Ines: What do you think the workplace will look like in 5 years? Many generational experts seem to think that we are moving away from traditional corporate structures and into a world of freelancers…Do you think this is the case?
Bruce: I’m not a futurist. I’d say that work is likely to be increasingly free of boundaries when it comes to where and when people work. I’d say work relationships are likely to become more and more short-term and transactional. I’d say that on-site, uninterrupted, long-term, exclusive employment relationships will be less and less common.

Ines: There’s a lot of talk about Gen Y having the highest self-esteem of any Generation so far. Have you encountered this in your research?
Bruce: Why are Gen Yers so confident and self-possessed, even in the face of all this uncertainty? One reason is surely that they grew up in the Decade of the Child. Gen Xers were the great unsupervised generation (we made the latchkey into a metaphor). But Generation Y was the great oversupervised generation. In the short time between the childhood of Generation X and that of Generation Y, making children feel great about themselves and building up their self-esteem became the dominant theme in parenting, teaching, and counseling. Throughout their childhood, Gen Yers were told over and over, “Whatever you think, say or do, that’s okay. Your feelings are true. Don’t worry about how the other kids play. That’s their style. You have your style.” This is what child psychologists called “positive tolerance,” and it was only one small step to the damaging cultural lies that somehow “we are all winners” and “everyone gets a trophy.”

Gen Yers have been respected, nurtured, scheduled, measured, discussed, diagnosed, medicated, programmed, and rewarded as long as they can remember. Their parents, determined to create a generation of super-children, perhaps accelerated their childhood. On one hand, kids grow up so fast today (I often say that twelve is the new nineteen); on the other, they seem to stay tightly moored to their parents throughout their twenties. Their early precociousness,in fact, turns into a long-lasting sophomorism. Many psychologists have observed that Gen Yers act like highly precocious late adolescents well into adulthood. (I often say that thirty is the new twenty.)

Ines: Your work reveals an interesting feature about Gen Y. On one hand, they’ve grown up with the hyper-connectivity and flexibility of the Internet and digital age, thriving on customization and diversity. Yet from your research they obviously need a great deal of structure in the workplace. What’s the key to reconciling these two Gen Y characteristics in the workplace?
Bruce: Gen Yers want freedom to maneuver at work. They want some latitude when it comes to their schedule, where they do their work, whom they work with, what they do, and how they do it. The problem is that every task, responsibility, and project has parameters that constrain every employee’s freedom.

But as much as they love freedom, Gen Yers also gravitate to structure and boundaries. For one thing, they don’t want to waste their time. Don’t forget, since they were kids, Gen Yers have been hyper-scheduled by overbearing adults. Whether they were being subjected to metal detectors, locker searches and lockdowns in school, or their own “individual learning plans”—and everything in between—Gen Yers are well accustomed to programs and procedures. One Gen Yer describes it this way: “The last thing I’m looking for is somebody telling me, ‘Yeah, do it how you think it should be done,’ but then it turns out she already knows exactly how she wants it done. I don’t want to beat my head against the wall trying to figure something out if you’ve already got it figured out. I definitely am interested in putting my personal stamp on things, but if that’s not going to happen, tell me up front.”

If you want to give Gen Yers more freedom at work, the biggest favor you can do for them is establish clear boundaries and give them a structure within which they can function with some autonomy. It is true that some jobs require employees to take risks and make mistakes. Even in those cases, it is the manager’s job to help Gen Yers avoid taking unnecessary risks and repeating mistakes that others have already made. Creativity and innovation do not require recklessness. You tell the advertising copywriter to “think outside the box,” but you must also help him avoid libel, slander, and obscenity. You need the nuclear scientist to be innovative, but you must help her avoid a nuclear explosion. It’s great if your food preparation workers are creative, but you don’t want them changing the recipes on regular menu items. As a leader, you have to create a structure and clear boundaries in order to create a space in which risk taking and mistakes are truly safe in the context of a job.

Often a good way to allow Gen Yers to express creativity is to give them assignments that are truly matters of first impression. Maybe you, as the manager, don’t yet have a clear goal in mind; you don’t know exactly what you are looking for yet. This is a great opportunity to ask a young employee to “take a crack at it” and “do it however you think it should be done” and really mean what you say. It’s perfectly fine to use this Gen Yer to help you work out the early stages of your own creative process. But make sure you are clear from the start about the structure and boundaries. Explain that you are delegating only the initial stage of the creative process and you intend to take the project back.

In fact, whenever you have a new task, responsibility, or project for one of your very capable young employees, always start by spelling out expectations. Make absolutely sure that person understands exactly what he is expected to do and how he is expected to do it. That’s the only way to get employees to adopt your organization’s best practices and turn them into standard operating procedures.

Ines: Ines: And how should be the performance appraisal or the follow-up after gen Y´s tasks?
Bruce: As long as the assignment lasts, you should follow up regularly with one-on-one check-in conversations to review the employee’s progress. In those conversations, you should ask, “What have you already done? What steps did you follow? What step are you going to do next?” Listen carefully to their answers. Make it a habit to wrap up these conversations by deciding on a specific place and time for your next meeting to follow up.

Every assignment, no matter how much freedom and creativity is required, must have clear goals and specific deadlines with measurable benchmarks along the way. Boundaries and structure, however loose, are actually the keys to making freedom and creativity in the real world possible.

You might think a generation raised on mantras like “we’re all winners” and “everyone gets a trophy” wouldn’t be particularly competitive. But that is not the case. While the self-esteem movement was chipping away at Generation Y ers’ competitiveness, the testing movement was building it back up. Still, testing breeds a different kind of competitiveness: competition against standards and benchmarks, against averages and means, and against one’s own past performance.

Think about a video game that a Gen Yer might practice and practice, beating one high score after another, set by himself. He wins every time, and nobody has a reason to feel bad. That’s the kind of competition Gen Yers are looking for: they want to compete against themselves in a safe environment where they can try over and over again to improve on their own performance benchmarks. When it comes to competitiveness at work, this is what one Gen Yer had to say: “I’ll do whatever they want me to do. Just tell me someone is keeping track of all this stuff I’m doing. Tell me I’m getting credit for it, that I’ve been racking up points here like mad. Tell me someone is keeping score.”

