Recent polls about "Millenials"

See that's the thing, I was not like that and most teens of my generation where not either. Of course you always had the few but for the most part we all had jobs starting at 15 and we did the job as we were supposed to. My first job was in a bakery at a grocery store. There was 1 supervisor for the whole store who stayed up front by the registers most of the evening and the departments had teens and early 20s working them. We all did our jobs and did them the right way without anyone standing over us telling us over and over to actually do our jobs. If you forgot to do something you sure as heck heard about it and never made that mistake again. Of course back then if you went to apply for a new job they would call your old job to see what kind of worker you were. They can't do that anymore so you could steal, cheat, lie, etc and your new job would have no idea what a horrible employee you where. The first thing they told us when we were getting hired is that if you are old enough for a job then you are old enough to do the job right. They would not talk to your parents if you wanted to call in sick or wanted a day off, etc. So back then, you did the job and did it right or you did not have a job until you matured and learned a work ethic, or not and you lived in your parent's basement forever.

And if you ask millennials, most of us will tell you that this doesn't describe most of our fellow generation either. Everyone I know took starter level positions in jobs that had no relation to our majors but still go to work everyday proud of our jobs and with a strong work ethic. We don't want to call in sick scared that we might fall behind. We work as many hours as we can get our hands on. We worked fast food jobs in college to pay our loans. We do everything we can to not have to live with or rely on our parents. Are there kids my age who are like you described? Sure. But the handful you work with don't speak for all teenagers. Stop being so negative about everything. If you hate your job as much as it obviously comes off as you do, then get a new one. If teens are such bad workers, a great employee as yourself shouldn't have that hard of a time finding a new position.

Oh I agree that for some reason people are not raising their kids the way that they were raised. I don't know why. Something has gone wrong especially in this country. It started with the Dr Spock and the the "shrinks" who tell these parents that you have to worry about your kid's feelings and that you should get down on their level and explain things. Nope, obviously that does not work. It is truly horrifying to see how these kids are now turning into school shooters.

I literally can't roll my eyes hard enough. Maybe you should parent every teenager in this country so that the school shooting will magically stop all of a sudden.
 
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No the difference is we were not allowed to be lazy at our jobs. They called us out on that instantly. I worked side by side with people old enough to be my parents and I did the exact same job as they did. This had not been my experience with many of the younger people now. I really don't see how you can say the my personal experiences are invalid. I am actually living this.

So it sounds to me like your issue isn't with the younger people, but with the fact that in the past the older people called out the younger people and that isn't happening now. Which means your beef is actually with the older people (ie you) for not doing the appropriate training and guidance for the younger people.
 
I am sharing my experience. The people we have had issues with are the younger generation. The older people that do work there come in and do their job and do it well. And in a perfect world I am sure they would love to be picky with who they hire. But we have such a low unemployment rate in my city that everyone is short staffed. No one is even applying for the jobs here. They have raised minimum wage plus most places pay above it. And that is part of the problem, they can go anywhere and get away with type of behavior because they need bodies. It is the more mature adults that have some kind of sense of pride and a work ethic that is lacking now.

But again, none of this is unusual in low-wage/high-turnover positions when the economy is strong. Honestly, it sounds to me like your management is probably a bit complacent and not doing a very good job of supervising new employees or setting workplace policies that demand a certain level of performance. You aren't alone. Plenty of companies are finding out now that the policies that worked when employees were desperate for any paycheck during the recession aren't working now that unemployment is low and changing jobs is a viable option if you don't like your current workplace. And it is very likely that what you're seeing as "some sense of pride and a work ethic" in the older workers is really the memory of what was going on economically a decade ago and the lingering fear that the bottom might fall out again. Your youngest workers don't have that same memory, so they're not scrambling to go above and beyond and prove their worth every day like the older people are.
 
No the difference is we were not allowed to be lazy at our jobs. They called us out on that instantly. I worked side by side with people old enough to be my parents and I did the exact same job as they did. This had not been my experience with many of the younger people now. I really don't see how you can say the my personal experiences are invalid. I am actually living this.
I don’t think ppl are doubting your experiences, but trying to say that your experiences don’t necessarily represent a large enough sample to generalize as much as you are for your generation or this current one.
 


Oh I agree that for some reason people are not raising their kids the way that they were raised. I don't know why. Something has gone wrong especially in this country. It started with the Dr Spock and the the "shrinks" who tell these parents that you have to worry about your kid's feelings and that you should get down on their level and explain things. Nope, obviously that does not work. It is truly horrifying to see how these kids are now turning into school shooters.
I agree parenting plays a huge role. But that is an absurd over simplification.
 
