I’m continually amazed by the willingness of businesses to pay speakers and consultants to tell them how different the new generation of workers is. The money might be better spent by setting it on fire to light cigars, or better yet, send it to me.
I recently re-read a well written article from a major trade publication advising me that the new generation of workers are a lot of entitled whiners with a poor work ethic and no sense of loyalty.
I was then advised that I’d better figure out how to harness the immense potential of this group by providing a cake and parade every time they managed to get to work without wetting the bed, and help them self-actualize if I was to remain competitive in the war for talent. This new generation is completely different than anything the world has ever seen come before.
Common advice — to be sure. However, the publish date for this article was April 1994.
Yep, that’s right. The middle-aged managers that are tearing (what’s left of) their hair out over managing the Millennial generation were once that sad lot themselves.
What happened to this disruptive generation of 20 years ago that was going to revolutionize the way we work?
Two things: Kids and mortgages.
The radical kids of the 90s were assimilated by the big industrial machine. Resistance was futile. Their own distinctiveness was added to our own.
We shouldn’t be surprised. About 2500 years ago, some guy named Socrates lamented the work ethic of the new generation, and how different their values were than anything that came before it.
This is not to imply that a very real generation gap doesn’t exist. Nor do I dispute that the nature of work isn’t evolving as society and technology changes. I just don’t see the value in paying $5000 for a keynote speech about how “kids today” are so much different.
In a few years, one of these Millennials is going to hire a speaker to come in sort out the issues she has with this new generation (called 21ers – for those born in the 21st century), who she perceives as a lot of entitled whiners with a poor work ethic and no sense of loyalty, because it’s completely different than anything we’ve seen before, and will completely change the way we work.
Remember… you heard it here first.