Being stuck on an airplane with a lack of reading material led me to Sky Magazine with Katy Perry on the cover with a big caption about "Millennials". The folks formerly known as "Generation Y" have new book written about them and there was an excript from the book in the magazine. If I remember correctly is was called "Generation M: How Millennials are Rocking the Workplace" and was written by two people who claim to be experts and looked old enough have spawned a Millennial or two who are probably attempting to rock the workplace as you read this. The parameters for being a Millennial is being born somewhere between the early 1980s and the early 21st century.
The article itself was interesting in that it was horribly insulting to this group, but tried to pass it off as "this is how these people are, and we must adapt to deal with them". Amidst the many adjectives like "smart" and "savvy" the message of the article was clear: this group is spoiled and feels entitled.
But is this true?
Of course not! It's idiocy to lump everyone born inside of twenty years off each other like this. I'm part of Generation X. The only thing be all have in common is a ability to eat cereal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Yes, there are morons out there who have been spoiled and feel entitled, and there is a culture of entitlement and victimhood that is currently annoying the hell out of a lot of people. However, there's also quite a few of these Millenials that know the value of paying their dues and putting in a hard days work.
According to that article Millennals have voice that must be heard. They want to know what they do matters. They need meaning. They want a gold star on their sticker chart. This is obviously stupid. There's a whole lot of folks just happy to be working right now and there's plenty who wish they were. The hell with gold stars and meaning, they want a paycheck. And I'm not saying that employers should just discount their opinions, but obviously the opinions of those with more experience are going to weight a bit more. The workplace is not going to just adapt to suit anyone. If there is going to be a change in how a business performs its going to be due to necessity and monetary motivation. Yes that includes making the workplace more compatible with the employees because that increases production.
And of course it brings up those "helicopter parents" because there's no reason why they shouldn't be involved in every aspect of their children's live including help negotiate for benefits with a company. OK, if your kid is in their twenties and possessing all their mental facilities and you need to hold their hand when dealing with the management of the company they work for, there's something fundamentally wrong. As a parent your job is to simultaneously protect your child while teaching them how to successfully survive out on their own. You have about 18 years to do this. This molly-coddling of of kids is what led to that Healthcare screw job in cluding kids being able to stay on their parents insurance until they are 26. That is not helping them.
Yeah, I've seen some of these punks who feel they're entitled to things. I've seen guys wanting to get paid by the day instead of waiting until Friday so that boss can actually bill for the work done and keep his checkbook in order. They're not the norm. If they are, they flee from my presence. The people I know in that age group work hard and many of them in jobs they don't particularly like.
So here's my question to the "Millennials": You're considered spoiled, entitled, and are expected to behave as if under the belief that you are a special little snowflake in the center of your personal universe, you gonna take that shit?
Prove those experts wrong. I dare all of you.
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