IMV41 : Managing Generation Y in the Workplace

The following is a transcript for IMV41 : Managing Generation Y in the Workplace. The original podcast is located here.

Announcer:

Welcome to the Internet Marketing Voodoo podcast, brought to you by MindComet. And now, here’s your host, Paul Lewis.

Paul Lewis:

Welcome to Internet Marketing Voodoo. Today’s topic is managing Generation Y in the Workplace. Our guest tonight is Jennifer Kushell. She is the founder of Your Success Network, YSN.com. She’s also a New York Times bestselling author and expert on managing Generation Y and young entrepreneurs in the workplace.

She’s coauthored several books, as well as appeared on CNN, CNBC, CBS, ABC, Fox, BBC, NPR. It goes on and on, with lists of places where she has discussed her expertise on Generation Y. So Jennifer, welcome to the show.

Jennifer Kushell:

Thank you. It’s great to be here.

Paul Lewis:

Could you tell us a little bit about why you’ve made Generation Y a subject of expertise for yourself, and a little bit about the Your Success Network that you’re involved with?

Jennifer Kushell:

Well, I’ve been working with young people in about a hundred countries for 14 years now, since I was 19 myself and really discovered the online world and what technology could do to help them really explore their lives and their options and their career opportunities.

So I started something called the Young Entrepreneurs Network in ’94 or ’93, and ever since, have been really trying to explore how technology can get them ahead faster in the world, and also help employers understand how to work with them better.

So YSN.com is our newest property. We just launched it a couple weeks ago. It’s called Your Success Network, and it’s an entire online universe dedicated to supporting young people as they transition from home and school into the real world, and really arm them with the tools and the strategies and the skills that they need to succeed in those first companies and organizations at an early age.

Paul Lewis:

Is Generation Y different in the workplace than other people? Are there aspects to their personalities that make them a unique proposition for employers today?

Jennifer Kushell:

Oh, there’s no question. That’s one thing that a lot of employers are not prepared for. Generation Y is very, very different than Generation X. They have grown up with technology and embraced it on a much different level than even we did ten years ago. They live online. They spend more time interacting with people online than they do in the real world, in many cases. They also have been able to interact with the world very differently. They have much tighter relationships with their parents.

They don’t necessarily make the transition as smoothly into the working world as Generation X once did. Generation X had a lot of latchkey kids. They also had many, many kids who grew up being very entrepreneurial to kind of get by. They took their independence very seriously, and really had to make their own way in the world, whereas Generation Y has been much more heavily coached. Their parents have watched over them a lot more carefully. They’ve been much more actively involved in their decisions, in their education.

And so when they transition into the real world, they tend to need a lot more instruction, a lot more mentoring. They’re not as ready to kind of hit the ground running as Generation X might’ve been.

Paul Lewis:

Oh, absolutely. Do you find that Generation Y, because of those specific skill sets, has specific needs and abilities that they bring into a new job role?

Jennifer Kushell:

Absolutely. I think they’re a lot more outgoing than Generation X might’ve been. I think they want to make an impact like Generation X did, but they’re very socially conscious. They realize the power of technology and how they can leverage it.

This is a generation that’s been brought up to have their own voice to build a platform for themselves. They know how to get their own messages and their identity out in the world. The big challenge, though, is that many of them do that in the social arena, and don’t know how to transition that into the professional arena.

So building a platform online, using a typical social network, for example, might not be positioning them in the strongest way possible, whereas in the corporate world, a lot of those skills are very transferable, but they haven’t had the experience to do so, and so they haven’t really explored how to build their own professional platform, and how to build their own expertise. Which, in a funny way, it actually can be done using many of the technologies they’ve grown so accustomed to, but there’s really never been a platform, I think, until we released YSN, for them to really do that.

Paul Lewis:

Yeah. I think that Generation Y’s comfort factor with technology, they’re just natural – that born digital natural tendencies to use it and to be so good with it, is one of the things that make Gen Yers so attractive to companies to recruit. But I think it can also create some liabilities.

I’ve read cases of people posting different information to their MySpace account, and then when they go to apply for a job, the background search actually turns up a lot of behavior that may not be what the employer wants, or once they start a job, they may be posting about their employer on MySpace, which may not get them the promotion. How does that factor into things?

Jennifer Kushell:

It’s not only just not getting them the promotion. A lot of kids have been actually fired from their jobs. They’ve also had offers pulled from recruiters. We even had a girl who applied for a job with us who had a fabulous résumé, who sounded great on the phone. She was coming in for an interview. We went onto her MySpace profile and, I don’t know if I can say this on the air, but her – the song on her site was “Crazy Bitch”.

