Recycled Bullsh-IT

In our ultra-PC times, to be labelled an –ist of any description (race, sex, pissart) can lead to social exclusion, automatic UKIP membership or, if really extreme, tutting. A victim of an –ism will get their own hashtag (#saynotowhatevermakesyoufeelsmug), trigger warnings, your own safe space, a belated police enquiry and, of course, a cup of tea. So, I find it disappointing that in the workplace we not only still have one of the, er, oldest –isms, Ageism, but it also is perniciously morphing to encompass an age group at the other end of the age spectrum, the so-called Millennials.

Of course, none of us are really ageist. We all have grandparents we love and respect (while secretly hoping they won’t hang around too long as we could do with the dosh to buy that mid-life crisis crutch, we desperately covet). We love our children (no one else’s though) but are keen to spend our wealth on ourselves rather than burden them with an easy life. We’ve taught our children to respect their elders but have effectively inaugurated The Hunger Games for when they come to get a job.

The most popular definition of a Millennial is someone born between 1981-1996.  Gen Z were born 1997-2012. Generation Alpha 2013 onwards. Some of you may fall in this range or have children of these ages. The rest of you (and me) are labelled as either Baby Boomers (1946-1964) or Generation X (in-betweeners of these two). If there is any one from the Silent Generation (pre-1945) please speak up…

More derogatory terms for Millennials include Generation Me, Peter Pans, or the Boomerang Generation. Seen as digitally obsessed, narcissistic, and politically correct, the largest age group in the US & UK now is, by most –ism definitions, definitely prejudiced against by their older cohorts. Is this fair? Do we/should we care?

Theirs is a more challenging place in which to start work or have a career. When we were leaving school, we had careers advice to pigeonhole us in a job we expected to do for life. A lucky few of us went off to some other city for a few years and learned how to drink to excess and hold a conversation with the opposite sex. An even luckier few had this paid for by the state and ended up with a university degree. As we sobered up, we fell into the start of that career and did mortgages, families, menopause, etc., over the following decades. 

Millennials, on the other hand:

• Spent their school years being told the exams they were taking were dumbed down versions of what their parents sailed through
• Have been persuaded to saddle themselves with huge debts for a degree certificate that for many will never pay for itself
• Find a bewildering job market that is totally alien to their belief system and has few jobs for life, but many zero-hour contracts
• Have only ever rented or boomeranged, because they need a deposit bigger than their combined dual incomes to even dream of a mortgage
• Are earning 20% less than the previous generation
• Find there are no gold-plated pensions left to be had – the grown-ups have taken them all and are now forcing the Millennials to pay for them

And we wonder why they seem sullen and withdrawn.  

Actually, the bigger wonder is how creative and tech-savvy they are:

• Enthusiastic for the things that excite them
• Hyper-connected through social networking
• Digital by choice
• Favour consumption over ownership – experiences not products
• Passionate about fairness and openness
• Want to save everything –  the planet, pandas, the world’s poor, the internet of pugs, etc
• Unfazed by failure – if at first you don’t succeed, whatever
• Have nothing to lose, so aren’t paralysed by fear
• Feel protected by their blissful ignorance, and cast-iron belief in themselves

Judging this generation by the rules and behaviour of our own mores and customs is hazardous because their drivers and needs are different. Did we all conform to our parents’ wishes and expectations of us? Who of us is in a job or vocation our parents wanted for us? OK, the doctors, accountants and lawyers can put their tanned, gold-encrusted hands down now.

In every generation, not only is there a Slayer (thanks Joss), but also a new way of looking at life, the universe, etc., which that next generation will use to reshape their world in their image. Sure, they will make mistakes, but different to what we screwed up. They have a tougher gig than us because we will have spent all the money we made and made promises that they are going to have to pay for. My advice to My Generation (who mostly didn’t die before they got old) is to be nice to the Millennials, and Generation Z following them, because who do you think is going to be paying for our care and wiping our orifices when we become Old Centurions? They may be the selfie generation, but we are the selfish ones.

John “Nice One Centurion” Moe