Could we learn from Gen-Z’s approach to the workplace?
Not according to acclaimed actress Jodie Foster, who finds their approach annoying — lackluster work, incomplete hours, and a reluctance to put in effort.
One reader argues, that Gen Z’s ‘I can’t be bothered’ work attitude inconveniences others. Not everyone lives to work, but what about professionalism or desire to move up the career ladder?
Read on to see what readers think about this issue, among others.
Your columnist and self-confessed millennial Louis Staples says members of Generation Z – roughly born from the mid-to-late 1990s until around the mid-2000s – get a bad rap (Metro, Wed).
He was writing in response to actress Jodie Foster, who said their workplace attitude was ‘annoying’ – coming in late if they felt like it, and describing proper grammar and correct spelling in emails as ‘limiting’.
Louis says we should admire their refusal to join the rat race and burn themselves out just to please the boss.
I’m afraid Louis is completely wrong.
I know several Gen Zers whose attitude to work was simply ‘I can’t be bothered, you do it’ (even threatening to leave if they had to work more than two hours of an eight-hour day), meaning those of us with a more professional attitude to work had to take up their slack.
How will things ever get done if we just decided not to be bothered today?
Also, they may, as Louis says, have a different attitude to social issues but so do we all, because times have changed and many of us had already changed our outlook long before they came along. Paul, London
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Louis talks about unpaid overtime. Quite right, don’t do it. But Foster was saying they don’t do their contracted hours and then produce shoddy work. Snork, via Metro.co.uk
Foster is talking about the movie industry, a super-competitive field. She’s saying that if you’re not willing to put in the work, you’ll be overlooked in favour of those who will work hard.
The ‘why should I work hard?’ attitude is all well and good, until you realise you’ve been working at the bottom of the ladder for 40 years. Laika, via Metro.co.uk
I’m a millennial and a lot of Gen Z folk work alongside me. Broadly speaking, they turn up, do their jobs and want to do well.
Turning up late, sending poorly written emails, not communicating etc are all things that it’s reasonable to have a problem with. Likewise, staying late, failing to take breaks and being stressed is also unreasonable. Comparing extremes is silly.Ryan, via Metro.co.uk
Robert in Leeds (MetroTalk, Wed) believes young people voted Remain because they have been ‘taught to loathe their own country’ by the ‘neo-liberals who have hijacked our schools, colleges and universities’.
‘Brainwashed’, he suggests. Yes, Robert, ‘brainwashed’ because they’d like to experience the freedom to study and work freely in neighbouring countries, just like their parents did.
Robert seems to regard wanting us to be an important contributor to the world – rather than isolationist – as being a betrayal. As if his brand of politics was self-certifiably the most patriotic.
I’ll think of his ‘patriotism’ when I go to work for my British company supplying 500 British manufacturers and despair at the delays at the border holding up production lines. And I’ll think of it when I pay the £5,000 increased costs for customs declarations. Joe, London
Robert thinks the younger generation voted to stay within the EU because we hate the UK.
Typical Brexiteer rubbish. It’s because we have the brains to realise our geopolitical position in the world and not be blinded by a dated, post-colonial view.Simon, Leighton Buzzard
Robert, teaching kids that Britain terrorised and exploited most of the world for centuries in the name of king, queen and country is more realistic than telling them ‘great’ Britain built railways in Third World countries, ‘discovered’ new lands and ‘convinced’ the natives to speak English, become Christian and pay tax to a foreign monarch. Tom Red, East London
MORE : I’ve managed Gen-Zs. Yes they’re annoying in the workplace – but they’re also right
MORE : Jodie Foster faces backlash after blistering criticism of Gen Z
MORE : The ironic reason Gen Z are ageing faster than millennials
