Gen Z, please talk to me: what management works and what does not?
Gen Z, please talk to me: what management works and what does not?
I am an Xer who manages a small but crucial team at my workplace (in an EU country). I had a lady resign last week, and I have another who may be about to resign or I may have to let go due to low engagement. They are both Gen Z. Today it hit me: the five years I've been managing this department, the only people I've lost have been from Gen Z. Clearly I do not know how to manage Gen Z so that they are happy working here. What can I do? I want them to be as happy as my Millennial team members. One detail that might matter is that my team is spread over three European cities.
Happy to provide any clarification if anyone wants it.
Edit. Thanks for all the answers even if a few of them are difficult to hear (and a few were oddly angry?) This has been very helpful for me, much more so than it probably would have been at the Old Place.
Also the second lady I mentioned who might quit or I might have to let go? She quit the day after I posted this giving a week's notice yesterday. My team is fully supportive, but it's going to be a rough couple of months.
I'm a millennial but have insight. Think about the 90s. Didn't even have MapQuest yet. No cell phones.
Okay, now you're at work, and your sister miscarries her pregnancy. When do you discover this? 6pm? 8pm? Later that week?
Gen Z finds out between customers. Or emails.
In the idle time you used to spend daydreaming about your girlfriend or lackthereof, gen Z is learning about wildfires that will reduce their air quality. They're googling rent worldwide to figure out if it's time to seriously consider moving somewhere cheaper and colder.
What am I getting at?
We as a society get ever more connected. We are therefore ever less present from our 9-5. There is so much going on that is relevant to us, and an 8 hour chunk of my day is really asking too much to sacrifice.
If your employees are at a computer, let tell them outright it's totally okay to watch Netflix or YouTube, or reddit, or lemmy, whatever as long as the work is getting done on time.
If your employees are serving customers, let them take frequent 10 minute breaks to use their phone or be away from humans.
Let them know you understand they have WAY more going on in their lives than your job which barely pays bills. Then, act that way.
But also, gen Z knows that no one gives raises like new bosses. So, don't expect them to stick around long.
I think I'm suited to answer this. I manage multiple people, including Gen Z. I am also Gen Z. People are actively trying to work here.
One of the biggest factors is employee appreciation and respect. A lot of companies will half-ass that front through just giving their employees an occasional pizza party. The problem with that style of management, is that it removes the human aspect. It kind of just turns it into another thing to just "check off the list" for corporate. It's something commonly thrown back at employees who complain. We've seen that happen enough to not want to deal with it.
It's also important to focus on the little things. Small details are what make up the big picture. If you leave those out, the big picture will be incomplete. Congratulate them when they reach a new goal. Tell them when they do work that would make the company proud, within reason. Encourage them, and actually work alongside them sometimes. If you want to throw free food on top, maybe poll your staff for their opinions on restaurants/food trucks. Show them you care.
Regarding the human aspect, a happy employee stays, and a happy employee is also usually a productive employee. Get to know your staff a bit, casually. Try to give reasonable allowances for time off during stressful life situations, like when their home floods or their sibling dies. Most companies will only allow the legal minimum.
Don't expect more from them than what you are willing to do yourself.
Accept their imperfections and work with them towards improvement. Instead of shouting, go straight towards the solution, and include them in the process. Allow them to learn how to avoid the mistake and learn how to fix it with you. Don't baby step it, but maybe show them a cool trick for that process if you have one. Remember that they are human and that there was also a time where you didn't know how to do it.
I'll be frank with you. Many of us don't see a great future over the horizon, so we're kind of making the best with what we have. We want to enjoy as much of the time in-between as we can. We've seen our grandparents, parents, siblings, and other family members become burnt out and emotionally overwhelmed, and we don't want that for ourselves.
The best way to not have that, is to not go along with it. So, hypothetically, I would go to the next job that treats it's employees well, even if the wage is the same. Why would I waste my efforts and hard labor on someone who doesn't value it? Why not spend it somewhere where I can learn, improve, and thrive?
One thing to keep in mind is that they're young and have fewer responsibilities than Millennials and Xers and can afford to float between jobs. I'm not saying all GenZers, but there are ones that still get some form of assistance from their parents and thereby have a safety net. As they age and start families, they may be less inclined to do so.
Also, maybe they're not being paid enough to want to stay and feel they can leverage the experience at your workplace to get a better paying position elsewhere.
Just my thoughts, I'm no expert.
Gen Z software engineer here. From what I can tell my generation doesn't care that much about company loyalty and all of that jazz. That's true for me as well. Companies have a soulless aspect to them. I can't put my soul into that. If another place is willing to throw more money at me, I will take it. Sure, if my workplace is extra nice I will think twice about it, but most of the time it isn't.
