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Gen Z in the workplace: Are they asking for too much or setting a new standard? · The SME Stream

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Kiyota.
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: daily podcast presented by the New Zealand Herald. Gen Z
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: can be credited with a few things, an uptick and
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: climate awareness, the ability to work any kind of technology,
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: and the revival of straight leg jeans, just to name
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  Speaker 2: a few. However, recruiters across the ditch in Australia have
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  Speaker 2: spoken out about gen Z graduates demands on employers, saying
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  Speaker 2: their arrogant expectations are living a bad taste in their
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  Speaker 2: boss's mouths. The oldest of the generation, born between nineteen
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: ninety seven and twenty twelve are twenty seven years old,
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  Speaker 2: so they are set to stick around in the workplace
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  Speaker 2: for quite some time. So are they in the wrong
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  Speaker 2: with their approach to work or are they actually onto something?
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  Speaker 2: Day on the Front Page, recruitment agency Robert Walters, CEO
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  Speaker 2: of Australia and and Z Sha Peters joins us to
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  Speaker 2: discuss the impact of our youngest generation of workers. First off, Shay,
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  Speaker 2: what can you tell me about gen Z's in the workplace?
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  Speaker 3: Gen Z quite a unique generation of individuals we've found
• 1:27
  Speaker 3: entering the workforce. They've come through at a time when
• 1:30
  Speaker 3: the global labor market has seen significant change. They've been
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: coming through university through COVID times. What that presents is
• 1:38
  Speaker 3: a generation of individuals that's done a lot of remote
• 1:41
  Speaker 3: working compared to their predecessors. They've seen a lot during
• 1:46
  Speaker 3: that time. They've seen a depressed labor market during COVID
• 1:49
  Speaker 3: with the world panicking. Then they've seen a boom labor
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  Speaker 3: market where supply definitely didn't meet the levels of demand
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  Speaker 3: that global workforces required at the time post COVID, and
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  Speaker 3: now we're seeing a macroeconomic situation that's really contracting the
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: labor market once again, and the leverage of the power
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  Speaker 3: dynamic and the employment relationship is shifting. So they're seen
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  Speaker 3: a lot in the space of two or three years.
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  Speaker 2: I've read an Aussie recruiter quoted as saying they've had
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  Speaker 2: kids saying to them, I'm not getting out of bed
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  Speaker 2: for less than one hundred K. Is this your experience?
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  Speaker 3: Not so much in New Zealand specifically, and New Zealand
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  Speaker 3: has they've always had lower salary expectations than Australia. I
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: haven't really seen that come through in Australia so much.
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  Speaker 3: In the one hundred grand space for newly qualified brads
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  Speaker 3: that would typically be highest paid grads. Well, probably you'll
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: probably see them in the areas of real school shortage.
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  Speaker 3: Like the professions legal has always one that's got a
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  Speaker 3: very high starting salary for grads, and then you see
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  Speaker 3: if they might go contracting and tech and they might
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  Speaker 3: get somewhere near that on an hourly ray. But these
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: are that's really outside the normal. I haven't really seen
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  Speaker 3: one hundred k being expected by too many graduates.
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  Speaker 2: What are some of the key differences between gen Z
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  Speaker 2: and any other employee?
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  Speaker 3: Do you think level of expectation of flexibility for one,
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  Speaker 3: because they came through a post COVID time. Also probably
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: level of expectation on leadership. It's a very different generation
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  Speaker 3: that doesn't necessarily respect leadership for a job title. Gen
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  Speaker 3: Z are far more purpose driven, and so what we're
• 3:32
  Speaker 3: seeing is that they're really looking for leaders to be
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  Speaker 3: truly inspiring and visionary and having a lot of empathy
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  Speaker 3: towards their staff and not all cases. Is this quite
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  Speaker 3: the reality in the workforce?
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  Speaker 2: Have gen X and millennials just put up with awful
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  Speaker 2: bosses for too long?
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  Speaker 3: Do you think, Ah, I don't know, I don't think so.
