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Gen Z is out here wylin' and changing workplace culture. Gen Z is defined as the 72 million people born between 1997 and 2012, or as anyone too young to remember Sept. 11.
Gen Zers are not afraid to speak out. At a supplement company, a Gen Z worker questioned why she would be expected to clock in for a standard eight-hour day when she might get through her to-do list by the afternoon. At a biotech venture, entry-level staff members delegated tasks to the founder (aka the reverse pls fix).
While millennials started work during and after the financial crisis, they felt lucky to land any type of work, and believe in the "hustle". Gen Zers, meanwhile, are starting their careers at a new moment of crisis — in the midst of a pandemic that has upended the hours, places and ways we’re able to work.
A fall 2021 survey of Gen Z job candidates from the recruitment software company RippleMatch, found that more than two-thirds wanted jobs that will indefinitely stay remote.
Gabe Kennedy, 30, founder of the herbal supplement brand Plant People, noticed as he recruited Gen Z employees that some had no interest in the rigid work habits that felt natural to his mostly millennial 10-person team.
“Older generations were much more used to punching the clock,” Mr. Kennedy mused. “It was, ‘I climb the ladder and get my pension and gold watch.’ Then for millennials it was, ‘There’s still an office but I can play Ping-Pong and drink nitro coffee.’ For the next generation it’s, ‘Holy cow I can make a living by posting on social media when I want and how I want.’”
Short Squeez Takeaway: As cringe as we might find some Gen Z habits (TikTok), we appreciate Gen Z taking one for the team and trying to change a rigid workplace culture, where nothing has really ever been questioned till the pandemic. LFG Zoomers.
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