As a 25-going-on-26 year old woman in her first full-time career position, I can’t help but constantly be aware of the generational differences in the workplace. It seems that the Baby Boomers & Generation X aren’t quite sure how to lead us, as we come in a generation that is fiercely proud, independent, and conscious of our individuality.
Being on the cusp of Generations X and Y, I feel that my friends & I are forerunners in the battle that lies ahead, as the Baby Boomers retire, Generation X becomes senior management, and we struggle in the workplace.
Via WeHeartIt
As a woman, it can be an even harder and more noticeable divide, as the men of our generation and Gen X try to continue the “boy’s club” games, and we still struggle for equality and independence.
I’ve been to etiquette training seminars that told my female colleagues & I we had to wear clothes from Talbots in order to be professional, that our trousers have to hang straight down from our bottoms, and that we can’t have long hair. The idea outfit for us to wear was loose pants, a turtleneck sweater, and a blazer; a fitted cardigan sweater set and pencil skirt was deemed “to sexy and inappropriate.”
This created quite an outrage amongst the women in the group, as you can imagine.
One of the big reasons I love reading Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist is because, as a Generation X-er, she seems quite astute in recognizing the traits & qualities in Generation Y and relating information on how to interact and work with us. Things I’ve noticed, either through her or my own experiences:
♥ Generation Y is preoccupied with their own identity. Why shouldn’t we be, when we grew up with our parents and teachers telling us that we were special, individual snowflakes? As a result, how we express our identity is important. We expect to be able to work in corporate America & have pink hair; to be doctors and have tattoos; to wear fishnets and be librarians. Our generation doesn’t like our personal expression to have to conform to the Baby Boomers expectations.
♥ Generation Y loves their media and won’t be penalized for it. We’re multi-taskers, and we expect to be on Twitter while taking phone calls, checking Facebook while making meetings. More and more reports are coming out in favor of this, too, saying that social media sites help increase our productivity by granting us a way to refresh our brains while we’re working.
♥ I loved when Trunk said that “Generation Y has a lot of great traits, but classic, top-down leadership is not one of them. This is not a surprise: Because gen Y is the great teamwork generation. They did book reports in teams, they went to prom in teams, and they are notorious for quitting jobs in teams.” I read this immediately after reading an email talking about my own initiative (or their perceived lack of), and I couldn’t help but think how much this applied to my own work style, and how someone in Generation X was simply misunderstanding that.
Am I the only one noticing the differences in the workplace? How are you coping with these changes themselves? How dramatic is the changes betwen generations based on where you live? (Here in the Mid-West, it seems more & more drastic all of the time, despite being in the liberal oasis….)
{ 16 comments… read them below or add one }
I cannot agree more. This is in fact the exact reason why I’m pursuing the freelance/temp route with my career (copy editing/proofreading until I go back to school to study design)–I have so much more freedom and I like work so much better. Thanks for posting this!
I’ve noticed the same things you have! Luckily, my GenX boss (he’s in his early forties) pays attention, too, and has even gone to conferences that talk about how the GenY mindset and work ethic are different, but still valid. If he wasn’t so open-minded about it, we would probably clash a lot more.
In short, I got lucky.
I work in the old boy’s network. They tease me about my cherry red hair and I always get the “Look at those SHOES!” comments. Lucky me, everyone around here is all tatted because it’s an industrial setting, so they’re used to people looking sort of… alternative. It’s why I can wear shirts that show off my tattoo and have my nose pierced. In any other job, they’ve asked me to take the piercing out.
As far as social media – they don’t get it… There’s this different work ethic between their generation and ours. I’ve been criticized for being laid back about work (working to live instead of living to work), when my other office counterpart is a beast about how things are done. However, those who might criticize my laid-back attitude are the people who come to me, because it’s easier to get stuff done in a way they need that might be different than the system.
Love that you posted this! I follow/study Gen Y vs. Gen X very closely for my job. We are the empowered/entitled generation – no ceilings, but we expect that performance should be the true measure for reward (optimistic/no ceilings). Gen X on the otherhand – the slacker generation. They graduated during the last economic crisis…watched their parents get laid off, couldn’t find jobs themselves (pessimistic and realistic). An awesome comparison is looking at the antidrug campaigns:
Gen X: This is your brain, this is your brain on drugs…
Gen Y: It’s the magical amount…
It will be interesting to see how Gen Yers’ outlooks change following the recession…especially the younger ones that are going through a similar situation that helped mold Gen X.
Sorry for leaving a novel…I get really excited about this topic. :)
Well as a Gen-Xer…albeit the tail end. I’m seeing this from the other side. Yep, we faced a whole different world, we saw the internet and cell phone be born, you’ve never existed without them. I call Gen-Y the Princess generation and the biggest problem with that is the sense of entitlement that many of the generation feel…not everyone of course, but there’s a huge gap there that must be overcome before Y is ready to take over the world. I wish you luck!
I probably fall in the middle of these two age groups and don’t really identify with the stereotypical work ethics of either, but when I first started working I worked very hard at everything and tried to learn from and respect everyone. I’ve also worked hard to buck the “good old boy” system, which is still disgustingly in place in many businesses.