Paul Lewis:

Oh, my gosh.

Jennifer Kushell:

And she did a whole blog post that was like a page or so long about how her employers were a bunch of morons, and used so many expletives in talking about her – the people she currently works with, it scared us tremendously, and we sent a letter back and said, “We’re sorry. We actually uncovered this. This is not the type of character we’d like to see in our company, but we actually recommend that you make your MySpace profile private if that’s the kind of information you’re gonna share, because it could actually impede your opportunities.”

So I think a lot of the way that some of these social networks are positioned kind of encourages people to share information that’s sometimes not so attractive in a professional light. When they’re encouraged to show promiscuous photos, talk about the parties that they’re going to, that’s kind of dangerous in the online world.

That message is starting to get out there, that they have to be a lot more responsible with how they position themselves. But again, I don’t think there have ever really been tools out there to show them what employers are looking for, and how they have to adjust their personal identity to succeed out in the world.

Paul Lewis:

Oh, I agree. Should employers take a proactive stance of developing policies and other materials to provide to new Gen Y workers about their policies, in regards to posting company information on MySpace, or talking about coworkers, or taking a snippet from a memo or an e-mail and putting that online?

Jennifer Kushell:

I think it’s a great idea, and along with management training or introductory training to companies, it might really be something that a lot more businesses have to take seriously. Because it’s not a matter of a lack of judgment. It’s that they don’t have any context. It’s more a naïveté, where they haven’t had the chance to operate in the professional world.

I use the analogy a lot about it’s like taking kids and dropping them in Korea, or some foreign country with a totally different language, different culture, different food, different terminologies. That’s what it’s like for them to transition from school into the real world. It’s a drastic change in their day-to-day lifestyle and their day-to-day sensibilities.

And so it’s important that employers do help set a different context for them, and show them what is appropriate and what isn’t appropriate, and also give them some context to understand how those decisions that they might make online can impact their careers, their lives, and the companies that they’re making their first investments in.

Paul Lewis:

I think that’s spot-on. I believe that most of the young people have a very good attitude and they want to perform, but it’s exactly what you said. It’s in context. They’ve been posting on their personal blogs for years anything that they wanted to talk about regarding their school or their personal life, and all of a sudden, now work becomes a huge part of their life, and yet, they’re not posting and talking about it in the ways that they used to. And so they just – they don’t see that differentiation, and you just have to set those guidelines at the beginning.

Jennifer Kushell:

Definitely, and I think that’s a major, major reason why we started YSN, because young people don’t have any context to build their professional identity in. And we looked at what they were doing online, and the fact that they’re spending two hours a day, on average, even while they’re working, surfing the net and looking at, you know, lifestyle sites and posting about their parties and their evenings and all that. We said, “What if we could create an environment that supported their success, that celebrated the things that made them positive, successful people in the professional space?”

So instead of doing a profile, we had them build a portfolio, and we asked them about their milestones, their goals, their aspirations. What they’ve actually accomplished so far. What their challenges have been. What they’re reading, what they’re thinking, what they’re doing.

And it really helps them not only be a lot more introspective about who they are, but helps them set a different context, and at the same time, it ensures that when employers want to do research on them online, they see something that’s positive. They see them in the best possible light.

And a lot of the young people are coming to us saying, “YSN makes me want to be more ambitious, because I see myself in a different perspective.”

Paul Lewis:

I think that’s a perfect example, creating that vision for them. Helping them to create that vision of where they might want to go and how other people are approaching it puts them right on the path that they want to be on.

Jennifer Kushell:

Well, a woman said to me recently her mama used to say to her, “Show me your friends, and I’ll show you your future.” And that’s a really good thing to say to young people today. The people they surround themselves with do absolutely dictate their opportunities, their actions, their aspirations.

And I think if you can put young people in an environment where they’re surrounded by success, where they’re surrounded by young, ambitious people who are doing very positive things with their lives, who are impacting their – the companies they work for in a very positive way, it’s almost impossible for them not to be more successful and make that transition more smoothly.

Paul Lewis:

We’ve talked about some of the challenges with Gen Y, some of their naïveté, some of their predisposition with technology and the troubles that can cause. What are some of the reasons why employers today really need to be thinking about including Gen Y in the workforce?

Jennifer Kushell:

They absolutely just have to, because 500 million young people are going to enter the world of work globally in the next ten years alone. Also, a lot of the senior positions in companies are starting to be vacated in the next few years because of the Boomers retiring. I think the average age of a vice president is gonna change by a matter of like ten years, from the 40s into the 30s, over the next couple of years.

