Millennials Aren't Unicorns
by Sueños on 03/15/17
In his diatribe Simon Sinek makes the claim millennials want to, "Work in a place with purpose, [they] want to make an impact, and [they] want beanbags and free food." While his first two points are valid, that's literally something any ambitious person has wanted to do since the inception of the modern workplace. This isn't a brand new phenomenon created by 20 and 30 somethings entering the workforce. The last part of this claim, however, is complete nonsense. We don't want beanbags and free food, we want affordable healthcare packages, parental leave, and development. Literally the same things that people have wanted from their employers since the 1920's.
Do you really want to know how to lead any group effectively? Quit treating them like populations in a survey, and treat them like individuals. We're talking things like day one IDP's, celebration of each other's major life events, and instant feedback to performance with the aim of improvement. The symptoms we're dealing with come from a degradation of HR departments to an enforcement arm of management. HR departments used to essentially function as in house coaching and development; however, in trying to cut costs we've stripped them of this function. We're asking people to come to their jobs having already learned everything that's required of them. The problem with this mentality is that no one is teaching their employees how to perform, no one is coaching leaders on how to be better leaders. As baby boomers retire, if companies want top talent, they're going to have to develop it themselves.
In Simon Sinek's narrow argument he also neglects the huge impact of globalization. We're no longer just recruiting top talent from our backyard. We're looking to countries like China and India to provide it as well. Millennials are competing for positions on a global level, and companies are competing for talent on a global level. It's no longer good enough to have the best comp plan in your state or your country even, it's about putting together the best comp plan in the world.
Finally, we get to one of the most pressing issues of the modern work place -- work-life balance. For me it's as simple as this, if a company's employees are depressed or sad they aren't going to perform. Whether that's lack of sleep, poor nutrition, not enough exercise, whatever the issue is. If a company works their employee's so hard that they aren't meeting their basic needs, expect poor performance. The wellness movement that has swept over the tech industry shows exactly how game changing these policies can be. Most white collar jobs can basically be done anywhere, and it's important that we remind our employees to take good care of themselves, because someone can't show up to work if they're dead.
I guess what I find most frustrating about Simon Sinek's claims is the total cherry picking of facts without taking in their broader context. Millions of developing leaders saw his video, and in their efforts to lead millennials effectively, will get in their own way. It's the same game we've been playing there's just more competition, and a whole lot rookies. What they need is a good coach.
This is a guest post by one of our coaches Diego-Andreas. If you like this post, and want to see more like it, check out his blog at www.wonderingintomyself.com
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