When Gen Yers know you are keeping track of their day-to-day performance, their measuring instinct is sparked and their competitive spirit ignited.

If you can think of easy ways to convert the performance you need from your young employees into a point system, then maybe you should consider it. I promise you, a point system will get Gen Yers focused like a laser beam. If you want them to start showing up earlier for work, attach points for every minute they arrive early, and take away points for every minute they come in late. If you want Gen Yers to meet quality standards, give them checklists of every detail and specification, and give points for every detail and specification completed—and take away points for every one missed. If you want Gen Yers to speed up, set a realistic quota of tasks per hour and give points for every task done over the quota—and take away points for every task under the quota. And so on.

Another approach is to help Gen Yers keep track of their own work by using self-monitoring tools. Activity logs are diaries that Gen Yers can keep, noting contemporaneously exactly what they do all day. Each time he or she moves on to a new activity, the Gen Yer might note the time and the new activity. By using these tools, Gen Yers can document their own hard work every step of the way and build their own track record of success.

My advice to managers is to plug into Gen Yers’ transactional mind-set. Stop paying them and start buying their results, one by one. The more you trade results for rewards, the more reliable their performance will be. The smaller the increments you buy in, the more effective it will be.

The key to your success will be defining those measurable pieces of work and setting a price per piece.

Like was said in the post bellow, here goes the second part of the interview with Bruce Tulgan, the founder of Rainmaker Thinking Inc., best-selling author and the 2009 recipient of the prestigious Toastmaster’s International Golden Gavel, in an exclusive interview with Talking About Generations:

Ines: How do the aspects of privilege, culture, and social class fit into “Not everyone gets a trophy?” Is the idea of a generation getting trophies just for showing up, linked to a privileged American upbringing?
Bruce: The title is a reference to the fact that Generation Y is the generation of kids where every kid did get a trophy, just for participating. So many so-called ‘experts’ have jumped onto the bandwagon of this topic, but our research shows that most of these so-called ‘experts’ have got it all wrong. In many recent books and articles, many of these ‘experts’ argue that, since Gen Yers have always gotten a trophy just for showing up, maybe the best way to manage them is to give them lots of praise and, basically, give them a trophy just for showing up.

These ‘experts’ tell managers to create “thank-you” programs, “praise” programs, and “reward” programs. They recommend turning recruiting into one long sales pitch; transforming the workplace into a veritable playground; rearranging training so it revolves around interactive computer gaming; encouraging young workers to find a “best friend” at work; and teaching managers to soft-pedal their authority. In my view, this approach is out of touch with reality, especially in today’s environment.

Here’s the short story with Generation Y. If you liked Generation X, you are going to love Generation Y. Generation Y is like Generation X on-fast-forward-with-self-esteem-on-steroids. Gen Yers’ childhood was defined mostly by the 1990s, and they are reaching their early stage of adulthood amid the profound changes of the 2000s—this era of uncertainty. One could say that the same major historical forces that shaped Generation X are also shaping Generation Y: Globalization and technology, institutions in a state of constant flux, the information tidal wave, and the growing immediacy of everything. But those forces have picked up so much velocity in just one generation that I would argue there is a profound difference in the life experience of Generation Y. After all, there is only one globe, and it is now totally interconnected. GenYers connect with their farthest-flung neighbors in real time regardless of geography through online communities of interest.

But as our world shrinks (or flattens), events great and small taking place on the other side of the world (or right next door) can affect our material well-being almost overnight. World institutions—nations, states, cities, neighborhoods, families, corporations, churches, charities, and schools—remain in a state of constant flux just to survive. Authority is questioned routinely. Research is quick and easy. Anyone can get published. We try to filter through the endless tidal wave of information coming at us from an infinite number of sources. A year is long term, and five years is just a hallucination. Short term is the key to relevance. In a world defined by constant change, instantaneous response is the only meaningful time frame.

Ines: But why is Gen Y so different from other generations?
Bruce: Gen Yers are comfortable in this highly interconnected rapidly changing web of variables. Uncertainty is their natural habitat. Globalization does not make Gen Yers feel small. Rather, it makes them feel worldly. Technological change does not make them feel as if they are racing to keep up. Rather, it makes them feel connected and powerful.

Institutions may be in a state of constant flux, but that’s no problem. Gen Yers are just passing through anyway, trying to squeeze out as much experience and as many resources as they can and so on.

The power of diversity has finally kicked over the melting pot. Generation Y is the most diverse generation in history in terms of ethnic heritage, geographical origins, ability/disability, age, language, lifestyle preference, sexual orientation, color, size, and every other way of categorizing people. But this doesn’t make Gen Yers feel alienated and threatened. Rather, they take the concept of diversity to a whole new level. Generation Y, difference is cool. Uniqueness is the centerpiece of identity.

How do Gen Yers continually shape and reshape their uniqueness? They want to customize anything and everything they possibly can. This goes beyond the services and products they buy. Gen Yers want to customize their very minds, bodies, and spirits, by customizing their information environment on the Internet. They voraciously pursue an ever-increasing array of mind food—images, sounds, experiences, texts—in an ever increasing range of media and formats, from an ever increasing number of sources, for an ever increasing number of purposes (education, skills training, self-help, health, entertainment, news, household matters, consumer interests, life planning, death planning, spirituality, and so on).

They customize their bodies by availing themselves of the wide range of natural and artificial tools and techniques, going way beyond tattoos and piercing and fashion statements. Their efforts range from food obsession to surgery; from Ritalin to naturalism; from yoga to steroids; implants, teeth whitening, tanning cream, and on and on. Beyond family, they customize their primary relationships across space and time in personalized networks. They even customize spiritual lives of their own devising. Gen Yers often put together bits and pieces of the teachings of one or more religious traditions, rejecting others, and ultimately settling on their own selection of values and beliefs and religious or spiritual practices.