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  Speaker 3: But I do think that if you think the baby
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  Speaker 3: boomer generation and then gene X, they kind of come
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: through slightly more hierarchical tomes and they're used to they
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: used to hierarchy and working in those situations. But gen
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  Speaker 3: Z's didn'tly not seeing that didn't millennials put up with
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  Speaker 3: awful bosses. I'm going to say no because I'm one
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  Speaker 3: of them, so I'm gonna buyas for you on it.
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  Speaker 2: They're not bad, they're different, that's all.
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  Speaker 3: Like they're growing up in a world where they're probably
• 4:21
  Speaker 3: not going to buy a house, you ever going to
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  Speaker 3: be able to afford it.
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  Speaker 1: They've gone through COVID. I think they've just.
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  Speaker 2: Got a bigger sense of yolo than were And that's
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  Speaker 2: not a bad thing.
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  Speaker 4: It's just different.
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  Speaker 1: So I think older bosses are like, no, I worked
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  Speaker 1: a horrible job all my life.
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  Speaker 4: You should too, And the kids are saying no.
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  Speaker 2: There are reports of gen Z wanting the big bucks,
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  Speaker 2: like we've already said, maybe not in New Zealand, but
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  Speaker 2: making demands like working from home. Some apparently even state
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  Speaker 2: that as a condition of employment on their CVS. Do
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  Speaker 2: you think a kid just out of UNI with no
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  Speaker 2: work experience could be trusted to work from home.
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  Speaker 3: I don't know if it's a trust thing, but what
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  Speaker 3: they will miss out on is learning. You can't learn
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  Speaker 3: and develop if you're working from home full time. It's
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  Speaker 3: just impossible. Real workings in a job, as we all know,
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  Speaker 3: come from being on the desk, sitting, listening and hearing
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  Speaker 3: to others, actually doing the job. That's the real stuff.
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  Speaker 3: You can't get taught that stuff in online classrooms. So
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  Speaker 3: I think the level of expectation around staying from home
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  Speaker 3: one hundred percent of the time is just ridiculous. I
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  Speaker 3: think that is a throwback to when they're working, they're
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  Speaker 3: doing university full time, but that's just not the reality
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  Speaker 3: of life, and there's a real risk in that for
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  Speaker 3: that generation. So there's so many studies coming through that
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  Speaker 3: point to the fact that AI will take over a
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  Speaker 3: lot of hard skill roles and that's just the reality
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  Speaker 3: of what we're going to see. The real skill of
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  Speaker 3: an employee moving forwards are probably going to be their
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  Speaker 3: soft skills. So employers are now looking for employees with
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  Speaker 3: advanced soft skills because that's to be required from the
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  Speaker 3: next generation of working.
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  Speaker 2: And what kind of skills are those.
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  Speaker 3: Things like influencing relationship management, stakeholder stakeholder relationship management, being
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  Speaker 3: able to sit down and actually add value in a
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  Speaker 3: conversation and advise and partner. That's where the real value
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  Speaker 3: and an employee is going to be moving forwards, because
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  Speaker 3: if AI is going to and algorithms are going to
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  Speaker 3: do all this other hard skills stuff, the employee has
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  Speaker 3: to evolve. And it's almost like employee going back to
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  Speaker 3: the future. If you think about going back twenty or
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  Speaker 3: thirty years when technology was in his advanced and people
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  Speaker 3: had to use soft skills to be able to advance
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  Speaker 3: themselves and advance their own organizations and the global economy.
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  Speaker 3: I think that's what we're going to see moving forward.
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  Speaker 3: So if you're working from home full time, you're not
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  Speaker 3: going to have very good or advanced soft skills.
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  Speaker 2: Public Service Minister Nichola Willis has asked government departments to
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  Speaker 2: call their staff back to the office and to enforce
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  Speaker 2: stricter rules on working from home. She issued guidance to
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  Speaker 2: the Public Service Commissioner setting an expectation that working from
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  Speaker 2: home arrangements are not an entitlement and should be made
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  Speaker 2: by agreement. The overall theme is that good employers are
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  Speaker 2: taking active steps to ensure that working from home policies
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  Speaker 2: are fit for purpose. Do you support this? And should
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  Speaker 2: working from home kind of be viewed as a privilege
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  Speaker 2: rather than a right?
