Are Gen Z Changing The Traditions Of The Corporate World
The world during and after Covid sparked a lot of conversation, not only relating to our daily lives, but also our working lives. From home working, to pay, to expectations within the workplace, it’s becoming more and more apparent that the average employee and even employer is starting to see room for flexibility within the workplace. Particularly within the corporate world.
However, what our corporations didn’t account for was the generation known as Gen Z and it’s “controversial” opinions on working when compared to its baby boomer and Generation X counterparts.
Throughout time, the general consensus agreed upon by society was to gain success you would be required to put in the justifiable hard work. This seemingly reasonable principle was skewed over time, inevitably resulting in an unhealthy hustle culture developed by society. Whereby success was only determined by how much dedication you had for the corporation in which you worked for and how willing you were to give up any sense of work life balance.
This alone contributed to the decline in the mental health of employees within the workplace, a rise in burnout and a rise in CEOs taking advantage of hard working individuals through demanding working hours and low salaries when making a side by side comparison on what the job role actually entails.
The likes of Covid and working from home schemes were just the tip of the iceberg for this generation when it came to realizing that these once standard corporate regulations were actually less necessary than what we had been led to believe. However, this stretches so much further than the realization that you can be just as productive working from home as you can in the office.
Young entrepreneur success stories, social media and the increase in passive income opportunities has opened many gateways to the young generation’s earning possibilities, and has also got them questioning the fairness of giving up precious time in exchange for a cheque.
The ethical landscape of the corporate world is also under ongoing and increasing scrutiny with the questioning of workplace culture in the likes of Amazon, Blizzard etc. where working conditions and employee treatment is constantly being questioned.
All of these combining factors and a list of many others, including underpaid and over demanding job roles, unrealistic performance expectations and the increasing examples of unfair dismissals have certainly got some people protesting. These protests have been made apparent through social media such as anti work discords, reddit and tweet threads and the never ending debates in comment sections.
Some would argue that the reasoning behind these protests is due to the up and coming generation lacking work ethic and the inability to take basic orders. I would argue however, that this is a generation that has pinpointed the endless opportunities outside of the traditional 9-5 work life. They have recognised the difficulty it is to climb the corporate ladder in today’s modern age and the sacrifices that are required in order to do so.
For many years employees followed the traditional blueprint of the corporate world, solely for the reason that it was the norm within society. Statements like “you’re not supposed to like your job” being accepted as a way of life and the understanding that CEOs of these corporate giants seeing you as just a resource or a number was not just acceptable, but also expected!
As Generation Z moves into this landscape with the upperhand of reading the stories and experiences of those screwed over by this traditional way of working. They no longer want to fit into that mold and have a fresh understanding that although they are being financially compensated, they in exchange, are giving up something just as valuable… TIME. Something seemingly underestimated by employers.
Whilst there won’t be any drastic or instant changes to the way we see these corporate industries function on a day by day basis. I do think Gen Z will be the force it needs to shift the movement of limited flexibility and appreciation within the workplace.