From the first day, they arrive in the workplace, they are scrambling to keep their options open, leverage their uniqueness for all its potential value, and wrap a customized career around the customized life they are trying to build.

Ines: In your book, you argue that the idea that Gen Y needs work to be fun is a myth. I recently interviewed Don Tapscott the author of “Wikinomics.“ He writes, “They (Gen Y) think work—the work itself—should be fun and challenging.” He also states, “Training has to change, too. Some companies are using game-based training…” This seems to contrast with your view. What are your thoughts on this?
Bruce: One of the most important things I’ve learned in our research is that most GenYers don’t want to be humored at work. They want to be taken seriously. But they do want work to be engaging. They want to learn, to be challenged, and to understand the relationship between their work and the overall mission of the organization. They want to work with good people and have some flexibility in where, when, and how they work.

From computers, GenYers want to fill skill or knowledge gaps that get in their way. Their tools are usually menu driven information systems, wiki tools, and social networking sites. And it drives GenYers crazy when they have less sophisticated information management tools at work than they have at home. But that doesn’t mean they only want to learn from computers. They absolutely need the human element to do their best learning. GenYers love grown-ups and they love to learn from grown-ups whom they trust, and who are willing to share with them the lessons of their experience.

Gen Yers, especially the most capable and ambitious among them, push hard for more significant roles with increased responsibilities at much earlier stages in their careers than new young workers of generations past. It’s not just misplaced arrogance on their part, but rather a result of their natural adaptation to the information environment.

Managers tell me all the time, “In our line of work, it’s especially challenging to give inexperienced young people significant responsibilities. Perhaps a new young person could learn the knowledge and skill necessary to do one of these tasks and responsibilities, or two, or three, or four. But the role they want is too complex to hand over in its entirety to someone without several years of experience.” I promise you, I’ve been told that by leaders in supermarkets and nuclear weapons labs alike—and everybody in between. We call this the “meaningful roles problem.”

Ines: And what could be the solution for this managers and companies?
Bruce: The simple fact is that if it takes you months or years to get Gen Yers up to speed and into meaningful roles on your team, then you’ll have serious problems keeping high-potential Gen Yers engaged and growing. Don’t tell me you are struggling to manage and retain the best Gen Yers and then tell me it’s going to take months or years before they can do important work that allows their coworkers and bosses to take them seriously. How can you handle this conundrum? You may have to unbundle complex roles and then rebuild them one tiny piece at a time. You can give Gen Yers meaningful work at early stages in their tenure if you commit to teaching and transferring to them one small task or responsibility at a time.

So often I go into an organization that is trying to retool its training practices to suit what they think Gen Yers want and need.

Here’s the good news: you do not have to turn everything (or anything really) into a computer game to plug into Gen Yers’ learning needs. But you really should make the effort to get them the technology they are so comfortable and adept at using.

Yes, Gen Yers want the latest and greatest technology. But it’s not just a desire for the coolest toy. It’s like breathing. It’s their connection to the larger information environment. For Gen Yers, the information technology imperatives are simple: constant connectivity with whomever they want, immediate access to whatever information they want, total customization of their information environment, the ability to learn from and collaborate with experts in real time.

Wiki technology is the ultimate collaboration facilitator by enabling different individuals to contribute to a work product from remote locations on their own time.

Social networking allows anyone to build mutually rewarding relationships with people of similar interests—inside the company or outside—regardless of geography or other boundaries. Instant messaging means anyone can ask anyone they “know” anything at any time. Imagine a mind-set in which these tools—and the corresponding connectivity, immediacy, constant access, and total customization—are taken for granted. The only question is, What are you doing to facilitate Gen Yers’ use of these tools to increase their effectiveness at work?

Put the tools in their hands, and watch them fill one tiny information gap at a time in real time. This is the high-tech analogue to learning one task at a time. With access to the technology they know and love, Gen Yers will fine-tune and nuance their on-the-job learning in ways that might shock and delight you.

Especially when they are new on the job, Gen Yers are eager to identify problems that nobody else has identified and solve problems that nobody else has solved. They want to improve what’s already there, and they want to invent new things.

Most Gen Yers understand this on a gut level and won’t have it any other way. The real challenge is to keep them focused on all that work you hired them to do while simultaneously encouraging them to leverage knowledge and skill in that work. The more you encourage Gen Yers to think about their work—-whatever that work might be—the more engaged they will be. Help them channel their learning directly into their work instead of shooting down their ideas and dampening their enthusiasm. If you hire someone to unload boxes from a truck and that person wants to be an ideas guy, you need to get that individual to focus his thinking and learning on how to better unload boxes from the truck. If you hire someone to dig a ditch, get that individual to focus on how to dig that ditch better. And so on.

When they come in the door, Gen Yers want to hit the ground running. By training them one task a time, giving them the technology tools they need to be fast and efficient, and helping them focus their energy and ideas on the tasks at hand, you’ll be able to plug into their enthusiasm and keep their excitement going past their first day at the job.

Parents have never been so influential in their children’s decisions as they are today. Many parents actually accompany their children to job interviews. Some even make a point of dropping them off on the first day of work. Parents regularly complain about heir children’s grades and shamelessly ask bosses to lighten their child’s workload. Of course, this is old news. Everybody knows that generation Y grew up being overprotected and over parented. Parents are of course largely responsible for young people’s behavior in the workplace today.

Many experts have dedicated themselves to exploring this subject and discovering possible solutions. Bruce Tulgan is one of them. Tulgan argues, “Without strong management in the workplace, there is a void where their parents have always been.” Drawing from his experience as an inter-generational expert, Tulgan tells bosses to “Step into the void…[and] take over the tutoring aspects of the parental role in the workplace.”

Tulgan is the founder of Rainmaker Thinking Inc. and a best-selling author, his most recent book is “Not Everyone Gets a Trophy.” He is also the 2009 recipient of the prestigious Toastmaster’s International Golden Gavel. In an exclusive interview with http://www.talkingaboutgenerations.com, Tulgan shares his thoughts on managing the generation who got a trophy just for showing up.

