bfl
I get the bad feeling that so many are unprepared for productive work.
Horror story I heard this morning:
Manager asked his Millenial employee to stay late to deal with a crisis. Employee did so and took care of the situation. Next morning the manager approached employee to express gratitude, and instead of a gracious acceptance the employee snapped “I don’t want your thanks, just make sure it doesn’t happen again!”
bfl
I shut it off when he started blaming the corporations.
Just more feel-good anti-business leftism. He was pretty much on-point for the first half of his spiel.
I have hired about a dozen millennial over the past 5-6 years. The interview process saw 3-4 times that number. There are plenty of millennials willing to work and they do an outstanding job of catching on very quickly. None of those I hired have shown any expectation of ‘getting into management’ within 3 years, etc.
2 had masters, the rest all bachelors - all engineering related.
I typically paired 2 with 1 senior person in my groups in order to provide mentoring (as well as provide the senior members a chance to demonstrate some leadership). Each of the 3 had their own set of specific work to do, but the tasks were similar. Within 6 months of putting the teams together they were outperforming the other functions and we were asking how we could help in other areas.
It’s about leadership, structure, and giving them a chance to do what they think is right once they’ve been trained. I can’t tell you how many times frustrated folks from other depts (junior and senior alike) came to me asking how to deal with micromanagement because some manager wasn’t willing to let anything out of their grasp. Micromanagement is 100% due to fear - afraid to trust their people because they might get blamed.
Not to say I let young talent run off alone. I gave them mentors, monitored their metrics, and spot checked their records.
There isn’t anything wrong with the millennial generation - it’s specific to millennial individuals. The same as any other generation. Propensity may be higher I suppose, but as a hiring manager - that’s my job to figure out.
bkmk
I’m fortunate to have a job that we expect the best out of everyone for many reasons. We have 2 millennials working with the rest of us, and they do a great job! Smart, and ready to show and share what they know, but listen when told what to do.
I firmly believe that if there is a strong structure in place, the other employees will help keep the youngsters in line until they grow up.