Generation Y: Told We Can Change The World…. But Can We?
October 21, 2009 – 12:09 am | by Daryl TayGen Y is motivated to make a difference in the world… Each person has unique talents that are waiting to be maximised.
As I connect with friends who are new entrants to the workforce, I find that an increasing number of them come back feeling work should be “more than this” and feeling anywhere between annoyed to outright fed up with processes that should have been extinct right around the time of the dinosaurs.
I look at these friends and see people who were student leaders in school, excellent team mates who I’ve worked well with at one point or another and real go-getters, so why the seeming disconnect?
Perhaps we’ve been trained to think, to learn how to be decision makers and knowledge workers. But when we question processes/actions that could be done in cheaper, faster or smarter ways, they’re thrown under the “we’ve always done it this way” bus.
We seem used to solving problems within days when we could make the decisions, but now problems could take months to solve, new initiatives months to be approved, depending on how many hoops your corporation makes you jump through.
In a world where you can reach anyone via LinkedIn and we’re taught to connect to CEOs and build those relationships, these hoops seem counter-intuitive.
It seems Generation Y feels like they graduate from school and get hired by employers who do not know what to do with us and instead slap on “tried and tested” methods of management and work processes that bury Gen Y with what they perceive (rightly or wrongly) to be meaningless work, instead of harnessing the crazy amount of energy they possess and unleash it on conquering the world (or some similar corporate goal). Are the unique talents really being maximised? Or are they being utilised the way they always have been utilised before?
It seems they graduate and look at people in the company who have worked for a few years and are settling into “just get by” mode, and can see themselves transforming into those drones in a few years.
Can we change a world that is resistant to change?
Is this the “sense of entitlement” that people claim Generation Y have? Or is it a sign that the workforce is fundamentally broken and needs to be fixed?
You tell me.
Tags: brazen careerist, decision makers, Gen Y, generation y, generation y workforce, knowledge workers, new entrants, sense of entitlement, student leaders
3 Responses to “Generation Y: Told We Can Change The World…. But Can We?”
By Ziqi Koey on Oct 21, 2009 | Reply
I think big unwieldy corporations are the inflexible, unchanging ones. In many of these companies, most of us fresh grads are told we have to “pay our dues”: doing tasks that may or may not put us closer to where we want to be. Thats why many of us simply “get by”. Thats why we have startups and entrepreneurs. Startups (especially those started by Gen X or Y) understand the need to change and evolve, or die. (Actually most die anyway) Management in most MNCs don’t want to change, they feel they don’t need to, until its all too late.
I personally feel I’ll be more motivated to work in a startup or be an entrepreneur… although it isn’t a popular choice.
Cheers.
Ziqi
By Daryl Tay on Oct 21, 2009 | Reply
@Ziqi: Thanks for the comment! I definitely agree but I suppose for many of us the big corporations provide the stability and environments that we want/need as a first job and that’s why we head there instead of the startup route. Perhaps neither is actually better than the other because though maybe the startups will be more flexible and empowering, there might not be as much training or big budgets in place for experience.
By weekee on Oct 22, 2009 | Reply
interesting view though isn’t it true that the current generation are much better off as far as choices are concerned?
A few years back maybe for most, the path is to just find a stable job and work.
But the current generation is more mobile, there are more choices, more support of entrepreneurship and people are more connected. The current generation has much more tools and resources to live the way they want.
As for MNCs been slow etc, all companies are different. Instead of feeling frustrated, one can always work for a startup, etc.
The current generation has lots of choices, it is up to you guys to exercise them.