Then there's the lack of investment in the younger folks on the part of the company. No mentorship programs, a lack of workshops, etc. Our input isn't taken into account and is often overlooked. That's not the right way to show young people that you care about them or their future. In turn they won't care about you or your company's future.
Also the fact that people tend to bring their politics to work is a big problem for me. This is especially true with the boomers in the company. They love to stroke their right-wing, often bigoted political opinions in front of us at work. Mostly in the form of complaining about whatever they saw today on Instagram or Facebook. Now this isn't inherently a problem that can be brought up with HR, mostly because they do it in a subtle and veiled enough manner that there's not much you can do about it. But I'd say that personal politics is another big factor for me. It makes me not care that much about the workplace/company as a whole.
I would ask her directly, say that you want to know why you lose gen z workers.
Just remember that they're still early in their careers, changing jobs is about the only way to get a raise these days.
Generations aren't a monolith. It's reductive to say "these people are leaving because they're from a different generation."
The best thing you can do is perform an exit interview and ask them why they decided to move on. If they're good people they'll give you an honest answer.
And remember, young people in the workforce now have had adults in their lives who were likely laid off during the 2008 financial crisis. Those adults were, correctly, teaching their children that companies are not loyal to their employees, so do not be loyal to your company.
They are probably leaving for more pay, better benefits, or a promotion of some kind. The only way you'll know for certain is if you ask.
What do you mean by low engagement? Are they not doing their work in their given hours?
I'm a millennial but I imagine it's the same issue.
Work isn't something I want to do. It's something I have to do to for money. If someone offers me more money I'm going to take it.
So first thing to check is are they just leaving for better pay. If so paying them more is basically your only option.
In my industry (software development) the average length at a job for younger people is two years because it's the only way to get a decent pay rise in many cases.
The idea of loyalty to a company is dying a quick death.
If it's not that the only to find out is to talk to them. Ask them if they're willing to do an exit interview and see if there's anything you can improve on.
Some people here are posting with rather wishful thinking. I think the most cost-effective actionable advice I can give is that Zoomers don't buy into the whole "we're a family here" thing. They understand that their success and their company's success are not necessarily correlated. You can act on this by expressing an interest in your team's improvements on the basis of the personal goals they've achieved rather than with corporate metrics.
I often feel like my supervisors don't respect my input or my time. I work in IT, our business is solving problems efficiently. Yet when I pitch ways to improve our methods, or when I call out dumb decisions, I get ignored.
On multiple occasions in the past couple years, my immediate supervisor has made bad calls that would lead to unnecessary work for me and my team. I point this out to him, and I am ignored. Last summer, we wasted a couple days fixing computers after an unnecessary BIOS update kept them from loading Windows. We also spent a whole day installing a firmware update on a new shipment of monitors, this update was to fix compatibility with the Mac Studio - we don't use the Mac Studio at my work.
Stop trying to be their friend or do anything outside of office hours. 99.9% of people are not at the workplace out of free will because whatever it is you're doing is what they want to spend the next 40 years of their lives doing exclusively.
As others have said, fight for more pay and benefits and fuck everything else. Which may not be easy in your position which I assume is middle management. Most of us footmen are very much aware of how you guys are essentially just used as the fall guys for all kinds of bad news from above, and that you have little leeway in making such decisions at your level.
My baby boy, I’m so glad I get to share what’s worked for me.
My younger peeps seem to thrive on mentorship and coaching. If you don’t already do 1-on-1s (even just meeting every 2 weeks), I recommend starting.
During that time, ask each person what their honest career goals are (even if they involve working elsewhere) and then help them gain the skills they’ll need to achieve those career goals. It’s their responsibility to do the work, but you’re the one helping them stay on track towards the things in their life that matter to them.
I’ve helped folks with all sorts of things from time-management to negotiation to coding to project management.
A tool I’ve found invaluable is the book “FYI: For Your Improvement”. It’s basically a manual for helping improve soft skills. I recommend getting an older version that’s cheaper.
Using this philosophy, I’ve only had folks leave my teams because of pay (which is something I don’t control and am constantly in contention with my company about). I’m still in contact with most who’ve left and one if my former peeps even got me a new job one time.
First of all, let me say this - You are better than 99% of managers out there because you are asking yourself these questions. It means you are wise enough to acknowledge shortcomings and mature enough to seek help. So thank you. I wish more people had your worth ethic. You are probably a cool manager, and those are hard to come by these days.
Are you conducting exit interviews? I know it seems pointless, since they have likely already taken other jobs and it's too late to try and entice them back with a deal, but it does provide some context as to why they are leaving the company. They've got a new gig lined up, so they don't need to pull any punches. You will tend to get honest answers.
No, you don't know how to manage genZ (or any other cohort) because that's not a fucking thing.
