So I’m reading my business school alumni magazine (unfortunately not available online) and there is an article about Millennials (people born roughly from 1981-2001). The oldest who are now entering the workforce and graduate schools. So it got me thinking - do you notice a difference between people under 25 and 25-45 (Gen-X)?
My own observations (FTR, I am comparing people <25 in the workforce now against how I remember peers when I was the same age):
Gen-X:
-More independent - we seem to have a “I know what I’m doing, now let me work” attitude
-Edgier - we tend to be a bit more sarcastic and “meaner” in our humor
-More jaded - I don’t think we were lazy, but we have more of a “meh…it’s a living” attitude
Millennials:
-Less independent - they tend to need to be told what and how to do things.
-Fragile - they tend to take disappointment or being corrected very badly.
-Eager to please -
This is consistant with much of what I’ve read about both generations. While Gen-X raised themselves as “latchkey” kids, Millennials have typically been overscheduled all their lives. They are used to being told what to do, when and how, while Gen-X has always been pretty much left to our own devices.
My wife is a college professor (and a first-wave Gen-Xer). She and her colleagues noticed the change about three years ago. Some of the professors even had to retool their lectures to accomodate the change in student attitudes.
Their observations pretty much matched what you’re describing. The Millennials tend to be less independent and more group-oriented. They’re more respectful of authority and less likely to challenge authority. They’re hard workers but like to have everything spelled out for them so they know exactly what’s expected of them.
My wife loves 'em to pieces. She thinks it’s great that they’re not slacker bums like we were.
Well the major difference for me (Gen X) is that almost no one in my generation thinks that wearing your pants practically around your ankles is cool, while Gen Y obviously regards this as the height of fashion.
Re: the OP, As a Millennial, I’m confused by this. Could you spell out what you mean, exactly, so I know what I should be posting? I wouldn’t want to be censured or something, that’d be painful. I’m eager to help, here - so speak your mind, Mr. Authority, sir!
Gen Yer, or Millennial, checking in here (born 1984). Generation X is usually roughly counted as the generation born between 1961 and 1981. I’ve noticed differences between the two groups, which will no doubt grow further as the Gen Xers grow older and the Gen Yers begin to have societal influence. Gen Yers tend to be more materialistic, pehaps fitting for a generation born in the status and money-hungry '80s. They’re also more wired, having worked with computers and other technology almost literally from the cradle. Gen Xers display some of the same self-absorption that characterized their parents, the Baby Boomers – they’re fascinated by themselves and by their culture, by all the things (music, movies, TV, etc.) that were current during their formative years. Gen Xers have this image of themselves as rebel slackers, Gen Yers are more nakedly ambitious but work well in groups.
I was born in 1981, and as someone on the “cusp” I can definitely see that people even just a bit younger than me are less independent. Many of them want to stay in their hometowns forever and have less ability or interest in pursuing new things without approval from parents, teachers, etc. Everything has to be scheduled and they are less tolerant of free time. I chalk this up to the upswing in SAHMing; kids with two working parents have to entertain themselves more often and as a result are better independent thinkers. My sister (born in 1989) won’t move a muscle without getting confirmation from our parents, her friends, and like a million other sources. Gen-Xers are more like “lone wolves.” Parents of Ms, because they’re not filthy free-thinking hippies, are less accepting of differences between their kids and others, which leads to the Borg mentality. I also think Ms are more conservative than Xers, not necessarily politically but in their actions. I see a lot of parallels between fifties teens and kids today, whereas Xers were more like the hippies in their free-thinking independent spirit. I don’t weep for this (my?) generation, but I do think it’s gearing up to be a pretty boring generation.
Really? I thought this was the height of fashion in the mid-90s. It was already becoming passe when I was out of high school.
Or Fight Club
It’s really the need for approval and lack of independent thought I’ve noticed the most with the Millennials at work. They make great drones. Give them a list of tasks and they complete them as quickly and efficiently as possible. But if an iota of independent reasoning is required they shut down.