Ines: You’ve spent years conducting in-depth research on the millennial generation, becoming a veritable expert on the subject. What specifically made you interested in studying this generation, since you’ve spent good part of your career practicing Law?
Bruce: I started out interviewing young people in the workplace back in 1993 when I was a 26 year old lawyer. The oldest of Generation Y at that point were only about 15. Since then, I’ve continued interviewing young people in the workplace. It’s just that I’ve gotten older and older and the young people have become the next generation. So now the oldest GenYers are 32. Just wait, soon they’ll be in their forties and the young people in the workplace will be Generation Z.

Ines: Can you talk a bit about what made you want to found “Rainmaker Thinking” and what you are trying to accomplish through the company?
Bruce: Back in 1993, I was an unhappy lawyer working at Two Wall Street in New York City. I became curious about what was then becoming obvious to me, the generation gap in the workplace at the time. That curiosity turned into a book, which was MANAGING GENERATION X. That book got a lot of attention.

Companies started inviting me to speak at their conferences, train their managers, observe their operations and conduct focus groups with their employees. Then I became more and more interested in the dynamics between managers and employees, more generally. I’d go into a company, interview their employees and managers, meet with the senior executives and share what I’d learned from the employees and managers. And we’d provide training for employees to help them work more effectively with their managers and with each other.

Since the mid-1990s, I’ve had a front-row seat from which to study workplace dynamics. I’ve spent most of my time training managers and employees at all levels and every industry. The more we learn, the more we turn that learning back into more training. It’s a dynamic process, learning from people in our focus groups and interviews and turning those lessons into training programs so we can proliferate the best practices.

Ines: In a praiseful Boston Globe review of your book “Not everyone gets a trophy,” the reviewer remarks, “Tulgan’s approach sometimes sounds more like parenting than managing.” In your opinion do managers have to take on a parenting role? And if so, how will Gen Y eventually learn to “parent” and “lead” themselves?
Bruce: I have a whole chapter in the book called, “Practice In Loco Parentis Management.” Of course, that is somewhat meant to be tongue in cheek, but there is a lot of real data underlying this. The details change, but the thrust of the story is always the same. There’s no doubt that parents are far more heavily involved in the lives and careers of their young adult children than those of previous generations.

College professors and administrators report that the parents of Gen Yers show up to new student orientations in record numbers (some studies indicate that more than 80 percent of new students are now accompanied by a parent for some part or all of orientation). Parents are often consulted several times a day by their college-attending children, using cell phone check-ins to get advice about course choices, classroom protocol, homework assignments, and exams. Professors routinely field parental complaints about student workload and grades.

This pattern of helicopter parenting carries over once Gen Yers get to the workplace. Managers tell me about parents accompanying their children to job interviews and even, once in a while, to the first day of work. Parents are consulted about career decisions and management practices. The big surprise comes when managers hear directly from parents, suggesting their children should be working fewer hours, getting different assignments, winning promotions, and receiving pay increases.

Yes, it is commonplace today for parents to insert themselves in support of their young (and not-so-young) adult children, even in the most adult spheres when such involvement would have been considered totally inappropriate in the past. But remember, this is nothing new for Gen Yers. Their parents have always been highly engaged with them. Every step of the way, they have been guided, directed, supported, coached, and protected. Unlike previous generations, they don’t express much desire to break free as they reach adulthood.

It’s become almost cliché to say that Generation Y is over-parented. But they are. And that is a fact with which managers today must grapple. I don’t think you should accept that. You hired the employee, not the parents. But you do have to deal with it. The irony is that if you hire a Gen Yer who is not close to his or her parents, you may be sorry. Among today’s young workers, those who are closest to their parents will probably turn out to be the most able, most achievement oriented, and the hardest working.

Ines: And what’s the way for employers to deal with this problem of over-parenting?

In my seminars, I tell to take a strong hand as a manager, not a weak one. Your Gen Y employees need to know that you know who they are and care about their success. You need to make it a priority to spend time with them. Guide them through this very difficult and scary world. Break things down like a teacher. Provide regular, gentle course corrections to keep them on track. Be honest with them so you can help them improve. Keep close track of their successes no matter how small. Reward the behavior you want and need to see, and even negotiate special rewards for above-and-beyond performance in very small increments along the way.

When I describe this approach at seminars, at least one manager will remark that this sounds a lot like parenting. Are you saying that we should manage these young upstarts as if we are their parents?”

I’m afraid the answer I’ve come to is yes, at least sort of. Do be careful, and don’t get carried away. The worst thing you can possibly do with Gen Yers is treat them like children, talk down to them, or make them feel disrespected. Gen Yers are used to being treated as valued members of the family, whose thoughts and feelings are important. Remember, Generation Y has gotten more respect from their parents and elders than any other generation in history.

I call this approach in loco parentis management.

Read on tuesday the second part of the interview with Bruce Tulgan

By Tatiana Kielberman

Sometimes we assume that everybody knows the basic terminology which classifies generations, and we forget that there are many people who have trouble understanding the classifications and characteristics of each one.

In a chat with my older brother, I realized that I know more about this theme than he does. He’s a bit lost.

Our conversation went something like this:

-Tati, I know you are part of Generation Y and I’m part of generation X, I’m 32. Is that right?

- Yes, you are on the very edge of X and Y, you were born in a transitional moment between generations.

- Oh, I get it. And what generation is mom from?

- She’s a baby boomer, she’s 58 years old.

-Baby boomer…what? She explodes babies?

-Ha, that’s not what baby boomer means.

-I’ve told you millions of times that our parents are part of the baby boomer generation. They were born in the 50’s and right after the second world war, came a boom in births. People started to have lots of kids, and that’s why they’re called the baby boomers. The boom is an explosion in birth rates.

-Oh, ok. But let me try to understand. How do you know all this?

-Well, for many reasons. My generation studied English as a foreign language more rigorously than yours. You grew up in a time of constant economic inflation and economic tension. There wasn’t much money to invest in extracurriculars. When generation Y was born our parents felt a necessity to guarantee our future. English was a way to do that.

