4/25/2017 0 Comments how to manage milleNnialsDo you know what's tough? Discussing Millennials, Baby Boomers, and Generation X without hurting everyone's feelings. But here is the good news: Whether you are a millennial or raised a millennial, we have all contributed to these changes we face in the workplace (Yes, even you blame-shifting Millennials are at fault!) To understand a solution, you first have to understand the generational changes that have occurred. Numerous books have been written and scores of "experts" have offered their opinions, but perhaps none better than Simon Sinek. We want to be clear: Our goal in writing this piece is not to pick on Millennials. Instead, we want to acknowledge the differences Millennials bring to the workplace and then offer some tips for all generations as to how we all get along and accomplish the common goals at the office.
This is a two-part (part two coming next week) email hoping to achieve this goal. Do you know what's tough? Discussing Millennials, Baby Boomers, and Generation X without hurting everyone's feelings. But here is the good news: Whether you are a millennial or raised a millennial, we have all contributed to these changes we face in the workplace (Yes, even you blame-shifting Millennials are at fault!) To understand a solution, you first have to understand the generational changes that have occurred. Numerous books have been written and scores of "experts" have offered their opinions, but perhaps none better than Simon Sinek. You may have heard of Sinek. He authored the acclaimed book Start With Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action in 2009 and has since continually offered expert opinions on the best practices of leadership. Sinek, if anyone, should be lent an ear on the topic of millennials in the workplace. Born in 1973, he is neither a millennial or a baby boomer, which allows him to cut out the bias many of us possess and point the finger at each generation equally. On a taping of Inside Quest on October 29, 2016, Sinek referenced the "millennial question". He said he receives it often and the host of the show asked him to offer his answer. Sinek then proceeded to drop some serious knowledge, which we feel is applicable for any workplace. He says that millennials are "accused of being entitled, narcissistic, self interested, unfocused, and lazy..." But more importantly, he notes that millennials are confounding leadership and the result of this is that leaders ask millennials, "Well, what do you want?" To this question, millennials reply something like, "We want to work in a place with purpose." What do you do with that? According to Sinek, there are four problems when it comes to millennials. They are parenting, technology, impatience, and environment. We want to sum up Sinek's thoughts in order to offer some ideas on how millennials can effectively fit into the workplace in next week's article. Parenting Yes. It's time to face the music. There are quite a few of you who are responsible for raising millennials. Sinek calls this generation victims of "failed parenting strategies." The now legendary participation trophies are an example of this. Millennials are told the are special all the way up until they graduate college, but when they arrive in the working world, according to Sinek, "their jobs tell them they aren't special." There are no more consolation prizes and, most likely, their parents cannot call in a favor and get them promoted. As you can imagine, this results in lower self esteem for your millennial employees because real life is tough. Because of their parents, says Sinek, "millennials were dealt a bad hand." But bad parenting is only scratching the surface of this issue... Technology Get up and walk around the office to take a brief visual survey of your millennial employees. (This actually is probably applicable to all of your employees.) Odds are, if they aren't busy at work, they are busy on their phones. One of the more interesting things that Sinek points out about millennials is their addiction to technology. Specifically, he speaks of social media. Sinek points out that social media (text messaging included) releases dopamine. This release makes us feel good and keeps us going back for more. It's why you keep going back to Facebook and is the same chemical release involved with smoking, drinking and gambling. Oddly enough, Sinek points out that we have age restrictions on the three latter activities, but no restraints what so ever on social media. This reliance on technology impedes the ability heavy-technology users have to build lasting relationships. As a result, when they encounter stress (you know, because the workplace is stressful) they do not have the necessary coping mechanisms and turn to technology instead of people. As human beings, this causes a natural imbalance and one that, quite frankly, we should all guard against. Sinek cites well-documented research stating that those who are consistently on Facebook are more likely to be depressed than those who aren't. You can imagine how this translates to your business, but we will touch on this next week. Impatience We probably don't have to dive into chemistry to tell you that Millennials are impatient. They simply cannot wait... for anything. Sinek points out that Millennials are accustomed to two-day shipping with Amazon Prime and can even get dates through apps. They need instant gratification. What's wrong with that? Well, most jobs don't offer such a thing. Millennials want to climb the ladder, they want a job with purpose, and they want to make six figures. If they can't be "fulfilled" quickly, they will simply leave. "Everything you want you can have instantly except job satisfaction and strong relationships," says Sinek. "There ain't no app for that... Millennials need to learn patience." Environment You have heard it said repeatedly that the environment you create at your practice is of utmost importance. But how can you possibly create an environment that will combat everything you have just read above? Sinek notes that we are taking this damaged generation and putting them into corporate environments that, "care more about the numbers than they do about the kids. That care more about the short term gains than the long-time life of this human being." Sinek's argument here is that we are not putting Millennials in an environment that help them learn the skills they need and overcome the hand they have been dealt. He points out that Millennials are thrust into corporate environments where they don't learn patience, how to deal with stress, and cope with not getting a participation trophy and that the worst part of it all is that they think they are the problem. So how do we fix it? According to Sinek, it's the company's responsibility to fix the Millennial problem. Ultimately, we have no choice. Next week, we are going to dive deeper into the solution to the Millennial problem within the workplace. For now, if you have any observations or comments you would like to share (perhaps even solutions?), we would love to hear from you. Reply to this email and let us know!
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AuthorThe staff and doctors at VisionAmerica are committed to providing relevant information for you, your patients and your practice. We hope you find the information in our blog post helpful. Archives
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