First off, the usual writer's apology for a 2-week absence. Not a day goes by that I don't wish for a technological advance that would allow me to dictate blogs from my brain to my computer telepathically.  This would make my shower time much more productive, since I currently waste that 7 minutes of my day singing old Mental as Anything songs (from the seminal Creatures of Leisure album, in case you're interested).  

I'd probably blog more if I weren't so bloody verbose.  Thank you, grade 9 typing!

Anyway.

The other week I was asked to take part in a focus group about a new website aimed at Gen Y-aged job-seekers. (About which I should probably not go into too much detail.  They didn't make any of us sign an NDA or anything - though they probably should have - but I'll probably run into the organizers again one day and they won't thank me for giving away all their ideas.  Anyway, it's not really important for the purposes of this blog.)

For part of the session, I was alone in a room with 8 or 10 Gen Yers.  Some were in their last year of university; some were freshly graduated (a couple had both BAs and MBAs); some were a year or two out of school.  All of them were the kind of Type A Overachievers who'd been in student government (probably in high school as well as university); written for the university paper; and started a website and/or a business during school.

(You know, the sort you either hate (because they're just so darn popular and overachieving) or kind of like (because they're The Leaders of Tomorrow and have gobs of charisma) or recognize and feel sympathetic towards (because you yourself were in student government and a frosh leader and worked on the paper and you know just how paper-thin the confidence can be).  I'll let you guess where I sit on that continuum.)

I've participated in and facilitated a fair amount of focus groups in my time, and I'll say this about a roomful of Type-A Overachievers:  They may drive the wallflowers nuts, but they're good at articulating their thoughts (and they have a lot to say, so you get a lot of their thoughts in an hour).

Like most people in recruitment marketing - and as a Douglas Coupland-raised Gen Xer - I've read a lot about Gen Ys in the past few years (and I've even written about their effect on corporate philanthropy), but this was the first time in a while that I'd seen a group of them up-close and personal, and listened to their answers about what it's like to be entering the workforce or taking the first tentative steps towards a career.

(Now, before you say anything, I'll admit:  I know a roomful of overachievers with BAs and MBAs isn't a representative sample of the larger Gen Y workforce.  But let's be honest for a second here:  When most of us are thinking about/blogging about/talking about recruiting and retaining Gen Ys, aren't we mostly talking about how to get hold of exactly these candidates?  The ones with post-secondary educations, who are most likely to be A-list employees in the long-term?  And here in Canada, where more than 40% of Gen Ys engage in post-secondary education, it's not like university grads are an elite minority.  Though to be honest when I looked up that stat, I was a little surprised - I was sure that the post-secondary education levels were significantly higher than 40%. Weren't you?)

THE SURPRISING THINGS I LEARNED ABOUT GEN Ys:

1. They are desperate for mentors
   These are kids who were friends with their parents in ways that we (Gen X and older) never were.  They're used to having an adult they like helping them navigate the world.  But now that they're out of school and choosing careers - about which their parents may know nothing and therefore can't help - they're kind of lost for guidance.  We aren't reaching out to them because they seem so confident that we think they don't need (or want) us.  But they do.
   
   
2. They're scared to fail
   These are kids whose every word, step, poop and dance recital was applauded, announced, videographed and trumpeted as the Second Coming.  Now that they're adults, they're beginning to realize - and accept - that the world isn't going to congratulate them for successfully wearing matching socks.  But they have so little experience of failure that they're scared to death of it.
   
   
3. The peer pressure is brutal
   For those of us who graduated in, say, 1991 with an English degree, just getting a job was enough.  The recession had been going on seemingly for ages, we were all working for peanuts at crap jobs, and we really only knew what our own circle of friends was doing, so peer pressure was minimal.
   
   These kids have been hearing stories from older siblings about getting $80k-a-year jobs (which did exist a couple of years ago), the internet gives them access to a huge network of people at their lifestage (some of whom are still snagging great jobs or making huge salaries), and the media has filled their heads with stories of other 22-year-olds who invent some social networking site that they sell 3 years later for $1.9 billion.  So when all they see in front of them is a $40k-a-year job as an Assistant-Something, they begin to think that they're the only one their age who's 'sucking'.
   
   
4. They don't realize that the marketplace has negative stereotypes about them
   When I mentioned that recruiters and employers often think that Gen Ys have a sense of entitlement, don't work beyond 9-to-5, and come into a job expecting to be running the company within a year, there was shocked - and nervous - laughter around the table.   
   
   Not only do they not think of themselves this way, they were surprised to learn that potential employers might see them this way.  They think of themselves as hard workers who are just waiting for the opportunity to prove themselves - in other words, they think of themselves the way every new-to-the-workforce generation has thought of themselves since the dawn of time.
   
    
5. In some ways, they're just as green as we ever were
   We tend to believe that this internet generation is more savvy than we were - that they're entering the workforce with more knowledge and confidence or something.  And sure, they have more access to information than we ever did:  They can find and apply to more jobs (via the internet), they can better prepare for interviews by Googling a potential employer, and the internet is awash in resume templates.
   
   But in some very basic ways, they're still as ignorant as we were:  Remember when you didn't know how 'headhunters' worked, or who paid them?  Remember when you didn't have a 'network'?  Remember thinking, in the first year of your first job, that you hated it but now you were 'stuck' in this career forever?  Gen Ys may have a superficial confidence and swagger, but it's often masking #2 and #3, above.
   
   Which brings us right back to #1.

You know, I learned something else from the focus group:  I learned I kinda liked these kids.  (I'm also a bit shocked that I think of them as 'kids', because I clearly remember that at age 22 I totally thought I was a fully-formed adult.  And now I can't believe my parents didn't laugh their heads off at some of my 20-something pronouncements about life.)

A couple of them approached me after the focus group to talk about their careers, and said they'd follow up by email or phone - and I hope they do, because I find myself much more interested in helping them start/advance their careers than I used to be.