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  Speaker 3: Look? I support Nikola Willis in that statement because I'm
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  Speaker 3: of the same view. I'm all for flexibility in the
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: working environment. I'm all for working from home in the
• 7:46
  Speaker 3: environment when it suits both employee and employer. But I
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  Speaker 3: think that moving forwards, I think we're going to see
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  Speaker 3: the workforce far more likely to be working the likes
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: of four days from the office and maybe having one
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  Speaker 3: day's flexibility. We're already seeing global technology giants calling all
• 8:06
  Speaker 3: of their workers in back in full time. So I
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  Speaker 3: think the trend now that we're going to see is
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  Speaker 3: that instead of working from home two or three days
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  Speaker 3: a week, I think working from home will kind of
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  Speaker 3: be reduced down on the Norman and the majority to
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  Speaker 3: about a day a week.
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  Speaker 2: Don't you agree though, that other generations could learn just
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  Speaker 2: a little bit about the importance gen Z put on
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  Speaker 2: a healthy work life balance though that's something that they
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  Speaker 2: really cherish.
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  Speaker 3: Hey, yeah it is, and like I do believe there
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  Speaker 3: is value in that, and I suddenly do. But it's
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  Speaker 3: got to be a balance, and I think that that's
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  Speaker 3: where the gen Z generation they've got to be very
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  Speaker 3: careful because the balance seems to be it's not a
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  Speaker 3: work life balance, it's a life work balance for them.
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  Speaker 3: And yes, well, that may manage stress levels, that's not
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  Speaker 3: the reality of what people have to put up with
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  Speaker 3: on a daily basis. There is, you know, if you
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  Speaker 3: think about in anxiety, that needs to be managed very
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  Speaker 3: carefully and is very serious. So I do completely understand
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  Speaker 3: and support ways to be able to manage that, but
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  Speaker 3: I think the balance has to be way more in
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  Speaker 3: the middle rather than skewed one way or the other.
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  Speaker 2: It's kind of difficult for employers, though, isn't it to
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  Speaker 2: kind of give back some of that balance, because for
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  Speaker 2: generations they've been used to paying for that forty hour
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  Speaker 2: a week, five days a week, nine till five, whatever,
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  Speaker 2: whatever it is. Do you think that employers will make
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  Speaker 2: the decision to kind of hand back a little bit
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  Speaker 2: of I want to say life back to employees.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think we've been seeing that for a
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  Speaker 3: significant period of time. You know, for instance, our organization
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  Speaker 3: has a head of wellbeing and I think that's not
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  Speaker 3: uncommon now. So I think that the organizations understand the
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  Speaker 3: importance of wellbeing, whether it's physical or mental wellbeing, to
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  Speaker 3: ensure that they're getting the best out of their employee.
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  Speaker 3: So I think that organizations are pretty well advanced now.
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  Speaker 3: So I don't think that message or the importance or
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  Speaker 3: significance of that will be lost. I just think it
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  Speaker 3: just needs a correction of balance, and I believe the
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  Speaker 3: correction of balance is coming through you think about where
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  Speaker 3: the leverage and the employment relationship is, and this tends
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  Speaker 3: to swing with market. And we saw during COVID that
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  Speaker 3: all of a sudden, all the leverage came back to
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  Speaker 3: the employer, so the employer was kind of calling the shots.
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  Speaker 3: But then it became a boom labor market, and so
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  Speaker 3: then everything's swung way back in the employees' favor to
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  Speaker 3: the point of what I would say almost ridiculousness in
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  Speaker 3: terms of you look at salary and wage inflation during
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: that period of time. But now that's having a net
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  Speaker 3: effect and the labor market is now swinging back more
• 10:44
  Speaker 3: towards the employer, where job security is becoming far more
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  Speaker 3: important in terms of where the priority sits in the
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  Speaker 3: modern to employer, and I'll bet it'll only be for
• 10:53
  Speaker 3: a little while, But it's all around where that leverage
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  Speaker 3: and the employment relationship sits at a certain period of time.
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  Speaker 3: Now that it's back in the employeers favor, I think
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  Speaker 3: we will see employees being far more reasonable with your demands.