- That’s true. You’re right. I studied English for a very short time, and I never made it a priority. Mom and Dad also didn’t ask a lot of me, and since I entered a job where I didn’t need a foreign language, I didn’t think much of it. So for me, that’s why “baby boomer” makes me think of exploding babies. I know only the basics of English. But for what other reason?

- Well, maybe I am also more connected to these topics than you are. You have different interests. Also generation Y is a bit quicker. So while you guys were thinking about researching something, we were already “googling,” “copying,” “pasting,” and answering your questions, and we always did this with a great deal of creativity, and a certain level of efficiency.

- Convenient huh?

-It’s an example, I’m talking not only about myself here, but about most of the young people my age. This doesn’t exclude you, as part of Gen X, full of your own history, symbols, and idols. Plus, you were raised in a better way than we were. I bet mom and dad said “No” to you more than me. With me, they had to deal with my “No’s.” And I actually don’t think this did me a favor at all, because I think I would have experienced more personal growth, if things had been a bit more difficult for me. But anyways, that’s the reality of the matter.

-I would say that this is called “spoiling.” I guess, I’m spoiled as well.

-Of course you were spoiled, but spoiled by the lack of things. There was a lack of money at some points. That made it so our parents often tried to compensate in other ways. With me, everything was in my reach, at whatever moment, and however I wanted it. The good side of this, is that I discovered that information was available. I got to research and create. I discovered the meaning of a baby boomer before you. The negative aspect of this is that my thirst is somewhat unquenchable, and I’m not easily satisfied. Perhaps when I become a full-time employee this will be one of my weak points.

-Yes, perhaps you should try to diminish this anxiety you have, that seems so typical of Generation Y. In my case, I get anxious when I have to find a new job. But seeing you today, I feel that things in my day were easier. It seems employers expected the basics from Generation X. A good university, an impressive CV. That’s it. And yet, you guys need much more than that.

-Yes, that’s right. Things aren’t easy, and the question is no longer simply to grasp opportunity. Rather, you need to know what will happen to these opportunities once they’re in our hands. We have to be capable of transforming and making something out of them. Nothing is static, everything changes, all the time!

-Maybe that’s why things need to be so innovative these days. I get tired just from thinking about it.

-If you’re tired, imagine us, and the pressure we go through every day! What I want most is to be happy, doing something that I’m passionate about.

-Well, it seems that you’ve discovered this talent, and you can only improve from here.

-I know, I’m generation Y. I have you as generation X to remind me that quality counts. And I’ve got mom and dad to remind me not to forget what really counts in life.

-That’s right. And what about our kids? What do you think it will be like for them?

-Well, that’s a topic for another day. They’ll probably represent unimaginable speed and velocity, that we can’t even begin to conceive. They’ll make the earth move, and if we do our part, then they will be filled with value. In the end, the most valuable aspect of generations is that even though we live in different times, we all grow by living on the edge. Got it?

-What?

-I asked if you understood what I meant. Got it?

-On yeah, I “got it,”

-Oh! At this rate my own kids won’t no the meaning of yes and no.

-No problem, just like a good gen yer, you’ll teach them in a matter of minutes.

This is a question that has always haunted me. It still does. The roots of the question go even deeper: what do I want to get out of life? This philosophical question should be a question everyone asks. I don’t believe in simply letting life take over, relying completely on destiny, and yet I feel that most people live this way.

My generation was raised with the ideals of a “stable, solid, career” and a “structured family.” A solid career used to mean having a steady job in a good company, with a special focus in your area of expertise. The structured family meant marriage “until death do you apart,” with children. Combine all that with your own house, and you have the equation for perfect happiness. At least that was the life most dreamed of in the past.

Looking at today’s modern dilemmas, I ask myself if the old formula for success still applies.

Certainly, for this new generation, the point of life isn’t the same. Perhaps a huge change has been the feeling of realization and achievement. I’m talking about professional achievement. In this context, “solid careers” and marriages “until death do you apart,” don’t make much sense. Futurologists believe that formal job positions will greatly decrease, not to mention the idea of a traditional marriages. These days, people try being together first, before they even think of marriage. That is, if they ever do.

I believe that the big difference between my generation and this new generation is that we are living to build the future, while Generation Y is living in the present.

My Generation does everything for a better future. The formula of the future in the past was: “solid career” + “structured family” + “home ownership.”

On the other hand, Generation Y’s priority is to live. Of course they envision their future as bright and cool, but they think of a short-term future, not a long-term one. This generation wants to build a future, as long as it’s a near future.

I still wonder what I want to get out of my life. The feeling of realization and achievement are very personal and specific to each person. The feeling of fulfillment often feels like something almost unobtainable, and this creates frustration and inner conflict. On the other hand, every time we achieve something new, we think about our next challenge. Our being thrives on challenges, which quite possibly makes us the unhappiest species on the planet.

We make buying a car a priority in life, followed by owning a house, followed by exotic travels. Our search never ends. We always want more. This new generation seems less preoccupied with conquests, and appears more volatile. Maybe I’m wrong, but wherever I am, they always seem much more preoccupied with their own lives, than in getting the latest Montblanc pen.

Look in the mirror and ask: What is the life you are searching for? What is the purpose of life? What does success mean to you?

Have you heard of the Gen Y that doesn’t understand or know the meaning of processes? They are used to getting everything now. They like things to be easy and quickly resolved. You probably have. That’s where I’d like to start this post. A few weeks ago, I had a very unique experience that allowed me to observe generational behaviors.

I traveled to a remote beach only accessible by boat. Electricity was rationed, our showers were cold, food had to be delivered and was directly proportional to demand. The Internet? Nonexistent. Cell phones? You only get reception in certain places, with the help of fisherman who make up 80% of the population. TV? You could only watch it during the 4 hours a day when electricity is available.

Of course I marveled at how these people lived, without information or connection to the world, without cars, without traffic, free of everything modern. But even in the middle of all this, something really caught my attention. While my friends and I hiked along a path, we saw a group of men. Four men in their 40′s, with little boys who couldn’t be older than 6. At first we thought it was a bit strange since there were mostly young people around. Then we noticed that the men were with their sons.