So not only are young people critical to the workforce, but it’s gonna be critical for all of us to make sure that they’re better equipped to not only transition and adapt, but actually succeed at a much earlier age, if they’re going to help fill those leadership roles in companies that are being vacated right now by Boomers.

Paul Lewis:

Oh, absolutely. And I think that Gen Y also adds so much value for an organization, to connect it better with technology, to connect it better with the rest of Gen Y. Certainly, not only do you want to have Gen Y within your workforce, but most likely, your company wants to sell to people that are in Gen Y, or are just leaving that category zone.

Jennifer Kushell:

Of course. But there’s also the whole other side of there’s still a lot of people who have not accepted technology and embraced it. We had a couple lawyers in our office the other day who are wonderful, wonderful people, very successful in their field. They still don’t use computers.

This is a whole new way of operating, of living. There’s a whole new culture that’s enveloping our world today, and young people are incredibly savvy about that. The way we communicate message and news and information and education is all changing. So companies that are not quick - or serious about adapting their messages, their brands, their products, to this new world, are going to suffer.

And so what young people can do is they can help them understand how this new generation communicates. Whether they serve – whether they exist to serve this younger generation or not, the new way of operating in society in general is something that young people can actually teach companies a lot about.

But companies have to recognize that their methods are not going to be as standard or as traditional as they’re used to. Young people need to be listened to and spoken to in a different way. So the big challenge for employers is to figure out how to really leverage the skills, the passions, the interests, and the insight that young people have, and help them adapt that to the companies and the organizations they’re working with.

Paul Lewis:

Now that employers say, “Okay, I want to bring on more people from this generation into my workplace,” how do they go about attracting them? What is it about a company or a job that really attracts Gen Y and gets their interest?

Jennifer Kushell:

I think a couple things. One, they – young people are definitely looking for a lifestyle that is in alignment with their expectations. Many times, their expectations are off-base or are not really feasible. There’s definitely a huge sense of entitlement running throughout this generation that does need to be tamed. There’s no question. Not to say they’re bad kids, but there are lifestyle questions that are very important to them.

Many of them are also very concerned with salary, which can be a bad thing for them, too, because sometimes, they will choose their job opportunities based on salary alone and be very, very unhappy within a few years of that – afterwards. Plus young people aren’t happy in their jobs within two years of being out and are changing, and you know the rates of job-switching are very, very high these days.

So I think understanding and helping young people understand the corporate culture, the values of a company, the lifestyle, the expectations. Also, their opportunities for advancement and for making an impact. The fastest way to have young people enter your company and be miserable quickly is not to challenge them, is to give them mundane tasks that don’t enable them to really celebrate who they are and what they think they’re capable of.

And of course, there’s a big learning curve. They have a lot to learn when they enter a company. But giving them even small opportunities to really run with projects, or run with opportunities to show what they can do and prove themselves in this new environment, is gonna go a long way in building their trust and their loyalty.

Paul Lewis:

You mentioned that the majority of people change jobs more frequently than in the past. Is that something – is it that Gen Y has a sense of entitlement, that they’re not willing to wait for the promotion or the time of the organization, or do they just have a different perspective on life and on a way to approach it, as opposed to retiring with a company with a pension that might’ve been a goal 15 years ago?

Jennifer Kushell:

I think there’s been a big backlash over the past ten years, where there was a major shift where you went to a company and you really looked at that company as your home for life a couple generations ago.

But now, young people recognize that companies don’t always have their best interests in mind, and they realize that they are gonna change careers very often in their working life, which is a dramatic shift recently. Young people are – between 18 and 30 are likely to change jobs seven to eight times right now, and 25 percent will change over ten times.

That’s really thrown a lot of corporations for a big loop, because there’s an incredible cost to acquisition and retention of employees, and also training cost. So when a young person leaves the company after two years, or even a year, which is happening often now, too, it really costs the company a lot of money. It wastes a lot of time for them.

And another thing that I don’t think companies are recognizing is that sometimes when young people leave a company or are unhappy, they don’t recognize that that company has more opportunities than just the one that they’re sitting in. So if their first position is one they’re unhappy with, sometimes they’ll not only leave that company, but they’ll leave the industry entirely, thinking that they’ve gotten a taste of all that area has to offer.

So one other thing that I’d really recommend to employers is to think about the fact that that young person might actually not be in the best position when they land in that company, and so it’s really important to show them not only what other opportunities exist in that department, if they’re in marketing or sales or operations, but also, the broader opportunities that that company offers, so that they can get a better feel for the industry and how they can maybe move around within that field, instead of just totally abandoning ship, which does happen.

