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Millennials - Not worth employing

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Red Squirrel said:
That's a good point, not sure why the states are so obsessed with those. Lot of smart people smoke weed.

One of our best networking techs smoked weed regularly. Weed and Tim Horton's basically kept him going lol. Really nice guy and he knew his shit.
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It's how good the government propaganda has been for decades. Anyone who ingests thc must be a lazy good for nothin bum. Facts be damned.
 
Fact is that if you end up with bad employees on a consistent basis, the problem isn't the employees it's the people making the hiring decisions.

Having said that, it is very difficult to find a good employee.
 
Captante said:
Fact is that if you end up with bad employees on a consistent basis, the problem isn't the employees it's the people making the hiring decisions.

Having said that, it is very difficult to find a good employee.
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Agree - but also because any good employee is smart enough to know when they are getting shafted.

Which means, 2% raises with minimal benefits won't cut it for keeping them around long-term. If you really value an employer because of their good work that means bringing a money-clip to the table.
 
s0me0nesmind1 said:
Agree - but also because any good employee is smart enough to know when they are getting shafted.

Which means, 2% raises with minimal benefits won't cut it for keeping them around long-term. If you really value an employer because of their good work that means bringing a money-clip to the table.
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It's also very difficult to KEEP a good employee!
 
The generation you are talking about is technically Gen Z. Billie EIlish floods their playlists and it is likely they never had to touch a flip phone. Or see in their elementary schools vintage Apples that had floppy disks and Oregon Trail, all with text. Then middle school comes and they have iMac G3s. Or see Pokemon in its inaugural season, hear Britney Spears' Crazy in a movie trailer, get spammed Macarena, Shania Twain, have AOL discs come in the mail, live without Youtube, see Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, had to hear Y2K hype, desire to be a paleontologist because it was the only interesting thing back then.....

The generation of Back to the Future is now in control of the senior positions of the world. That subsequent generations can still "feel" and relate to that movie in indicative that the youth upbringing then and now is still more similar than different even though technology has changed substantially for the common man since that time.


A 23 year old now would likely be the spawn of Generation X.
 
Torn Mind said:
Weed guzzlers are very savage negotiators and low-key aggressive.
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I believe the point was that picking an employee based on a failed test for weed by itself is just dumb .... along with MANY of the other common methods used arbitrarily to make hiring decisions.
 
Raizinman said:
We spoke with him and he confided to us that he just wants a paycheck without having to do any real work.
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People might stereotype that this is typical of millennials, but for someone to state that about "without having to do any real work", you were instead dealing with an idiot (to state that rather than only think it) and those come in all age groups.

He told me that for the first two months he just let the information go by and did not pay any real attention.
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Seems like the training needs to involve some testing to determine how much info was retained, maybe weekly.

Keep in mind that someone of the age where they recently graduated from college, may have never had a work ethic and went to college to avoid having a real job for a few more years. It is curious that you went with a BA grad rather than BS? Is it an undesirable job where it was hard to find candidates? Or the pay is too low?

Was there a clear job description up front of what this position entailed? Possibly he had a misconception about that and after training started, he realized it wasn't what he thought it would be.

This is the second time this happened with someone in this age range
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Maybe hire people based on a resume that demonstrates they have been able to hold a job doing similar technical work, has had adult responsibilities if you want them to act like an adult. Graduating from college is not something unique today, hardly means what it did 50 years ago. Sometimes I wonder if it's the opposite today, that someone who had to support themselves for 4+ years instead of going to college, has a better grasp of how to meet employer expectations.
 
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Raizinman said:
I run a highly technical profitable company. I placed an ad looking for a new employee. A college graduate (BA) applied, age 23. He passed the drug test, driving test and appeared to be a really good candidate. We hired him and start his training. He would require 3 to 4 months of training before he can even start a job. His first two months went very good. I’ll have to say that the first two months are basically sitting and listening with virtually no hands on. In month 3 we start with some hands on training. He basically forgot everything we taught him. We took him on a job and asked him to just assist and he was completely worthless. We spoke with him and he confided to us that he just wants a paycheck without having to do any real work. He told me that for the first two months he just let the information go by and did not pay any real attention. We explained that he cannot work here. He begged and begged for us to reconsider, but we said that this company is profitable because we just don’t hand out paychecks to people who don’t deserve it. He still didn’t understand why he can’t work here. This is the second time this happened with someone in this age range. Are all 20 to 30 year olds like this? I would estimate that his best bet of employment would be fast food.
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He's young. He made a mistake. I really don't like putting people into these categories. I'm GenX and I can remember when people were saying that all GenX were lazy, pot smoking punks. Of course, this was not the case. I'm sure that there are plenty of young people who would be exceotional workers. Some times you have to get thru the bad before you can get to the good.
 