We overheard a father talking to his son as they hiked:

-”Son, here we are, at the highest point of the mountain. This is the moment where our victory starts, after the difficult path. Let’s wait for our friends and applaud when they arrive. The important thing isn’t who makes it first. The important thing is getting here.”

I could see the little boy’s eyes sparkle. The sparkle of a challenge overcome. The sparkle that isn’t very common for a 5 year old, especially these days. Once the friends arrived, it was beautiful. They hugged and celebrated their victory. Everything was being filmed by one of the fathers. Full of pride, he was stuck to his camera.

We asked if they were all together, and they replied that this was an odyssey! They had told their mothers that this was a man’s trip.

Later we saw the little explorers again. They were in a local restaurant, and the learning wasn’t over. While they ate, their fathers taught them good table manners, how to respect others, and how to share with their friends.

At this moment, a group of young people arrived at the restaurant. They had a lot of hiking gear, they wore huge backpacks, and bandannas protected their heads. They looked like professional mountain climbers.

Again we overheard the parents:

-”They are the pirates of the place. They are looking a treasure hidden in the mountains, and they don’t stop hiking, not even to eat or sleep!”

The kids looked like they were in a mixed state of enchantment and apprehension. Their eyes glued to the group of young “pirates.” It was probably one of the most memorable moments of their trip. Later, they excitedly boarded a fisherman ship, and ran on the beach, truly living a unique moment. Their fathers recorded everything, proud of having survived a weekend with the boys, away from Sao Paulo, and mothers, in a place with so little infrastructure. This weekend would probably stay firm in everyone’s memory.

At that moment, a million thoughts flew into my mind. Did we really have to go so far to teach proper table manners, the value of overcoming challenges, the taste of victory over difficulty, the art of learning through play, or the importance of time spent between parent and child?

Does one really need to escape “civilization,” fleeing to a place with no cell phone reception, where it’s impossible to connect laptops or use blackberrys to properly raise one’s kids? I’m sure this isn’t the case. However, in this place, so distant from reality, I saw something I hadn’t seen in a long while: parents passing on values to their kids. This was the way most of our own parents had been raised. They had learned the necessity of processes and various steps, to reach a final goal or objective.

I started to feel nostalgic for the time when conversations with parents were not interrupted by cell phone rings or vibrations, by people signing into AIM, or by the stress of traffic, and the lack of time to learn.

That vacation spent on that faraway beach definitely marked the lives of those kids, not to mention the lives of their parents. And yet, it also impacts our lives, the lives of generation Y, as we started to question if this is the way we will eventually raise our own children. I hope so.

By Manuela Mesquita

I’ve always thought of my mother as a baby boomer, but a baby boomer who doesn’t fit the stereotype. My mother introduced me to e-mail, even though I’m part of generation Y. My mother got on MSN chat before I did. She knows way more about computers than I do. I always relied on her knowledge whenever I had any doubts! She downloads music onto her cell phone. She’s always updating her computer with the latest software, and yes she’s on Orkut! (Brazil’s leading social network.)

She’s very present in my life. She tells me to update my pictures. She leaves comments and messages for me in cyber space. She doesn’t have a blog (yet), but I won’t be surprised the day she creates one.

Yet in the past few days, I’ve gotten concrete proof that some things go beyond the cyber world. Culture and the way people have been raised, ends up creating a gap between baby boomers and Gen Y.

A friend of mind has just lost someone very dear to her. The wake will take place in another city. I couldn’t be with her at that moment. I didn’t know how to act.

The first person I thought of in this situation was my mother. I didn’t think twice, I called for help. Immediately she told me,

- “In these moments, only a telegram will do.”

- What? Tele what?

You know, that thing people used back in World War II. In a few words they had to send a very succinct and expensive message. That’s what my mother was talking about!

I didn’t burst out laughing simply because I was going through such an emotional moment. She continued explaining that sending my condolences through the Internet would be extremely indelicate.

I decided to send flowers, along with a card, to the site of the wake.

But I still wasn’t satisfied. How could I be certain that the right person had gotten the flowers? Would my friend know just how much I wanted to express my solidarity? How long would the flowers take to get there? I logged into Orkut, and found that people had left several messages. Now, I’m against this. I find it really morbid. But I couldn’t resist the urge to speak to my friend. So I sent an e-mail, expressing my feelings, and asking if she had gotten the flowers. In less than 5 minutes I got a “thank you” e-mail, sent via Blackberry. I finally felt at peace. At least my message had been delivered.

As far as my mother’s surprising advice goes, it reveals just how much communication has changed. Yes, an e-mail is impersonal. It’s impersonal, and it’s not the most well-mannered way to go about expressing my condolences. But this isn’t important. What is important is that my friend got the message, and that my message seemed to help her.

What I take from this whole situation is that for us, Generation Y, it’s important for information to flow, and to arrive at the right time. We haven’t stopped using our common sense or etiquette. But in this case, the message I was sending would have had no value even a day later. Timing was extremely delicate.

How would I have known that she had gotten the telegram? And if I had sent a letter, it could have gotten lost. Why risk it when we have all this technology?

To generation Y, it would have been rude not to communicate right away, especially since there are so many different ways to get in touch! I do understand my mother’s perspective, and she’s incredibly modern for her generation. Still, culture is culture. Even the Internet or social networks can’t bridge this gap, at least not as quickly as we’d like.

By Mauro Segura

I know business executives who have been very successful in their own careers.  Yet they’ve faced tremendous difficulties in helping their kids as they embark on their own professional journey.  At this moment, all parents find themselves in the same boat.  It doesn’t matter if you’re got a PhD from Harvard, or if you’ve led thousands of employees in your corporation.  Much of what we learn in the business world just doesn’t cut it inside the household.

In the past, things were much more difficult.  Young people had much more difficulty obtaining information in regards to professions, and even areas of specialization.  This process depended very much on the interest and initiative students took to explore and discover things for themselves.  You really had to get out “in the field” to obtain correct information, and gain knowledge about new careers, understanding if they were for you or not.

