There's a new breed of worker upon us these days. Colleges and Universities have emptied out for the summer, many of these students have graduated and are about to begin banging on your door looking for work. But there are some things you need to know before you hire them and train them.
The way the new breed of today's workers operate is completely different than from a generation ago. The new generation entering the workforce do not have the same values as the baby-boomer's leaving the workforce. They don't have the same values, appreciation, loyalty, social skills or even work ethic as those who are close to retirement today. So why then, are you using the same training techniques you used years ago?
What worked for the last generation is lost on today's generation. If the new workers aren't even on the same page as the old workers, forget about training them the same way. They don't respond to the same stimuli, the same perks, dress-code or even calling people by Mr. or Mrs. They don't know (or even care about) your last name unless it's written on your office door. They know you by your first name and will call you that. Even Grade 1 students call their friends' parents by their first names. Visit a schoolyard and see what I mean.
Whining about today's generation doesn't fix the difference in the generations. It just makes you look old to the new generation of workers. Training them the same way you trained "lifers" who are retiring now is a complete and utter waste of your money. You don't have that kind of money to throw around.
Today's generation of workers is better-versed in soft-skills training. This is the group of workers whose parents had "Oprah" on in the afternoon and chatted about it over supper. This is the generation of worker who has never seen, let alone can comprehend, corporal punishment in the school system nor will they respond well to threats. This is the same generation who got moved ahead in school for fear that a failing grade might affect their self-esteem. It is a new generation of worker out there. And employers and bosses who want to get the best of the best of this generation better understand what and how they think.
Piercings, tattoos, earings and shaved heads used to be thought of for bikers. But have a look at the colleges and universities these days. This is the new "norm." Today's worker has fewer social skills face-to-face and a greater propensity for using computers, text messaging, cell phones and working alone. Don't even think of trying to appeal to these people with the age-old technical training programs of the past.
The new worker is "self-centered." That is not a bad thing unless you want to count them as nothing more than a number. But if you want the new worker to get you results, you had better be prepared to train them in the soft skills first and let them bring the newly-acquired soft skills across to the technical aspects of work.
For their whole lives, they've been getting things done alone - or at least it seems that way. They know how to use technology at mind-dizzying speeds. This is the video-game playing, MTV-watching, text-messaging, You-Tubing, MSN'ing and skater generation. They bring something to the table you've probably never seen before. Their values are different but their ability is not. They just may do the job differently. Don't try to train them the same way as you've done in past and don't try to make them fit into a tidy little package. They don't work that way.
Respect their talents - because you probably don't have them.
2 comments:
Great piece Kevin. I am part of the generation to which you refer and thus wanted to build on your comment.
I think your writing can actually expand past the converastion of "training" and to pure work design. I'd say that the fact you're still writing this as a "Boss Tip" speaks volumes. In part, I'd say that my generation is not only discontent with how training works, but how organizations as wholes work.
There's something here around removing the boss all together. Why exactly do I have a boss to tell me how to be trained? Can I not set my own learning goals and how I will action these? Can my team not support me in my development and help me be co-accountable for it?
In other words, I wonder if the new worker is, as you put it, self-centered or if in actuality, that new worker is only self-centered when looking at him/her through the lens of the "old" worker? In my opinion, I'd say that the new worker is actually less self-centered, less superficial, less dissociative, and more interested in authentic collaboration (don't think I need to point out places like Google, Craiglist, all the open-source stuff, etc... so there are tons of embryos of change taking place, they're just sometimes tought to spot).
Blah... digressing. All right, where I was going with this is that "bosses" need not only better understanding the new generation of workers, but also work to better understand the types or organizational settings in which this new breed of workers performs most effectively, with the highest possible joy in the workplace.
My two cents.
Dan
While doing research for my previous employer on "Employee Retention", I noticed most of the articles turning up were about the different generations. I'm not sure if you intentionally skipped Generation-X or not, but that's what I am (on the Gen-Y cusp to be precice). My generation has been in the Baby Boomers workforce for a while but unfortunately, we've had to play by their rules as well. In return, I think our generation has not been able to define the workplace to conform itself to our values, let alone be prepared for the values of the next generation. Don't we all recognize that none of our generations got it all "right", but that each generation has something new to give. Unfortunately it is also a product of the baby boomer generation (learned from the traditionalist generation), that someone at some point invented the right way of doing something, and you are only messing with that to try to figure out a better way. I'm sure some even believe that all the best things to be invented, have already been invented. Don't forget that after the industrial revolution, many thought they were at the highest state of evolution.
Can you imagine that some workplaces are now even paying for their employees to take naps at work? The first two generations (Trad. & Boom) are rolling their eyes or rolling over in their graves about this I am sure. And yet the last 2 generations (in the work force)Gen-X&Y are yawning a sigh of relief that companies are actually looking at what research has long told us. Our generations just want to do it "our" way, just like the ones before us. So what, we don't want to work 40 hours a week. Does it really matter if we take a pause to play some game for 15 minutes, if that pause gives us the renewal we need to get the job done with an hour at the end of the day to spare?
We don't just need to change the workplace, but change how we view work in general. The new generations are much more concerned with the life-work balance. And what if we believe that "work" as we know it, is not a necessary part of life that. I think we believe that work is a small part of life, and that to be consumers, we have to work, but to live, we do not.
Thanks for bringing up these importants topics.
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