not benefit the larger organization. What about when people who are passionate about something start to fight about whose turf is being stepped on? I care more than you! No, I care more than you!
Plus I have the feeling that you're going for something closer to "charisma," rather than "personality." The latter has a much broader meaning.
I definitely agree with the point made about playing music & listening to headphones! I feel like I can hardly do anything without music of some kind on, even if it's just classical. I just recently graduated from college and was apprehensive about the transition to 'real life.' I got lucky last semester when I learned about OneCubicle.com through a career fair at school. Their job postings are geared specifically at new grads and young professionals. I found the site quite different from other job search sites. I got my current internship through OneCubicle, and I even get to listen to headphones at work!
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