I remember the “old” vocational test, which wasn’t particularly captivating or insightful.  Actually, if I had based myself on the test, I would have studied Geography, and probably become a Librarian.

The reality today is different.  The world is interconnected and this “opening” helps a lot.  Information is delivered straight to your home, via the Internet, and through other channels of communication.  Students are bombarded with information.  What hasn’t changed is the need for initiative and curiosity on the part of young people, so that they can understand all the options, hear advice, and exchange ideas.  This is exactly how parents can help their children.

What inspired me to write this post are some conversations, I’ve recently had with both my sons. They are at the beginning of their professional careers, and yet they are full of doubts and dilemmas.

The following steps come from the practical experience I’ve gained from my friends and coworkers, as well as from my own experience in dealing with my children.

1- UNDERSTAND WHAT SUCCESS IS TO HIM OR HER.  This is crucial, it’s important not to assume that your conception of success is the same as the conception your son or daughter has.  Success is relative.  What success is for him or her may not be what it is for you.

2- AVOID BEING ASSERTIVE

Don’t be affirmative all the time.  In the end, advice that is very pragmatic can pressure your child into taking a path that he or she wouldn’t naturally take.

3- HAVE AN OPEN CONVERSATION

Your most important role as a parent is to create an environment in which you can exchange ideas, and have an open conversation, free from the “right” or “wrong” way of thinking.

4- LISTEN MORE THAN YOU SPEAK

Encourage your child to speak about his or her worries, decisions, doubts, and interests.  Most likely, the things your child is feeling are not so different from what you felt as a young person.  So remember that. Make sure to keep an open mind during these conversations.

5- INCENTIVATE YOUR CHILD TO EXPLORE, DISCOVER, AND SEARCH FOR INFORMATION.

Give your child the incentive to search for information regarding careers, professions, and above that encourage him or her to speak to other people about these things.  Even your own friends are a great option, and you can and should facilitate those connections.

6- DON’T DO THE WORK FOR THEM

Please don’t do the research for them.  They are responsible for that, and if they really want to know and are really interested, you don’t have to do anything.  Your child will look for you, with all the needed information already in hand.

7- HELP YOUR CHILD DISCOVER THEIR NATURAL STRENGHTS

Motivate them to self-reflect, and think about what sort of work they would love to do.

8- ALWAYS BE AVAILABLE FOR A DIALOGUE

It’s extremely important to always be available for a dialogue.  This will be a blessing for your child.  Your child will probably live moments full of doubt, as he or she struggles to make important decisions.  You can help by always being there.

9- HAVE PATIENCE.  THEY NEED TIME.

If you have patience, you will help your child immensely.  During these moments, your most important mission is to encourage your child to continue thinking and conversing.  Encourage them to question themselves.  There’s no rush.

10- ACCEPT ENTREPREUNERSHIP AS AN OPTION

The future of the job market indicates that more and more, workers will be entrepreneurs.  The first “entrepreneur” moment for your child is at the beginning of his or her career.  Open conversations and paradigms, as well as keeping an open mind and perspective, are key to helping your child as they embark on their career.

Another recommendation is to not preoccupy yourself if your child ends up choosing the same field as you.  Even if you feel that he or she has been a bit influenced by you.  The biggest preoccupation you should have is to make sure that he or she made this choice, based on their own initiative and desires.

In conclusion, despite the fact that this new generation is very informed, and mature in terms of their knowledge of careers, they also have the same anxieties and worries as we did in the past.

Imagining what you would have liked to get from your own parents, can serve as inspiration when dealing with your kids.  Just don’t forget that the world is going through many social changes, where professional success probably won’t be obtained through a fixed salary at the end of each month.  After all, entrepreneurship is personal satisfaction…

By Crystal Olig

When Talking About Generations asked me about doing a guest post for them, and idea instantly popped into my head. The topic is highly personal – my own experiences in the different roles I play as a female Millennial. My experiences will differ from my mother and grandmother in substantial ways, and not just in the workplace.

I want to put my remarks in context, because I recognize that each Gen Yer is distinct, and I can only tell my own story.

Who I am: A 26-year-old, Caucasian, college-educated professional working in public relations in marketing. I’ve been married for 10 months to my college sweetheart but we’ve been together for nearly five years. I’m the daughter of two still-married parents who are both in their mid-50’s, and the sister of a 19-year-old college sophomore. My best friends are from elementary school days in my hometown or my college sorority.

Spouse
My husband and I are both old souls in some ways – and we’re Midwesterners, so getting married in the mid-20’s isn’t unusual, though it’s younger than the U.S. average. One of the things that strikes me about our relationship and those I’ve observed between my peers, is the unquestioned belief in equality between the sexes.

My generation owes a huge THANKS to moms in the 80’s and 90’s who taught their sons not only to do laundry, dishes and clean, but that it was not below them or a “woman’s job.” My husband does the laundry and ironing, and when we have a yard, we agree I will be in charge of mowing.

Another crucial role in Millennial relationships is the new dynamic of female breadwinner and the stay-at-home Dad will become commonplace in just one generation. While too many negative connotations are still nestled in the term “Alpha Female,” the stigma continues to decline as women prove they can be supporters and fathers can be nurturing, strong family men.

I wholeheartedly respect and support my husband’s desire to be a family man before career dude – and in fact, I’m grateful for it, knowing that I can raise the family of my dreams and still pursue my career aspirations full-force.

As an aside, I think the decrease of traditional gender roles in relationship has an inverse relationship with Gen Y’s acceptance of homosexual relationships and marriage. We just frankly don’t care about other people’s choices. If you’re a good citizen, neighbor and parent, who am I to weigh in on your personal preferences?

Daughter
Millenials are closer to their parents than any generation before them. Bruce Tulgan cites in his 2009 book, “Not Everyone Gets a Trophy: How to Manage Gen Y” that, “[Gen Yers’] parents have always been highly engaged with them… Unlike previous generations, they don’t express much desire to break free as they reach adulthood.” It’s increasingly common for young people to live at home longer than previous generations, sometimes even after college. The movie “Failure to Launch” (2006) dealt with this new parent-child dynamic in a comical way, but it’s a real generational issue exacerbated by tough economic times.