One unfortunate thing I notice often about people a few years younger than me is that they feel they are ready for financial reward and major success when they have absolutely no work experience to back it up. Paying your dues doesn’t mean being under the thumb of a system, it means taking the time to learn your chosen profession and acknowledging that people with more experience with you are in their positions for a reason and you can actually learn from them, even if you ultimately end up taking things in a new direction, your direction. Which you will. But nothing happens instantaneously, no matter what your mother told you.
A very interesting read! x
I think it really depends on the person to be honest.
My parents, for instance, are pretty cool with everything and use technology in much the same way I do and are quite accepting of peoples fashion choices.
However one job I worked at, where I was managing a team and involved in audit meeting with top clients the MD still used to pat me on the head and call me “his little star”. Nice.
I’ve never worked anywhere that’s proscribed my style choices like you mention, but I’ve often had slightly patronising comments about my hair colours and shoes!
I think it will take a while for the 2 groups to find a happy medium, but I think it will happen (probably in time for generation Z to be writing articles about how behind the times Gen Y are!)
hehe, i never thought of the whole gen x / gen y in the work place, i can see the whole ‘quitting in teams things..’ and the whole team thing too.. but i’ve been more prone to team work (i’m a classic gen xer too) but with the talbots? that’s clearly baby boomers, my generation never, ever wore pant suits to our corporate jobs (albeit in san francisco)
then again, i was reading this article about twitter/facebook, and it’s actually more used by older people, gen-x and above because younger people like to keep things more private… they don’t want thier over protective parents checking what they are saying to their friends on twitter, it’s not a safe (from authority) environment for htem, so they use other platforms… .like skype.
on another yet similar topic, i have noticed about the difference between gen x and gen y (my boyfriend is gen y) is when it comes to going to concerts…
the gen x guy: stands around looking cool and jaded… maybe nodding his head to the music if it’s reeeeally good.
the gen y guy: dancing like a maniac jumping all over the place and yelling… and that’s for the opening band.
Absolutely fantastic post! I suppose there will always be a divide in the workplace along the generation lines. Each influx will come with new, and by the earlier standards, less conservative ideas. I was interested to read about the clothing advice they gave you, I personally think that is rubbish! Women should not have to conform to looking more masculine in order to succeed, and to be honest, if a woman did bring herself down like that, she would pretty much fly under the radar anyhow.
Balance is the most important thing, we should take the advice of the elder generation who were successful, and apply it to our way of thinking and be successful.
@amanda lee – Thanks, Amanda! I’m envious that you’ve gone the temp & freelance route. In many ways, I hope that it could be something I’ll work in to my life at some point…
@Jennifer Nicole – I’m definitely going to start looking in to those conferences… if anything, maybe they’d help the inverse. An early Gen Y’er wanting to know how to communicate with a Gen X’er!
@Birdie – I loved your comment about our generation working to live, and not living to work– it’s very true! At 5 p.m., my work day is done. It’s my time, after that. I, too, tend to hold a laid back work ethic– I work hard, I get my work done, but often at my own pace. It makes some people nervous.
@jordana – It’ll definitely be interesting to see how the younger Gen Y-ers end up… I think us older ones seem to have a good head on our shoulders in many ways, and a realistic optimism. Our economy will get better, through hard work; we’ve got this fantastic new president in office, and we can see how we made that change. Though it’ll be interesting to see if the younger Y’ers keep that optimism and enthusiasm about change or not.
@Pamela Quevedo – Pam, like you, I can see both sides (probably from being the very old end of Gen Y, but having a Gen X sister). The kids below me definitely have a Princess complex, but I love and appreciate that I’m at an age where I lived most of my life without cell phones, the internet, or even lots of cable channels. It puts me at a point where I’m very excited to see how far we’ve come in such a short time, and it makes me excited about the progress we’ve created as a society, even in these simple things.
@Shay – Shay, like you, I actually feel I often fall between the two. I definitely think you have a point about younger people wanting to reap financial rewards before they’ve earned them; it baffles me when high school, young college kids think they’re going to earn loads of cash for doing nothing– I’ve been working my bum off since I was 13, and still don’t expect to reap any financial rewards now that I’m 26. Even with a Master’s.
@Retro Chick – There are definitely exceptions (I see a lot of Gen Y’ers trying to act like the Baby Boomers to succeed), but you’re right about the happy medium. It will be found. It’s just really frustrating to be caught in middle ground of the transition!
@Jennine – Your comment about dancing is too true! I always love to see people dancing & getting in to it, but hate mosh pits. I’d love to see the article on Facebook & Twitter being used by older people… I definitely see the privacy thing though! I know I keep my FB restricted to some degree, mostly because I like to have my personal life private from people I don’t know.
@dapper kid – It’s very reassuring to know that a male found her ideas of female dress as antiquated as we did! The men in the room seemed very encouraging (with the exceptions of one), and we just thought it was ludicrous! You make an excellent point about the generations emulating the strengths from each, while bringing in their own perspectives, too.