Paul Lewis:

Would it be fair to say you would recommend some career path planning or mentorship, then?

Jennifer Kushell:

Of course. I think also, one concept that I love in the medical field that isn’t – is very rarely ever applied to companies is the concept of a rotation. We wrote about this in the book. Young doctors, they have an incredible opportunity in med school, or right after med school, to go and explore the cancer units and the burn centers and the ER and geriatric care and pediatric care. They get to see all different sides - surgery.

They don’t get to do that in the corporate world, and so many young people have so many misconceptions about what an industry does, or what their function might do. I see kids coming out of Ivy Leagues that say “I don’t want to be in marketing because I hate sales.” Well, that’s insane. There are thousands of things you can do in the marketing field that don’t involve sales. But they don’t get that. So they have a very limited perspective, and they don’t realize how limited that perspective is.

So companies have a real obligation, I think, to really open up that world to them and educate them, and show them what business means, and what marketing means, and what does operations mean, and how is that manifested in so many different opportunities and roles and jobs and positions.

Paul Lewis:

I think those are a lot of really good points to think about as an employer. I also wonder about corporate culture. From my perception, corporate culture is becoming much more casual today, and it seems to be something that Gen Y responds well to. Do companies need to look at their culture as they try to attract younger people into their workforce?

Jennifer Kushell:

I definitely think so. It’s no different than – we have to think a couple years ago, corporate culture meant you wore a suit to work every single day. That was a uniform. That’s very different than it is today. One of the things that I think the technology industry has done has really made the workplace a little more – or a lot more casual.

You see a lot more environments accepting people working in khakis and button-downs, or women wearing skirts or sandals to work. We have an office where people – the standard uniform is jeans and flip-flops, to be honest. When we have meetings, people dress up and they put on their suits, but the everyday environment, if you can make it a lot more casual and comfortable, they’re more likely to spend more time and not be watching the clock to see when – the first minute they can get out of the office.

Paul Lewis:

Wow, that’s been a lot of information. To kinda sum things down, I wonder if you could give us your top tips for an employer, in regards to either recruiting or managing Gen Y?

Jennifer Kushell:

I think the first thing I would say is make sure that you listen to them. First and foremost, have conversations with them. Ask them what their expectations are. Without really sharing much about what your expectations are of them, allow them to talk, so you can get a better context for how to deal with them and what kind of education or training they might need that you might not be expecting.

I would also try to really find ways to leverage what makes them special, what makes them different. That’s something we really try to draw out of them on YSN, to get them to share those things, so they’re more immediately obvious to them and their employers. But finding ways that they can apply the things that make them special in the professional world is not something they’re gonna be so capable of doing in the beginning.

The last thing I would say is, encourage them to get as much outside real-world experience as humanly possible. Send them to events, to conferences. Have them network in industry organizations. Have them network with other people in different departments.

There’s a big transition for them happening, and the more you can enable them and support them as they engage with other professionals, the more equipped they’re gonna be to succeed in your own environment, in your own industry.

If they’re gonna spend two hours a day online on your dime, surfing the Internet and everything, at least make sure they’re in an environment where they can learn things that can fuel your company, where they can seed your efforts and be real evangelists for your company, instead of trying to find ways constantly to escape from their day-to-day duties.

Paul Lewis:

Sounds like a lot of great advice, Jennifer. If an employer wanted to try to recruit Gen Y, is that something that they could do on Your Success Network?

Jennifer Kushell:

We don’t have a formal system for it, but we have an amazing system that allows corporations to be mentors on the site, so more experienced people, who might even be employers, can go and talk to young people and see what they’re looking for. You can also search young people and see what they’re doing by industry or by aspiration.

It’s a really amazing place to really tap in and understand what these young people are thinking, and engage with them in a less threatening environment. I think it’s important to realize that great connections in the world happen in the real world. They happen outside of résumés, outside of career centers, outside of formal networking events sometimes. Sometimes, they do happen online, and there’s a powerful opportunity to connect with young people on YSN and through the tools that we have developed.

Paul Lewis:

That’s awhttp://www2.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifesome. Jennifer, thanks again for spending some time with us today.

Jennifer Kushell:

Thank you. It’s been a pleasure.

Paul Lewis:

For more information on Your Success Network, please visit YSN.com. If you’d like more information on our show, visit internetmarketingvoodoo.com. Again, thanks for listening.

Announcer:

For more information on this week’s topic, visit internetmarketingvoodoo.com. This podcast has been brought to you by MindComet, The Relationship Agency.

[End of Audio]

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