My dad is a boomer. Back in the 80s, one of his co-workers at a chemical factory he worked at would clock in for the night shift and sleep in a cot he had set up in a storage closet for 8 hours before going home. Maybe he was looking for a gig like that. Anyway, that factory shut down.
 
We hired a few staff at the beginning of the year that were in their mid-20s and this was their first full-time job. They came into the office for about a month before we were sent to work from home. 1 of them, who we were really impressed with at the interview showed some bad habit signs from the get go. My Director walked by her cube on her first or second day and she had her feet on the desk and was browsing her phone. When we started working from home, during our weekly check-ins she would either log in late or not at all. When we came back to the office full-time, she wouldn't produce work on the deadline and was constantly late. We eventually let her go.

The other guy, our 2nd choice, is awesome and is doing fine. Always on time, always asking questions after he's researched and still doesn't understand the subject and his work product (staff reports) has been great.

Honestly, for the one we let go, if we hadn't been sent home to work, we may have been able to identify the work habits and helped correct it. Being their first time job and having the ability to WFH, probably encouraged them to slack off and create some bad work habits.
 
Mai72 said:
He's young. He made a mistake. I really don't like putting people into these categories. I'm GenX and I can remember when people were saying that all GenX were lazy, pot smoking punks. Of course, this was not the case. I'm sure that there are plenty of young people who would be exceotional workers. Some times you have to get thru the bad before you can get to the good.
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I was a lazy GenX pot smoking punk!
Thats what you are before you grow up. Don't expect people starting out in life to care more about your business than their life.
Yeah I'm pretty hard working now but even now my life is way more important that some guys business.
 
tbh I don't believe in all of the Millenial garbage. Every generation has slackers; they're just more visible now because of the Internet, where the Vocal Minority has a platform. Which in practice mostly means older people whining about younger people haha.

That plus individual maturity is such a variable thing. One of my top go-to contractors that I hire for my IT programming projects is 23, and I've been working with him since he got out of high school. Delivers on time & does a phenomenal job. Me, on the other hand, I'm perpetually disorganized, so I'm not one to talk! Hahaha
 
How was it determined that the first two months went well? Seems at odds with discovering in month 3 that the training was not retained. Or maybe it was adequately tested throughout but moving on to another topic removed any opportunity to reinforce the earlier training for the long term.

Not really important but out of curiosity - what industry is this, was his degree specifically a BA or is that just how you were referencing a college graduate, and what was his degree in?
 
I feel it goes both ways.

These days companies do not care at all about their employees. You're just a number and they'll drop you at any moment's notice if they can find a cheaper alternative.

So if employers don't care about employees, then why should employees care about them? They will show up and do their job. Nothing more, nothing less.

Simply wanting a job that gives you enough money to buy a house is considered "self entitled" these days which is ridiculous. All most millennials want is to be able to get the same life boomers had. Having a job, a house, and living comfortably. But this is hard to get now because everything costs way more. You are expected to have tons of education and papers etc, and even then you are lucky to even get a decent paying job.
 
Red Squirrel said:
I feel it goes both ways.

These days companies do not care at all about their employees. You're just a number and they'll drop you at any moment's notice if they can find a cheaper alternative.

So if employers don't care about employees, then why should employees care about them? They will show up and do their job. Nothing more, nothing less.

Simply wanting a job that gives you enough money to buy a house is considered "self entitled" these days which is ridiculous. All most millennials want is to be able to get the same life boomers had. Having a job, a house, and living comfortably. But this is hard to get now because everything costs way more. You are expected to have tons of education and papers etc, and even then you are lucky to even get a decent paying job.
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Heh, you have to care as an employee just enough to beat out the other candidates when competing for the job.

Then you have to perform just well enough at the job to not be canned 😉

It's a delicate balance.
 
s0me0nesmind1 said:
Heh, you have to care as an employee just enough to beat out the other candidates when competing for the job.

Then you have to perform just well enough at the job to not be canned 😉

It's a delicate balance.
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Pretty much. Give your 100%. 10% on Monday, 20% on Tuesday, 30% on Wednesday, 40% on Thursday, and take Friday off. 😛
 
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