Employers reveal why Gen Z is the hardest generation to work with
Despite many of them having only just entered the workforce, Generation Z — those born from 1997 onwards — is already getting a bad rap at the office.
According to a recent survey of 1,300 managers, three out of four agree that Gen Z is harder to work with than other generations — so much so that 65% of employers said they have to fire them more often.
One in eight have let go of a Gen Zer less than one week after their start date, the study found.
The results ring true with managers across the US and in various industries, who report that young hires have been difficult to deal with, particularly when it comes to language.
“I feel kind of hamstrung on what I can and can’t say,” Peter, a New Jersey-based manager in the hospitality industry, told The Post.
“I don’t want to offend anyone or trigger someone. I always have it in the back of my mind that I’m going to get angry one day, and I’m going to get freaking canceled.”
For Alexis McDonnell, a content creator who managed Gen Z employees at a tech company in Dallas, “The biggest difference I noticed was just a difference in professionalism.
“I do think the pandemic had a big role to play in that because for all of them, this was their first job out of college and their last years were spent remote,” McDonnell, 28, told The Post.
Starting their careers during a pandemic may have stunted Gen Z’s office etiquette.
In fact, 36% of survey respondents reported poor communication skills among their young hires.
“They all exhibited the same weird office behavior,” said Peter, who asked to withhold his last name for privacy reasons.
“They didn’t know how to conduct themselves in a business setting. I was taught how an office operates, whether it’s dealing with a hierarchy or just something as simple as when someone’s in front of you, you look them in the eye.”
Another major complaint was distractibility, with 36% of managers agreeing that Gen Z has a hard time concentrating.
“We would be on team calls, and you’d be able to tell that they were on their phones,” Alexis said.
“If we called on them, it was like deer in the headlights, and you could tell that they hadn’t been paying attention.”
An anonymous electrical construction manager agrees their phone addiction hurts office culture: “They are phone zombies. The lunchroom used to be a blast — talking s–t was part of the fun. Now most just keep their head down and scroll.”
In the study, 37% of managers also dinged their Gen Z employees for displaying a lack of effort.
“Anytime a customer would come in even remotely close to closing time, [they would] be doing anything to get that person out of the office quicker,” Peter said.
“I mean, you’re in customer service with zero interest in helping the customer?”
Many bosses are also reporting that, even though Gen Z are the new kids on the block, they’re demanding special provisions.
In fact, 21% of managers reported entitlement is an issue with new hires.
“They just have very different expectations when starting a new job,” Matthew Dearden, 35 — who oversees dozens of Gen Z employees working in enrollment at a university in Ohio — told The Post.
“They want to determine when and how they do work.”
“I’d say that’s the biggest difference, whereas even millennials and prior generations understood that you come to work and you do what your employer asks of you.”
Nathan Punwani, a physician from Arizona who works with Gen Z residents, told The Post that this attitude is even creeping into the medical field: “They start actually asking for things like, ‘Oh, I don’t want to see patients.’ When I was in their shoes, I wouldn’t ever respond that way to any of my supervisors when they told me to do something. I would actually do it, no questions asked.”
He also reports that “disinhibition” with superiors is an issue.
“I’ve had residents call me by my first name, and it just feels a little odd because one of the things about medicine is that you do need to create some kind of a hierarchy,” Punwani said.
“When you have that kind of informality, it makes supervision harder. There are some certain red lines.”
And managers are noticing that it’s difficult to give feedback.
In fact, 35% said Gen Z workers are too easily offended.
“It takes a little bit more patience to deal with them,” Danny, who works in marketing and manages three Gen Z employees in Chicago, told The Post.
(He asked to withhold his surname for privacy reasons.)
“You have to be careful because I do think they’re a little bit more fragile and sensitive. And you have to deal with their attitude if they don’t take the feedback well.”
Employers are also finding that Gen Z hires tend to be more easily offended on the political front.
In fact, a 2022 Deloitte survey found that, despite having only just entered the workforce, 37% of Gen Zers say they’ve already rejected a job or assignment based on their personal ethics.
“Our Gen Z employees dominated our culture with social justice fundamentalism,” Matt, the leader of a nonprofit in Colorado who withheld his last name, told The Post.
“What is initiated by the 25-year-old comms manager is then adopted by previously rational Harvard and Yale types who begin leveling accusations of ‘white supremacist colonialism.’”
Because Gen Zers are bringing their politics into the workplace, more and more employers report that they’re walking on eggshells — and even fearful of their own subordinates.
“I’m a normal human being and certainly not an angry racist or homophobe or anything like that, but I don’t know where the line is,” Peter said, “and it feels like with the younger generation, the line keeps getting redrawn every day.”
