Rethink Work by Eric Termuende

Author:Eric Termuende
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Barlow Publishing

Seeing the Individual

I think it is time to drop the stereotypes behind the Millennial label. They are not real, or authentic. The articles on Millennials do not describe all people my age, nor do articles on other generations capture everything about them. And when companies put out well-meaning reports on Millennials that play off the stereotype, I just have to laugh—and I’m not the only one.

Why, for instance, do they define a generation in terms of a fifteen-year cohort? If you see the Millennials in terms of their use of technology, that fifteen-year definition does not make much sense. Technology is changing fast and delivering new life-changing services like Facebook at a dizzying rate. So why not shrink the span of a generation—to six years, or even six months?

In fact, bottom line: age does not matter. What matters are values—the things people care about.

So here’s a novel idea: why don’t we treat employees (and all people) as human beings? Maybe some of them have things in common, but those are probably not defined by their age. Some might be introverts who like to fiddle with numbers in a quiet office; others get their joy from connecting with people, exchanging stories, and moving step by step toward the big sale.

If we start treating people as individuals, not as members of a stereotyped generation, we may find that there is a better chance of recruiting the right person for a job. When reaching out to a customer who happens to be age thirty, we may find our pitch is more successful if we listen to him as an individual, instead of checking off the boxes of a corporate profile of his generation.

Companies that find ways to connect with employees, partners, and customers of my generation as individual people will be successful. Companies that think the way to learn about these people is through expensive surveys may find that the “real” people in that age group are deserting them.

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