It’s interesting that this family model is common in more group-oriented cultures, especially in Latin America, and that multi-cultural Gen Yers feel little shame in living with their best friends, their parents.

My parents are both on speed dial and I e-mail my mother-in-law frequently. I call them for advice on jobs, money, and sometimes for relationship or spiritual advice. They’re my lifeline and support system, my tie to an extended network of family, friends and my hometown. I just wish my Dad would get on Facebook.

It’s no coincidence that “career parents” who are often lambasted for producing a “Me-me-me” generation, also have emotionally stronger ties to their kids than they had with their own parents. There are two sides to that coin, but ultimately, I’m a more productive, contributing member of society with my parents by my side.

Sister
Within just Generation Y, I see two dynamics. I’m at a strange spot with my 19-year-old brother. I’m at the cusp of the Millenial generation, born in 1983, and he’s towards the end of it, born in 1989. The age difference is easily seen by simply looking at the MySpace/Facebook phenomenon, and texting.

I had a cell phone by age 16, but didn’t really text until college. His set of friends had phones a few years earlier, and I swear they have more thumb muscles than I do – you think I type fast, watch them text.

Facebook relationships lived and died in a more public way than I ever dealt with, not entering today’s social networking sphere until my college days.

The divide will play out in new ways. My brother is more conscious of his personal image and what he makes available online. “Cool kids” are resisting social networking as it becomes mainstream.

In terms of the roles of being a Millenial sister, I’m honestly not sure yet. I know that I was really excited and proud when my brother trusted me as a confidante for the first time, calling my cell on a weekday morning with girlfriend problems. We have a relationship nurtured by quick “What’s up” texts and the occasional Facebook wall post. As Gen Y continues to grow up as the first “digitally native” generation, means for connection between siblings and extended family will change with us.

Friend
Connected Gen Yers have a changing friendship dynamic, and it’s motivated by being a physically mobile generation, able and willing to move across the country for a job or significant other. It’s so easy to nurture friendships through e-mail, unlimited weekend cell phone calls, texts, and accompanying a friend’s life journey through their Facebook photo albums.

Sometimes I lament the physical space between us when I feel so emotionally close to my long-distance friends — and it makes it harder to connect to new friends in a new city. Hybrid online and in-person friend networks are the norm for most of my peers.

Gen Yers value honesty and transparency in friendship, and are less likely to put on a public “face” for the sake of fitting in. Uniqueness is at a premium. Personal expression is crucial. Observe the rise of the personal branding phenomenon, and watch marketers focus in on products that express a design aesthetic that speaks to the customization needs of an expressive generation. I respect friends who are original, have clear views and passions and are willing to share those with me.

Crystal Olig blogs at whY genY, discussing Gen Y issues — reacting to news, research and commentary on her generation. She is a 2006 graduate of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with a B.A. in journalism and an advertising major. After cutting her teeth early on in journalism, she moved on to work in public relations and marketing for companies in Denver and Phoenix. A recent transplant to Columbus, Ohio, she’s on her 3rd post-college destination and hopes to stick in the Midwest, and find a job in public relations. You can connect with her on Twitter <a href=”http://www.twitter.com/sparklegem”>@sparklegem</a>, <a href=”http://www.linkedin.com/in/crystalaolig”>LinkedIn</a>, <a href=”http://www.facebook.com/crystal.olig”>Facebook</a> or <a href=”mailto: crystal.a.olig@gmail.com”>e-mail</a>.</em>

By Mehnaz Thawer

“I hope I never turn into my mother.”  This is a phrase that I’ve heard more than once in my lifetime.  Mostly I’ve overheard it on the bus, or in the movies.  It’s a phrase I’ve never understood fully.  Though I can understand that not all of us are bestowed with perfect mothers, sometimes there are opportunities for us to learn from them.  I for one, can’t think of a better person to turn into as I age for so many reasons:

Work Ethic
My mother instilled in me a work ethic that has helped me through academics and through my work life.  Beyond any talent, the sensibility to work hard, and do your job well is something that is valued in almost every situation that I have been in.  Were it not for my mother, telling me to test my own limits, or teaching me one more new word, I wouldn’t understand the value of a good work ethic.

Family
Aside from family reunions being a clever ruse to eat until we vomit, family is a central part of my life.  In my world, though we may not have time for family dinners because of hectic schedules, we value each other’s contributions and support each other through most decisions, big and small, from career changes to recipe alterations to wardrobe critiques, the central place of family life is pivotal and has allowed me to grow up and become part of something larger than myself.

Resilience
I don’t take bad news well.  I generally want to sleep off the rest of the year when I’m stuck in a rut or when life takes an unexpected turn of events.  Growing up around my mother has taught me that no matter what, you have to get up in the morning.  If there is a lesson to be learned, file it for future reference and move on with the rest of your life.  Resilience is important in how we interact with each other and in the workplace.  The best of us have to react at one time or another to something that isn’t of our liking.  Resilience is the ability to walk on.

Self Respect
Gen Y women face quite a challenge ahead of them when it comes to self respect.  Though opportunity is available for the grab more than ever, is it ever okay to compromise who you are as a person, in the name of achievement? Fame?  Love? My mother has taught me that you are your own best friend, so you should treat yourself as a person of value.  If you wouldn’t do it to your best friend, why do it to yourself?

It’s difficult for me to process that becoming my mother could be a bad thing.  I inherited her curly hair and bad eyesight, but I also inherited a host of traits and perspectives that I wouldn’t trade for the world.  So the next time, you think that your mother is the last person you would want to turn into, ask yourself, “Would it be a bad thing?”

Mehnaz Thawer
Mehnaz is an international development practitioner and lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. She writes regularly and has been published in several creative writing journals to date including Iamb, White Chimney and 4 and 20 poetry.  She enjoys reading, photography, blogging and running.  You can visit her blog at www.strawberryghetto.blogspot.com.