Start here:
Fight to pay them more. Period. This should be at the top of your daily to-do list. Your team is the reason you have a job, and they're the reason your shareholders live such splendid lives. So, you want to keep your position(s) of benefit & security? Then never stop fighting for worker's pay & benefit INCREASES. It is really hard to care about management, production (or shareholders 🙄) when you can't take care of yourself or your family.
Curate a safe, work-focused environment that supports the life-cycle of a product that actually solves current, real-world problems like - global warming, profiteering, equality, etc.
Stop managing and learn how to lead.
Leaders:
Know how to say, "I don't know."
Show / do by example
Share knowledge
Support and foster knowledge sharing.
Shut their goddamn mouths and trust their teams to succeed (that's why you hired them in the first place right?) and when the team/member falls short of PREVIOUSLY AGREED UPON goals you work together to address the extenuating circumstance(s).
Every company's greatest asset and product is the verve, innovation, and vision of its employees. Squash, or worse, fail to invest in any of these aspects of your workforce and the human beings you're trying to "manage" will "manage" themselves into better working conditions elsewhere.
In addition to the wealth of experiences and opinions in this thread, it is worth reminding:
2 is a really small sample size
I am not one but I am manage two. So far I have yet to see any real difference. They were like me when I was that age.
It is cynical but you have to be cynical. Everyone has basic drives. Find what it is and give it to them. One of mine is driven by praise, I praise him when he does good work. The other one is driven by achieving variety, he wants to touch on a thousand things, so I move him around.
Have you tired asking them? When you sit down with the employees to discuss performance the conversation should be two way. You tell them what you expect and how they are doing while they tell you what they expect and how you are doing. Maybe what they want is unreasonable but you won't know that until they tell you.
Have you asked these unhappy employees? You’ll probably get a more helpful answer if it comes from somebody familiar with the specifics of your job / company. If you’re not doing exit interviews (or not setting a tone where they feel they can be honest in the exit interview), you’re doing yourself a disfavor.
This post seems ridiculous to me. If you would like to know why your employees are unhappy then why would you ask random strangers on the internet why they are leaving your company? If your (or anyone's) workplace culture discourages employees to air grievances then you aren't entitled to know why they would like to switch companies. Most likely, I think that young people don't wish to be percieved or talked about as whiny (or any other words you can use), in the event that they raise issues which management or colleagues view as unimportant or inconsequential for the company. I'm also curious as to how you know that your Millennial team members are happy, as opposed to working just because they need the money and don't see better opportunities elsewhere.
Perhaps you got hung up on that whole "Generations"-Thing. Generations cannot be defined by common attributes as easily as it might seem. Perhaps the explanation is less the "generation" but more the age of the people? Younger people are more likely to quit a job because they have less responsibilities that would keep them from doing so if they start to dislike their current job. Gen X/Millenials are now all in prime family-establishing age and thus more likely to prioritize job security over job excitement. Younger people might weigh this differently and switch around to try other companies/other fields.
Were they being paid at a similar level to their generally older, more experienced co-workers?
While there certainly could be a wide variety of possibilities, age as a factor has a correlation with so many different things, it's wise to narrow it down a little bit by eliminating the most obvious possibilities. Financial compensation is an extremely easy first one to consider, as a factor.
I can tell you why I'm quitting. I'm a millennial. I generally loved the people I work with. I like the work environment. Or I did. We have several old timers quitting right now. The attrition rate is through the roof. Retirement is upon a lot of the old guys and they're leaving either for better jobs or for ones that are less stressful if they aren't retiring. The younger ones (millennials and gen z) don't see the point in sticking around if the older cohort leaves and take their knowledge with them. There's no one to train us, and worse still, changes to the way that my worksite is managed make staying untenable. We don't want to be left holding the bag so to speak. Blamed for low productivity after the older guys are all gone and the knowledge gap becomes more apparent. We aren't really paid well enough, and we don't see the kind of COLA adjustments we should.
Additionally, there is a shortage of us, we have expenses on tools and so on that add up and the company I work for doesn't manage slow times and busy times. So I can't even count on overtime. Sometimes it's mandatory. Sometimes it's nowhere to be found.
I have brought up multiple issues with safety and legal responsibility and been told by my manager that they need to think about it - repeatedly. I feel like my concerns aren't being addressed. I want a good home/work balance. I spend 10 hours or more a day at work, and sometimes that's 4 days a week sometimes it's 7.
Worrying and stress are a big part of why I am leaving. I don't want to be worried or stressed all the time. I don't want to think about work outside of work.
You sound like a good boss who is engaged in the development of your employees. That's good. But sometimes it's just that we often take jobs because we have to, not because we want to. And when something better comes along we feel like we have to take the chance.
