For those that missed it, there is an interesting interview with Simon Sinek was released regarding “Millennials in the Workplace”. For those of you that missed this video, click here for the link.
What’s interesting is that there are almost 7.4 million views of the link above, with 62,000 giving a thumbs up and 3,000 giving a thumbs down, and attracting some 3,900 comments. The thumbs up would seem to suggest that there are 95% pro and around 5% against. That’s interesting if you consider millennials are very digitally active. And if you read through the comments there are some pretty heated discussions on millennials.
A quick reminder that Millennials are generally agreed to having been born in the 1981-1997 range, with Gen Z being born after 1998. So Gen Z are likely already undertaking Australian accounting cadetships and intern positions post school. And if the Gen X’ers and Baby Boomers can’t grasp Millennials, then what hope for understanding Gen Z.
If you ask the Millennials, they’d probably say it was the Gen X’ers and Baby Boomers that have put this world into where it is now, including the deluge of plastic that pervades our planet, global warming and all the millions of problems of excess that we are now asking the Millennials to deal with or solve. One of the big questions is going to be what happens when Millennials run the world, or at least Millennials running the workplace?
However, what is probably most interesting in the communication coming from Millennials is that there are dozens of blogs about the issue, and the blogs are still coming. The digital generation works best in their medium of choice, even if the Gen X’ers and Baby Boomers aren’t listening.
Some of the millennials seem to agree they are too involved in social media and mobile devices in general. That dopamine hit that has been likened to the office equivalent of Cocaine. There seems little time to work in between cell phones, texting, internet, and social media.
Certainly there are a quite a few millennials out there that are sick and tired of “millennial bashing” and the comment that “Millennials are Entitled and Lazy”.
And almost a year after the interview, there are still voices from the Millennial world coming out with blogs, such as “Why Millennials can’t stand Simon Sinek’s Viral interview on Millennials”.
With the thought that Millennials are entitled and lazy, there seems the obvious (incorrect) connection that work will be offshored to cheaper labour destinations, where the work ethic is strongly connected to their desire to improve their life. And whilst this might seem an easy though lazy conclusion, it seems more likely that automation is more likely to remove most of this work, and outsourcing is the least of millennial’s problems. It is important that outsourcing doesn’t become the de-facto goto when a culprit is needed.
As the generational shift occurs and more Gen X’ers and Baby Boomers head to retirement or part time work, it is important that more communication must occur with Millennials and Gen Z. The fact is Millennials will have taken over from 2020 onwards. And if comparisons are to be made with other Australian issues which are divided, it involves a respect for each others positions, and a willingness to assist points of views to merge over time.
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