My girlfriend also noticed that with the <25 set she manages. When she has to correct them, they mope and complain to her boss that she’s “mean”. Ironically, she is actually one of the sweetest people so it upsets her greatly when her boss yells at her for her “meaness”. On the other hand, I am a legitimately mean, or at the very least short-tempered, especially when I have to cover for incompetence, so I imagine I would scare the crap out of them.
I must admit this is very interesting. I’m a Millenial born in 83 and I couldn’t wait to get out of town and I’m trying to buck the work force to work for myself asap. But this could be perhaps because I have 4 older Gen X siblings.
I think the fact that we’re more social and group oriented is probably influenced by the pervasiveness of communication technology. Cell phones on everyone’s hip and the Internet is everywhere and was for much of our childhood.
Actually The Big Chill doesn’t apply very well to younger Boomers. Coming of age in the late 1970s was quite a bit different from doing so in the 1960s. Though I always have liked that movie nonetheless.
In the book, The Fourth Turning, at one point they describe the dynamics between generations with a OT Star Wars analogy. The book has its own generational archetypes too: artist, hero,prophet, and nomad.
Obi Wan Kenobi - Boomer (Prophet)
Han Solo - Gen X (Nomad)
Luke Skywalker - Gen Y (Hero)
I like this analogy because I’m Gen X and I think Han Solo is cool.
Freshman comp wench here, born 1976, started teaching in 2000. As much as I usually dislike this sort of stereotyping, I have to admit I think there’s something in it. My perception of the current crop of college students is that they’re far more docile and passive than our generation, and they don’t “get” irony and dark humor very well. (I showed Dr. Strangelove to a couple of my classes in 2002; only one kid got it, and he was a senior who had somehow managed to put off freshman comp until the last possible moment.) Most of them think they are entitled to As for expressing conventional sentiments in a gramatically correct manner, rather than saying them anything particularly original or extraordinary, and they think anything less than an A is a poor grade. On the bright side, they’re probably much easier students to have in the classroom than my peers and I were, as they’re not much given to arguing for the sake of arguing.
I hadn’t thought about the over-parenting hypothesis, but that makes a lot of sense. (For what it’s worth, after the Dr. Strangelove incident I developed a theory that the differences had something to do with whether you could remember the Cold War or not, but I can’t for the life of me remember what my line of reasoning was. I also think the prevalence of standardized testing and grade inflation in the schools is a big contributing factor.)
Of course, all of these are huge sweeping generalizations, and they may reflect the differences between a selective liberal arts college and a big state university more than anything. YMMV.
It’s a natural inclination for people to identify traits that are different and label them bad. My generation may have an inclination to marry younger, but lots of the Gen Xers indulged in casual, meaningless sex. My generation may be docile, but the Gen Xers can be loudly individualistic without having much to say or anything to stand for. Like every generation, there’s a mix of good and bad traits. I personally think my generation’s going to shape up into fabulous adults: civic-minded, ambitious, cooperative.
I was born in '82 and I constantly feel like I belong to both and neither. Although people under 20 seriously seem to be a completely different species than me. I don’t get the vast majority of their stuff, but I’m aware of (some of) it instead of being completely oblivious.
Within these specific stereotypes that people have posted in this thread, I feel more like a Gen Xer, but not quite.
All I know is that in college, my profs loved me because they could mock my classmates (age-wise) and I’d agree (like them whining that they paid a lot of money for this class, why aren’t they getting an A? Or when they’d come to me for writing tutoring and get upset that yes, I found things wrong with their papers and didn’t just say “This is WONDERFUL, you are so awesome!”). So maybe I’m just not an idiot or a jerk.
They also have some traits in common with those generations:
Obi Wan Kenobi - Boomer (Prophet) - Wacky old ex-hippy
Han Solo - Gen X (Nomad) - Cool, hip guy with badass ride
Luke Skywalker - Gen Y (Hero) - Whiney, approval seeking pussy
Millennials are the culmination of decades of grade inflation and “helicopter” parenting (parents who always “hover” around). I have to think the enevitable result is a generation that will take longer to mature. They aren’t immature in a Gen-X “I don’t want to grow up and join the daily grind” kind of way. It’s more of a sheltered, lack of independence, childish kind of immaturity.