I don’t think ppl are doubting your experiences, but trying to say that your experiences don’t necessarily represent a large enough sample to generalize as much as you are for your generation or this current one.

Maybe, maybe not. But a person does not have to look hard to hear this story over and over again. Just google it. The fact that I see it every day is depressing. The fact that young people are shooting up schools now should wake people up about how children are being raised now.
 
The older people doing the job and doing it well are probably part of a demographic where they have had their careers and are working to supplement retirement or because they like to be busy.

They also may realize that over a certain age, employers may not be as likely to hire them in favor of younger people and are lucky to keep the job they have.

Also, older workers have 'been there, done that' and are more complacent and not looking to job hop.
 


Maybe, maybe not. But a person does not have to look hard to hear this story over and over again. Just google it. The fact that I see it every day is depressing. The fact that young people are shooting up schools now should wake people up about how children are being raised now.
I agree with much of what you are saying and as an employer have experienced much of this myself. It can be really awful dealing with then for several reasons.
A friend of mine owns large law firm in Orlando. He hires mostly women in the 50's and 60's. He will not hire any more young ones. Another runs a large medical practice, the stories she tells me are funny. She now has in place a zero cell phone policy. She's had to.
 
Maybe, maybe not. But a person does not have to look hard to hear this story over and over again. Just google it. The fact that I see it every day is depressing. The fact that young people are shooting up schools now should wake people up about how children are being raised now.

As sad and tragic as it is, school shootings date all the way back to the 1850s in America. Very few things are new at the core. While technology and speed of media have changed how much information we receive, most of our “new” problems aren’t new at all.

I think what others are saying is not that your experiences are innacurate but your experiences have been shared and seen by every generation and not new to teens today or millennials.
 
Sounds like a management issue, not a millennial issue.

Let's not let all these comments distract us from the fact that the people who are defending the Millennials the loudest are the ones who have raised them.

And the Millennials themselves, of course

Lol

(I'm kidding!!! I've already said upthread that not all Millenials are as bad as portrayed)
 
It is not an us vs them mentality. Do you work? Are you over the age of 35? Do you have someone that is 18, 19 years old come in and treat you like the idiot and that they know how to do a job better then you in their first week? We see that all the time. I have been working for 30 years and do my job very well. Also we don't talk about our salaries but the younger people seemed to be obsessed with it and have the nerve to want to get paid as much as the people with decades of experience. Not every single young person is like that but a majority of them are.

I have been working for the same company since 1999 and not once has someone in the millennial generation treated me like an idiot or asked me my salary.

Although, honestly, with the way technology changes, they probably can do my job better than I can when it comes to some respects. They don't have the experience I do, but they might know techniques they learned in school that I was never exposed to. This happens in a lot of professions.
 
i've seen more adults (baby boomers - generation y) post things on social media and the internet in general, saying that the earth is flat, weather isn't real, and everything they see is a break in the matrix (lmao). my generation (z) is more into pop culture conspiracy theories. i really don't understand why most adults target younger generations about things of this nature lmao. and i can tell you one thing... there is no way in hell 61% of my generation isn't aware of the holocaust.
 
i've seen more adults (baby boomers - generation y) post things on social media and the internet in general, saying that the earth is flat, weather isn't real, and everything they see is a break in the matrix (lmao). my generation (z) is more into pop culture conspiracy theories. i really don't understand why most adults target younger generations about things of this nature lmao. and i can tell you one thing... there is no way in hell 61% of my generation isn't aware of the holocaust.

You’d be surprised, just look at those man on the street bits where they ask people obvious questions and get insane answers & blank stares...
 
Given my profession, I can honestly tell you this mentality ("mental" being the operative word) is prevalent in many groups, not just millennials. You wouldn't believe the number of phone calls our office receives with people of all ages freaking out that they "completely forgot" about their taxes or "NO ONE REMINDED ME THEY WERE DUE" (seriously?) and can we 1) do them while they wait, or 2) file them an extension? On the outside, I have to be courteous and recite the "No, sir/ma'am, we do not prepare them while you wait, but we can absolutely assist with an extension" or "Yes, ma'am/sir, since you are a repeat client, your name is already on the list for an extension." Inside? Tiny me is sitting at a desk, crazy-eyed and surrounded by files and papers and screaming, "HOW DO YOU FORGET THIS WHEN YOU LITERALLY HAVE MONTHS TO PREPARE?! THERE ARE COMMERCIALS! ADS! AND YOU'VE BEEN A CLIENT HERE FOR FIFTEEN YEARS!" o_O Ignorance is not tied to one demographic.
 
