Gen Y's Anarchists

by Chris Taylor.

The internet has raised a Napster Generation of outlaws who are used to getting what they want right now.

These young people will have difficulty adapting to the command structure of the business world and will force employers to give them room for personal initiative from day one.

Most of the people I know who have not adapted to the command structure of the business world are unemployed.

Every decade some guy makes millions assuring us all that "the rules have changed" but they actually do not. Human beings are hierarchical and territorial by nature; this isn't going to change overnight (or even over the course of centuries) no matter how many people tell you it will.

There are sound reasons for having leaders of divisions, departments, etc. Accountability and responsibility would be the best reasons. Morale would be another.

Try submitting your raise or bonus appeal to all of your colleagues. Some of whom will think you do a good job, some of whom will think you do a poor job and some of whom may be surprised to learn that you're in their department.

You are either 1) not going to get the raise because everyone else isn't immediately getting one too, or 2) you will get the smallest raise, relatively speaking, because your reasonable demands will be outpaced by ambitious peers who ask for even more.

Published CEO salaries are an instructive point to illustrate option 2. CEO pay has skyrocketed not because they are greedy, but because they now have readily available benchmarks against which to measure themselves.

All it takes is a couple of guys steering sinking ships (but making stellar pay) for everyone else to say "Well I'm doing a better job than that schmoe, shouldn't *I* get paid more?"

When you and I are retired and golfing in Florida, guys will still be making these hilarious "but it's all different now!" claims. And it won't be. The technology may change, but human nature won't.

See also: Napster Made Me

Comments

[Ryan Paugh]

We're Anarchists. We don't follow rules.

[Ryan Healy]

Maybe in the old days it was conform or starve. Nowadays it is stick with the status quo and just squeeze by. I guess we're from two different worlds, but my friends who have not adapted to the business world are wealthier and happier then everyone who has.

I will pass on sticking it out for 35 years so I can retire to the golf course and wait for the grim reaper to come rearing his ugly head. A better idea; enjoy the best years of your life and figure out a new way to think about retirement.

[Recruiting Animal]

Ryan Healy, isn't your schtick saying that things are different now than before. Doesn't sound like it here. All your saying is that its better to work for yourself. That's not a generational issue, is it?

[Ryan Healy]

I'm saying a couple things here actually. Things are different now, companies must change their policies to make them more entrepreneurial (i.e. work from home, not micro managed, long term goals etc.). Most people can't or don't want to risk working form themselves, so why not eliminate the risk with a paycheck, but empower the employee with an entrepreneurial spirit.

That's a small taste of my schtick.

[Maureen Sharib]

Interesting article today in NY Times related to this subject:

"This means more of what we have already seen: flexible work schedules, telecommuting, job sharing. Women in particular, but also a substantial percentage of men, have made it clear that is what it will take to keep them loyal. A study by the Families and Work Institute shows that 24 percent of women and 13 percent of men who work full-time would like to work part-time. And among the youngest workers, those now having children and most actively juggling family and career, Fortune magazine found that 61 percent would leave their job if they could find another that allows them to telecommute."

Read the whole thing here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/17/fashion/17work.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

[Recruiting Animal]

So Ryan Healy, you are saying that The Gen Y is going to force companies to
a) let employees work from home
b) give up micro-management
c) give staff a chance to play golf now

[Chris Taylor]

Interestingly enough, I agree with Ryan's comments here. That said, it has always been the case that the adaptable companies thrive. The stuff Ryan asks for now was available to me at IBM in 1997 -- did 17-year-old Gen Y drive that change, or did the market?

At the Big Four firm I work for now, the partners on down to the lowliest helpdesk guy get laptops. The office phones can be routed to home (or our BlackBerries) if we're working from home on a particular day. If we take a day or two off to volunteer for the charity of our choice, we'll get paid for it. Flexible hours, concierge service, fitness allowance, etc etc. This is not groundbreaking Gen-Y stuff; this is ordinary business in the 21st century, brought about by evolution, not revolution. Most of the companies in Fortune or the Financial Post's "Top 100 Companies to Work For" will have similar stories. The companies that don't have it have a shortage of employees.