I wonder if they are going to encounter difficulties when they start entering the workforce. On the one hand, they are very docile and eager. On the other, they don’t take criticism well and when people’s money or job is at stake, they tend to be less forgiving or coddling. I imagine many of them may have a tough time once they realize that the real world does not have grade inflation.
As a Gen X’er I have to say I think you nailed it with this. While I believe there are certain generational generalizations that can be made; it is a mistake to attribute positive or negative values to these traits in and of themselves. The reason for this is that even when certain traits can be identified as being more or less prominent within a given generation, that tells you nothing about how, and to what degree these traits are being expressed.
As an example, there seems to be an agreement that the X’ers and M’s tend to fall on opposite ends off the independence-social spectrum. That’s all well and good and personally I think it’s a fairly valid generalization. What it doesn’t tell you is how those traits are being expressed. As Gen Ex’ers are we self-sufficient individualists or are we anti-social misanthropes? The Gen M’s? Are they needy sheep or do they tend to form cohesive social groups?
As Mississippienne said, we often identify with those who share traits similar to ours and often have difficulty relating to those who’s traits are different and thus label their traits as negative. To expand on this, I would assert that generations qualify ‘sub-cultures’ [small c] of their own and thus when generations interact there can often be a degree of culture clash with the expected social mis-cues. A parallel to this would be the stereotypical clash between the loud, brash American and the cold, aloof Japanese, which while certainly a broad stereotype [not to mention that the labels freely switch depending on the situation] can often cause interaction problems due to these cultural miscues.
Basically, the “edgy” Gen X’er notes that the Gen M’s are fragile and thin skinned while the Gen M’er notes that Gen X’s are assholes.
Furthermore, many of the posting Gen X’s noted that the Gen M’ers need far more oversight and ‘hand-holding’ to accomplish a task. I wonder though, how much of this perceived phenomenon is attributable to a difference in styles as regards to leadership/management. My basis for this theory is… well, pretty much everything that I wrote above. However, I have had some luck applying it in the workplace. For a while I frequently despaired that the subordinates I was dealing with just weren’t of the same quality that I had come to expect. In short, they didn’t function like me. If I wanted anything done I’d have to spell it out step by step to start them off and give additional guidance anytime something came up that required independent thought. It got to the point where I was pretty much ready to write off the lot of them off as sheep, good for coloring in the lines but that’s about it.
What changed things for me was watching how the younger Gen M’ers functioned when dealing with Gen M superiors. The Gen M’ers got a lot more work out of their Gen M subordinates then I did and with a lot less effort. The difference was that they were speaking the same language; while we both delegated responsibilities, their overall model was more cooperative whereas I had always preferred separate little bubbles of responsibility working more or less independently. Eventually, I realized that I needed to learn to try learn to speak their language, get a better sense of their values, “culture,” etc. Naturally at the same time I’ve been working to explain my “language” to them so they can better understand my signals. It’s not a quick process but I’ve gotten better, and as results I’ve had a lot fewer problems.
In any case, this has gone on far too long for what was originally intended as a short “good point” so I’ll stop. In conclusion, I believe that the differences between generations can be more accurately described as differences in values and styles rather then positive and negative traits. That and it helps to remember that not long ago people despaired about the coming generation of disrespectful, apathetic, slacker Gen X’ers.
Good post, and some interesting observations. It seems to me that Gen Xers still have this image of themselves as rebels, cynical and jaded, who are going to shake up the complacent world of their parents. But it’s 2006, the oldest Gen Xers are in their forties, even the youngest are going to be hitting thirty soon. Meanwhile, the oldest Gen Yers are just now entering the workforce and universities, while the youngest are in middle schools. They’re just now beginning to make an impact on the world, as the Gen Xers find themselves becoming the responsible adults.
I really wonder how the mindset of the Gen Yers is going to affect the culture in the next 10-20 years. Ours was the first truly “wired” generation, the first generation raised under the spectre of AIDS, the threat of terrorism. We’re also part of the mini-Baby Boom, only slightly smaller (72 million vs. 76 million ) than the famous Baby Boom generation. Are we going to be a weird mismash of the Boomers and Gen X? Or something entirely new?