I work for a large Energy Company (Oil Company). I am 58 years old and work with millenials. I had one sitting next to me for a while and we used to have long discussions about the differences in generations and he really made sense and helped me understand a few things. Fist let me say he was not typical of his generation. He was smart, Jewish, Politically involved and would fly from Houston to DC and other areas to work on the presidential campaigns in 2016. He was well connected not necessarily through family but by his own efforts. When I might complain about his generation from time to time, he would not get upset but rather explain the why's as he saw it that they acted the way they did. First was the fact that many of his generation did not want to work for corporate America simply because all their lives they have been given a seat at the table when it came to making decsions. They could not deal with corporate settings because it was too hierachical. They don't want to be told what to do, they want to be a part of the discussion and have a say in things. Secondly money was not as important to many of them, quality of work and quality of life and life experiences were in many instances much more important. He has worked on politics, run with the bulls in Pamplona and toured Holicost Sites in Germany in his 26 years. The classic education experience is not and never has been important to their generation. By classical I mean an education in the Arts, Science, and History. They want to study what they want to study and not have their education dictated to them by someone else. That means they might not be aware of certain historical things because at the end of the day it is just not important to them. They are not dumb, they are not lazy, they just don't like established structure.

I have to pause at this point and say like any description of a group of people, this is not the singular definitive description of the generation but rather a wide ranging description of the larger group and there will be countless exceptions to these observations.

They tend to not trust a lot of things because to an extent they feel the prior generations have screwed things up a little and forced standardized testing on them, media that cannot be trusted and a global situation that is less than perfect. They tend to be more liberal in their thinking (although my co worker is actually staunchly conservative) and see more of a global citizenship than a more nationalistic view of things. They have not suffered many bad things in their lives therefore they have a more upbeat view of things (ah youth!). They want everyone to be taken care of and with some exceptions hate corporate America (except, Facebook, Google, Amazon, and any free wheeling tech type company because that's where a lot of them want to work) They value freedom and lot's of vacation more that money.

So while any interviewer can walk on the street and ask questions that are commonplace for our generation but millenials will stumble all over, it does not mean for one second they are stupid. They are quite bright but those things don't interest them and in the internet/information age we live in they cannot keep up with it all but rather only focus on that which interests them.

And finally as another poster commented, they are a function of the generation that raised them so don't be too critical on yourself.
So they want what they want. They want everyone taken care of. Money isn’t important to them.

So I wonder how they think their “life experiences” and “care of everyone” will be paid for?

And you’re right...the Baby Boomers raised them and somewhere decided that their childrens lives shouldn’t be based in reality but they should be protected from all bad things so they could have their upbeat, albeit unrealistic, view of life in the real world.

I also work with a multitude of millennials. All I hear is “well that doesn’t work for me”. “That’s not how I want it to be”. “For me, it works better this way”. “I want this to happen.”
 
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“The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise."

Socrates

In other words, every generation has pissed and moaned about the younger one since forever. But I guess it must be fun (??) because we all keep doing it. Now get off my lawn!
 
So they want what they want. They want everyone taken care of. Money isn’t important to them.

So I wonder how they think their “life experiences” and “care of everyone” will be paid for?

And you’re right...the Baby Boomers raised them and somewhere decided that their childrens lives shouldn’t be based in reality but they should be protected from all bad things so they could have their upbeat, albeit unrealistic, view of life in the real world.

I also work with a multitude of millennials. All I hear is “well that doesn’t work for me”. “That’s not how I want it to be”. “For me, it works better this way”. “I want this to happen.”

Thank God for people (often young people) who say "That's not how I want it to be" and "I want this to happen" and continue to work hard for a better world for all of us.
 
Thank God for people (often young people) who say "That's not how I want it to be" and "I want this to happen" and continue to work hard for a better world for all of us.
But many of them don't want to put the work in, they want it handed over and right now.
 
“The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise."

Socrates

In other words, every generation has pissed and moaned about the younger one since forever. But I guess it must be fun (??) because we all keep doing it. Now get off my lawn!
Yes, that's obviously a very old quote that most of us have heard about many years ago. But the great philosopher didn't include the part about them being ignorant to the world around them.
 

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