Treat them as normal understand them listen to them you should be good
My company has struggled with this too. We’ve lost all the Zs we’ve hired within the first few months, and we were deliberately trying to mentor them so they could gain the professional skills they were very clearly lacking on hiring. I invested so much of my time training them on how to write an email, how to write a document using complete sentences, how to proofread a document, and how to be in a meeting (4 different Zers individually, who could not do any of these things without significant hand-holding).
Once we were happy that they were up to speed and on the same level as the rest of the team, they left. Consistently their reason was “thank you for giving me the skills I needed to get a better job.” Which, great! I guess. But that leaves me pretty stumped. How am I supposed to train new team members knowing that they’ll leave at the first opportunity? I’m not a manager, so it’s not really my problem, but ya, it’s frustrating for this elder millennial who just appreciates having a job that isn’t exploitative.
I think, like others have said, an exit interview is your best bet if you really want to know.
We don't know anything about what it's like to work for you, what you do, what everyone gets paid, etc. Tell them you want to know and they will most likely be happy to tell you.
Are responsibilities being spread fairly or are older employees dumping the shitty work onto younger employees? Does the workplace unfairly reward employees based on how long they've worked there? I've worked in those environments and it sucks.
This reminds me of what a relative told us about one of their first days at work. Some HR manager apparently told them that he wishes for everyone present to get into the situation where they'd leave the company at some point. He admitted that he probably shouldn't say something like that as HR person but they're all still young and it's a good thing to broaden their experience and see other companies/company cultures etc.
Furthermore, when seeing memes and other posts about things like the housing market I'm not surprised that lots of people steer away from being loyal to a company and towards making more money (though that doesn't seem to be the case here based on what I saw from other comments)
I'm on that brink between the two. My experience is that people are less likely to deal with inconveniences, especially during the ramp up period. There is a sense of immediacy that has been growing in recent years on all sides of work. Some people will feel as though demand on them increases disproportionately to the time and training provided them.
My parents always advised me to "Wait it out" if I didn't feel comfortable or prepared to do the tasks a job required of me. However, while most places are slow to fire someone for not being up to task, there will be a good amount of pressure and expectations to succeed. Every job I've had, I could do the work, but didn't know their proprietary systems or unique business processes in use. So while I interviewed well, I struggled to demonstrate my skills because of a ticketing system or set of forms required. Nobody was too friendly to someone who said they were good, but can't hit the ground running.
Keep in mind, as others have said, that most younger people are only just now entering the workforce. They don't know how to work, they don't know what's normal, they don't know what to do or what to expect. They're seeking a place where they can get guidance on how to be productive. Not in terms of micromanagement, but in terms of adequate instruction, offering of support if needed, and empowering them and providing them resources needed to succeed. If they aren't comfortable, don't feel the right vibe from the workplace culture, can't figure something out... the patience for such things is very very thin. Not to say you should walk on eggshells, but as also said: they don't have loyalty yet. Most young people see it as a necessary evil to work, and most companies something to tolerate, not embrace. They will bounce at a moments notice because they aren't married to the concept of being a "company person".
It's a difference in how their work ethic is applied. They need that immediate return for their input. There is no safety in working towards something several years in the future if the future doesn't exist, or won't be kind to them. So they seek more benefits that are applicable to their daily/weekly life. I know you mentioned Europe, so they don't face the American problem of being fired at will or layed off with no notice. But it is something to consider that there is seemingly no perceived value to staying at one place until you retire like was had in the past.
~ Just some thoughts.
The biggest thing I've found that make me want to leave a workplace are condescending attitudes and hovering, the absolute best jobs I've had had the attitude " you know what you're doing let me get out of your way, and I know that if you don't you'll come and ask me because I'll explain without becoming irritable"
They are likely quitting because you are not putting forth an effort to build trust with people who are different to you(you’re favouring genx within just a few sentences so that is saying loads about where your glaring blind spots are).
Bad management is indeed the leading cause of unemployment https://www.hcamag.com/us/specialization/industrial-relations/why-bad-managers-are-contributing-to-the-great-resignation/322106
https://hbr.org/2022/08/quiet-quitting-is-about-bad-bosses-not-bad-employees
It’s also possible If genz are unhappy, so are genx. You’re just seeing through the lens of a manager.
Genx have just been soul destroyed enough (due to years Of being told bad management is part of working, a concept handed down by the boomers to make genx more pliable) to not have any standards to quit which is problematic because they are more likely to sit through abuse without reporting it causing a missing stair syndrome which anyone else is easily picking up on and not wanting to deal with all the fixing of alone.
So just cuz a genx doesn’t quit doesn’t let you off the hook. You all just found your level. It’s not a good level.
Why are you pandering to a generation that has proven to be lazy and unreliable? Why not focus on better candidates to begin with and target older employees? Seems like Zoomers are getting a disproportionate amount of focus while at the same time are rather sub par when it comes to productivity.
And folks can downvote all they want, but that is just more proof that I am right.