A lot of this junk started back in the late 80s and early 90s -- again, market-driven change. Company A offers more incentives to retain employee loyalty, Company B ups the ante. The companies still expecting people to slave away like dogs are the guys going out of business, because nobody wants to work there -- or deal with the downtrodden souls that do.

So I agree with a lot of what Ryan desires and says, but I think we disagree on the casaulity. Gen Y's not changing the world -- the market is changing itself, just like it's done for centuries.

[Ryan Paugh]

No matter the variable that allows a change to take place (in the case the market), it's people's actions that make it a reality.

Just throwing that out there.

[Chris Taylor]

I should note that I mention GenY age in 1997 not as a put-down, but merely as illustration that they were not -- at that time -- influential in the workforce. =)

[Chris Taylor]

And again, we agree on the key point, but differ on causality. This flexibility has been around for a decade or more, but only at certain vanguard firms.

I think Gen Y *is* going to drive for broader adoption of these measures, but the adopters are at this point the laggards -- the leaders have been implementing for a while now.

[Chris Taylor]

...but the adopters are at this point the laggards -- the leaders have been implementing for a while now.

That should read "but any new adopters are at this point the laggards"...

[Ryan Healy]

Chris,

Glad we agree here, and of course the market drives change. But employees can help drive it as well. And you are right about this stuff being around for a while now, I think the problem is it exists for older employees. The managers and CEOs are the ones with these freedoms, while the entry level guys are treated like children. I think older folks are blind to this because they aren't in our shoes, but its amazing the response I get from people my age when talking about our blog. None of them truly have what you described above, yet every company preaches it....

[Chris Taylor]

Then I would tell those folks to come work for our firm! =) I've only a been here a year and a quarter, I'm not a partner or director, and this is easily the most flexible and adaptable company I've worked for so far. Sort of shattered my impressions of what a global audit and accounting firm would be. The new-hire rank and file guys get all of that stuff from day one.

But yes I think we've all had instances from our own work experience where the new guy is the low man on the totem pole and gets the crappiest assignments and the tiniest rewards.

I think a big part of The Firm's pro-mobility, pro-flexibility enthusiasm is derived from the fact that a lot of the client-facing folks spend huge amounts of time away from the office. Not necessarily out of their home city or country, but at least away at client sites conducting audits and so on. So all of our processes and procedures are built around the idea that we have to be able to do our work away from home base, whether that's at an office tower down the street or in our own living rooms. And that flexibility extends out to the non-client facing side too. The only guys who don't have much flexibility in terms of work location is the mail room -- they kinda have to be there to sort and deliver the mail. But everything else can be spread out and managed remotely.

If a company doesn't earn its livelihood checking out other companies and examining their internal processes, then I can see how the incentive to be mobile is a lot smaller. But since that's how we earn our coin, that's how everything is structured. Eventually that sort of thing will filter out to other industries and companies as well and that's where Gen Y comes in. We're at a point in the technology tree where a lot of our stuff can be virtualised and executed anywhere. The only time you have to be a certain physical location at a specific time is when you have to handle an actual, physical object.

There's probably a whole other debate in whether line management or HR is responsibile for lobbying for and implementing this kind of flexibility and change. I have a feeling that it is also, paradoxically, hard on the Firm's HR folks -- they seem to have higher turnover than most other departments.

[laurence haughton]

I've read about, observed, and been told stories about hundreds of businesses that practice what you are asking for across all industries. And there has to be thousands more teams inside firms where the local managers practice it even though top managers don't.

I understand the urge to conclude that "the only things that are true are the things I (or my friends) see." But that's the same kind of thinking that led people to conclude the earth was flat. (really flat not in the Friedman sense) There's a big world beyond our own observations.

[karen m]

Hmm, wasn't generation X thought to be the same back in the good ole days by the Baby Boomers http://www.joanlloyd.com/articles/open.asp?art=697.htm
Wonder what happened.. maybe they grew up?

Think we should be wary of stereotyping, people learn to conform; With Age comes maturity, education, knowledge and adaption.. so, is it not possible that the same assumptions would always be held but eventually in time life goes on as the wheel keeps turning?