I don’t know which generation I belong to, since I am much older than you my dear, but I blatantly lie about my age. I’ve been working in corporate America for years and see so many different types. I have lived “The Office” which is why I can’t watch that show. You keep doing what you’re doing and don’t you EVER shop at Talbots!
Wonderful observations on our generation…. there are so many question marks though that are yet to be filled…what exactly is our true potential after the old stalwarts retire/leave?
Very keen observations, darling!
xoxox,
CC
If anybody is serious about wanting to know more about the differences between the generations, they should read the article at:
http://www.cluteinstitute-onlinejournals.com/PDFs/983.pdf
It is quite insightful into the values of each generation.
A quick note, the feeling or belief of entitlement is what has kept the masses of Black Americans and Hispanic Americans predominantly underpriviledged. Immigrant Blacks/Hispanics (like those from Nigeria, Kenya, Trinidad, or Mexico, Nicaragua, El Salvador, wherever) climb to the top so much faster because they spend most of their time preparing themselves to get into a position of success instead of standing around their whole life demanding what is DUE to them, demanding a job with benefits that they’ve never earned.
There will never be an employer on the face of this earth that comes to you or me or anyone begging us to please take their money for our paycheck for us to go party. Every business boss is out to get the most out of their employees for the least amount of money, period, that’s a fact, take it to the bank, positively think it away as much as you want, it’s the cold truth. Generation Y’ers will be forced to re-evaluate their entitlement perspectives once they hit the streets looking for ways to make their money. Either they change that mindset and start working their way into better pay or they’ll spend their lives as angry people blaming everybody in the world for their own self-made misery.
Another note for emphasis: Barack Obama was not raised believing in the entitlement mentality. He worked his way into the presidency, nobody came to hand it to him on a silver platter. Obama is a Black Immigrant, no Joke. He took nothing for granted but appreciated every opportunity he got and made the best of it to make his best, better and better with every new challenge.
After doing a quick Internet search, I found your post (and the amazing post-posts following) – and I’m coming in about 9 months later!
I’m writing a book for college students called “Brand Yourself! for College Students: How to Use Personal Branding to Get the Job You Want!” (which will be used with speeches I give at universities and colleges over the next several years). The chapter I’m working on now is about how to beat your competition to get the job. (How many job openings for new grads would you say there are in the US for every 100 graduates in their field? Not 100. It’s a tough market out there.)
~Glory Borgeson
http://borgesonconsulting.com
I was in the middle of writing up the stories I’ve heard from corporate managers about the crazy things 20-somethings have done on the job.
The previous posts here discussed more about “style”. The stories I’m being told by corporate managers are more about maturity vs. immaturity (not about style).
Even though I’m a boomer, I’ve always been a “work to live” type of person — very multi-dimensional. I started out as an accountant, but was also involved in many other things (non-profits, sports, cooking, painting, etc.) I liked to switch gears at 5:00. I liked a lot of vacation time (I should’ve lived in Germany – 6 weeks to start?) I also liked a more independent type of living, which I’ve done professionally since 1996 (due to being fired by a dysfunctional boss, but — thank you very much, it forced me into independent work!).
I’m all for Gen-Y-ers having a different style, finding new ways to work that work for them. I’ve always been a proponent of telecommuting, for example. As long as people work like grown-ups and don’t mess it up for everyone else by not getting work done at home, telecommuting can work for many different types of jobs. (Hey, and no driving. That saves tons of time.)
In my findings, the problems with Gen-Y that managers talk about are not about style. For example, regarding clothing, it’s fine if women choose clothes from Express instead of Talbots. Wear patterned tights with a skirt. (I wear sweater sets with fitted — not tight — skirts. Works for me.) However, showing cleavage, belly or back skin, or wearing 1-shoulder tops at the office is not smart. That is not demonstrating a style-choice. That is demonstrating a childish-choice.
Other stories corporate managers tell about working with Gen-Y-ers include using the cell phone for personal calls/texts too much, not calling in when sick, showing up late too often, & not checking in with the team regarding leaving early (and, thus, leaving the team “in the lurch” with extra work).
Your comments/posts about being a woman in the workplace…. ugh. I really hoped that these things would change for your generation. I read recently that Wanda Sykes was in the writer’s room with about, say, 8 writers (half women, half men). One of the women made a suggestion; the men reacted cooly — not really finding it funny. Ten minutes later, one of the guys made the same suggestion, and the rest of the men laughed their heads off. Wanda thought, “What in the world?” A boy’s club was right their in the midst of what seemed like a fair team-oriented group.
I’d like to encourage young women to make note of all the times you are treated unfairly — when you know it’s because of your gender. Write these things down. Think of what your response could have been at the time, to call attention to it right away — to let the man know the words/behavior were unacceptable. The more you write these things down and figure out a response, the more likely you will think of a response immediately when it happens again later. Speak up for yourself! The more women speak up for themselves and don’t accept bad behavior from others, the more likely “the others” will change their behavior for the better. (Also, I’ve also been treated poorly by some women in the workplace. That’s awful, too. More based on jealously and envy than on patronizing….)