Website: Harvard Business School
“Working Knowledge for Business Leaders”
Section: What Do YOU Think?
Article: How Will Millennials Manage?
Published: August 2, 2007
Author: Jim Heskett

Heskett wrote an article, “How Will Millennials Manage” wondering how this group, also called Gen Yers (born in the late 1970′s) will handle managerial positions. His article provides an interesting observation from a managerial point of view on the trends he sees in the work place. Worthy of reading if you haven’t heard been hearing about the Millenials in the workplace social phenomenon.

However, I’m including here a particularly well-spoken/written response to the article, (signed “Anonymous”) written by someone in this particular age group. The writer could be a spokesperson for the generation. I’m on the fringe of this age group and associate with a lot of what this writer says.

It’s strange for me to say, “I’m a millenial,” because I don’t think of myself as being part of a greater mindset tied to a specific date range. However, I am a millenial, and I do fit, in large part, the description above. I am ambitious but not overly committed. I prefer to work as a consultant because I am not chained to one company. I am a problem solver by nature, and I want to get immediately to the problem solving. I’m not interested in meaningless titles, mine or anyone else’s, and I’m not willing to enslave myself to attain a position with a great title and no depth of purpose. I don’t want the appearance of success. I want the integral satisfaction of succeeding. I want to make a lot of money, but only if I have time to spend it, and I’m more interested in health care and vacation than bonuses that I’d have to work too much to get and work too much to enjoy.

My family and my pursuit of knowledge for knowledge’s sake are more important to me than any particular job, with any particular company. I have confidence in myself, my marketability, and my ability to put my nose to the grindstone when it is necessary. I’m interested in being as efficient and productive as possible, but not every second of every day, and not under someone else’s thumb.

I think that, if I am representative of millenials, then my generation doesn’t buy into blind loyalty, and impressive but misleading statistics. We don’t think we should have to sacrifice ourselves for the good of the company and take what they decide to give us, or measure our success by social comparison. We are the bridge between the old and the new, and the best hope of riding the transition from analog to digital and finding a happy, efficient, productive medium, because we grew up under the old regime and we took stock of where and how the system failed the individual. We started our education in the analog system, where computers were fun but too expensive and too cumbersome to be widely used, and we ended it amidst the rise of the digital age. We are the generation that can do our math problems long hand, on a graphing calculator, in MS Excel, or maybe write our own application to do it. We can bridge the gaps in knowlege and relate to the older and the younger generations. At least I can.

How will we be in management? Well, I am in management, and I do try to be as sensitive to the needs of my direct reports as I would want any manager to be with me. I try to anticipate potential conflicts by knowing them as individuals, and searching for compromises before conflict arises. Would I open up my organization more widely to global opportuntities? Definitely. I am not scared of other cultures or languages, and am not unwilling to compromise in order to foster mutually beneficial situations. I am not lost in political correctness to the point where I can’t see cultural differences for what they are and find ways to change processes to suit those differences and still maintain continuity.

Will we create work environments in which jobs fit into personal life styles rather than vice-versa? I am doing my damdnest. Not only for others, but for myself. No doubt some of the concerns will remain, but maybe the difference in perspectives will lead to solutions to some of those concerns.

We are in an age of specialization, and the rules have changed. The greatest change I see is in hiring and retention. Business which are not adapting, and remain married to the process of blindly searching for degrees and certifications, and who judge employee reliability based on “time served” at other companies are failing to attract, hire, or retain the high knowledge workers. They are top heavy on authoritarians who treat employees like children, and they are going to suffer the most in change management as retirement hits. And, then they’ll come-a-calling. There may currently be a resistance to turning executive roles over to my generation, but the reality is we are the ones best suited to weather and/or foster the imminent and necessary change which result from the mass retirement of the baby boomers.

– Anonymous