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  Speaker 1: I'll tell you why you're wrong, because there is no
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  Speaker 1: real long term data for all of your bold claims
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  Speaker 1: about you know, we're more productive because we can go
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  Speaker 1: to yoga and have a fennel pasta for lunch and
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  Speaker 1: then go back to it.
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  Speaker 4: Not our own time, our minds happier if they get
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  Speaker 4: to work flexibly. People value it so much they would
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  Speaker 4: be as happy to get eight percent pay rise as
• 11:30
  Speaker 4: they would to be able to flexibly work two or
• 11:32
  Speaker 4: three days from home. That's huge, and that's something that employers,
• 11:35
  Speaker 4: if they don't have the money, they can say, look,
• 11:37
  Speaker 4: can't give you a pay rise, but you can work
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  Speaker 4: more flexibly.
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  Speaker 2: And gen z are set to outnumber baby boomers in
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  Speaker 2: the workforce by the end of this year. Hey, is
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  Speaker 2: this just the future?
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  Speaker 3: Absolutely? And you know one of these things I don't
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  Speaker 3: I certainly don't want to come across as old school
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  Speaker 3: and I'm progressive of my thought process because what we
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: do have to understand is gin z emlannials extra offer
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: a lot. Their level of I think their level of
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  Speaker 3: sophistication and understanding of how technology can help move organizations
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  Speaker 3: forward is far more advanced than what a baby boomer
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  Speaker 3: generation will be, and that's just natural. But I also
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  Speaker 3: think they come with an inherent confidence that can be
• 12:18
  Speaker 3: used in a positive way. That level of confidence coming
• 12:22
  Speaker 3: into the workforce and almost a surety of their own
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  Speaker 3: belief system is far more advanced than what other generations
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  Speaker 3: will be. So I do think they've got a lot
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: to offer. The level of intelligence is very high, and
• 12:35
  Speaker 3: they're quite well advanced in terms of sophistication in a
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  Speaker 3: number of areas. What I think they're lacking is the
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  Speaker 3: ability or the skill set around soft skills, because it
• 12:45
  Speaker 3: tends to be they're digital natives. And if we're understanding
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: that they're a digital native, and that's absolutely cool. They
• 12:52
  Speaker 3: understand that world very well. But if they're not going
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: to move forwards and try and advance their soft skills,
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: which I think will be of value moving forwards, then
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: they might find themselves in trouble. So making sure that
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: they evolve over a period of time I think is
• 13:07
  Speaker 3: going to be really important. And time in the workplace,
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: the aising with other employees is going to be very
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: important to help advance that soft skill base.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, how else would they know to talk
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: about the weather next to the water cooler?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, the weather, or what happened on Friday night drinks
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  Speaker 3: or anything like that. They're missing out on a lot.
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  Speaker 2: And I mean nine till five workday, five days a week.
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  Speaker 2: Do you think we're going to be seeing the end
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  Speaker 2: of it? I mean, who even came up with the
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: nine till five work day, five days a week? Anyway?
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  Speaker 2: What's that about?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's gone. Like I am a firm believer you
• 13:40
  Speaker 3: need flexibility. So I am a firm believer in flexibility,
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  Speaker 3: Like I approach kids sports teams and stuff, and that
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  Speaker 3: helps me with my own kind of balancing my mental
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: well being and my role. So I do think there
• 13:52
  Speaker 3: has to be flexibility to allow people to actually lead
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: their lives. So completely understand the importance of that, but
• 13:59
  Speaker 3: are just just making sure that there's a balance in there.
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: So flexibility and working from home are two different things.
• 14:05
  Speaker 3: In the generations coming through have to understand that you
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: might have flexibility within the working day, but the employer
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: might need to have you in the office four or
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: five days a week, but give you time when you
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: need it to go and do things to help balance
• 14:19
  Speaker 3: your work life. So I think making sure that everyone
• 14:22
  Speaker 3: understands that there's a difference between flexibility and working from home.
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us, Shay, no worries. That's it for
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: this episode of The Front Page. You can read more
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: about today's stories and extensive news coverage at enzherld dot
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: co dot nz. The Front Page is produced by Ethan Seals.
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: Richard Martin is a sound engineer. I'm Chelsea Daniels. Subscribe
• 14:51
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• 14:54
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• 14:59
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