Millennial employees aren’t lazy or entitled. They’re just different.
Reams of think pieces on millennials — roughly defined as people born between 1981 and 2001 — paint a picture of a generation defined by its laziness, sense of entitlement, and yes, those oft-mentioned participation trophies.
That differing outlook is rooted in their upbringing and goals, he says. It affects how they choose occupations and employers, as well as how they operate in the workplace and what they expect from managers.
To start, millennials look at jobs in a fundamentally different way than previous generations. Baby boomers lived to work and valued the spoils a stable career could fetch. The much-maligned Generation Xers worked to live, but did not define themselves by their occupation. Still buoyed by youthful idealism, millennials want to make a difference and gravitate to organizations and positions they believe have a purpose, Thornhill says.
At Snagajob, two out of three of the company’s employees are millennials, says Candace Nicolls, whose official title is “head snagger,” putting her in charge of human resources functions for the company’s Richmond office. Snagajob’s mission to connect people to jobs, and their track record — last year 5 million people found work through its site — are “fantastic selling points” for young applicants, she says.
Millennials enter the workplace expecting to have input in the decision-making process, Thornhill says. This egalitarian attitude is anathema to the pay-your-dues mentality of baby boomers, but they have themselves to blame. From a young age, parents gave millennials a vote, Thornhill says: Do you want to go to timeout? What do you want to do this weekend?
Some millennials lack interpersonal skills, a symptom of a life spent with screens. Others are clueless about basic professional etiquette, which you can blame on a dearth of work experience. And yes, their sense of entitlement can display itself in the form of expectations for a quick raise or promotion.