Trainees no longer ready for workplace

[Kukcoo]

I used to love having trainees allocated to us. They were so enthusiastic, hardworking and a breath of fresh air. It was great to see them develop.

The last few have acted like they're doing us a favour if they turn up by lunchtime because they could have called in sick for nothing. Seriously can't be bothered doing the basics and expect everything to be done for them. Little respect for anyone else and the huge support they're being given. Won't meet a deadline, because this would affect their mental health and basically impinges on their human rights.

They all still expect to qualify and will be passed by the provider unless they do something truly dangerous, but they won't have the real experience or skills to join the workplace and get on with a job.

I'm barely even a different generation, but wouldn't have dreamed of acting the way they do when I was learning and felt I had to prove myself. AIBU to expect standards to be the same?

Blame the HE sector. It’s all about getting the numbers on courses.. plus the amount of Molly coddling students get from their universities makes many of them feel very entitled. They pay £9 grand so they feel YOU are providing a service to them.

Can you not fail them for their practical ability? I used to assess a different profession and I had to fail students a couple of times, they made it so difficult to do that, that it did put you off going down that route. In my previous area just because you passed the academic side ( and extensions were ridiculous) did not mean you qualified, you needed to pass both.

I felt like this about our trainees 5 or so years ago but now we seem back on track (and these are the covid impacted intake). Very enthusiastic and personable.

I'm mid 30s and gone back to uni to change careers. The difference in this cohort to my first 15 years ago is astounding. There is so little engagement from them. The lecturer asks for an answer and crickets unless I speak or 2 or 3 others out of 60. This is a very person centred career so I have no idea how they'll manage!

Last year one of my kids did a placement year as part of his degree. Before he started I said to him

you’ve a true once in a life time opportunity and make the most of it. Whoever you meet now will remember you and you may run into them in the future. They’ll know other people and those people will ask about you and what you’re like

i said to him. Whatever they ask you the answer is yes, no job is beneath you. Arrive a bit early and leave a bit later. Never complain and do everything in a positive way.

result? He got on brilliantly, they loved him, he got given more and more responsibility, he became a key part of the team and 2 weeks before he left the MD invited him for dinner at The Savoy, just the 2 of them. He put on his best suit even though it was a casual dress job, and the MD offered him a grad job.

Secondary school here. Same problem with people in their 20s but the youngers ones who are 18 or 19 , and we get some as support staff are much better, I'm really hoping for the best when these new ones , I think they are called Generation Alpha, start teaching things will improve.
I did read in a scholarly work that if a person grows up in a very unequal society it affects that person negatively. I grew up when Britain was at its most equal before Thatcher ruined it. Or Margaret Thatcher Milk Snatcher as we used to chant. That's how old I am.

I'm not a teacher or NHS but work in retail
About half are bright eyed,bushy tailed and keen to get stuck in
The other half-well,not
They show up late,if at all,lazy,rude,don't want the job and refuse to do any of the work
One time,I was heading out of the door to go home with a banging headache due to her moaning and wailing all shift,when she stopped me,handed me a cloth and told me that a customer wanted their table wiping
I handed it back and told her to do it-id finished and she threw the biggest shit fit I'd ever seen
It was her job-she knew this when she got it
Thankfully she quit but the next one was just as bad
It's like they are molly coddled and can't cope with real life

@Mummyoflittledragon I wasn't questioning your knowledge, I was interested in where the disparity with what I've been told before. Which seems to come from the fact that GCSEs have got much harder again since I took them in 2002 which makes sense.

I have multiple siblings who have been through the system recently and my mum is a teacher whose last kid did GCSEs not long ago at all. (Large family.) But maybe she just said it to get us to work harder.

Whilst this is true, there has been a marked change in specific areas since the pandemic.

The increase in sick leave taken by people under 30 is statistically evidenced and (anecdotally) my experience is of a lot more "casual" sickness - a lot more time taken for a cold (a couple of days is fine but a trend to take two weeks).

I do think it's not everyone and those working full time seem as hard working as ever.

We've had placement students who have expected full time staff to drive out of their way to fetch them because they're not being paid - they are however voluntarily or as part of their course doing a placement. They seem not to understand that they are not doing a personal favour to the employee they are given to to supervise. I had a 20 year old tell me it was "the least I could do" to take and fetch her from the train station because she "shouldn't have to" wait in the cold for a bus. My own 16 year old would be left waiting at a different train station if I took the extra time to drive the student, and she was demanding and unhelpful generally so I had already said no, I've no idea why she thought telling me it was "the least I could do" would make me change my mind! However she was so entitled she complained about me not "helping her " to my boss - and my boss ended up doing it!

Despite my boss driving her she dropped out before the end of the placement.

I can't imagine having asked in the first place at 20, and I didn't have a car then either.

I have also experienced a lot more single days especially amongst younger people combining work with study who are open about being "exhausted" from a study deadline and therefore "needing" to ring in sick the following day - it seems the boundaries have shifted a bit because now this is actually regarded as legitimate enough to be open about in some people's minds - it obviously has always happened but people would have known it wasn't legitimate and kept quiet about it!

I do think however it might be a very specific "glitch" in the system caused by a very specific narrow cohort who have the pandemic mentality frozen in their minds. It's not even one whole age cohort but a subsection - just quite a large minority of one age cohort, perhaps the ones who's parents were very dramatic about the pandemic and have continued to style their offspring as victims during and since?

I'm an accountant and I was saying yesterday that our trainees are very different from how they used to be.

The acting like they are doing us a favour rings a bell and expecting support and to qualify but not expecting to prove themselves.

Taking a leaf out if senior management book and setting their own timetable despite the fact that SMs work all hours so have earned flexibility. They want the flexibility to be late a leave early but won't come early or stay late.

Can be really disparaging about low salary which was always normal for trainees. What do they think the rest of us did. Working even harder on less! Apparently it was so easy for us because everything is expensive now and they are uniquely disadvantaged.

Oof this sounds bitter.

“Young people have exalted notions, because they have not yet been humbled by life or learned its necessary limitations; moreover, their hopeful disposition makes them think them- selves equal to great things.” - Aristotle

The counts of the indictment are luxury, bad manners, contempt for authority, disrespect to elders, and a love for chatter in place of exercise. …
Children began to be the tyrants, not the slaves, of their households. They no longer rose from their seats when an elder entered the room; they contradicted their parents, chattered before company, gobbled up the dainties at table, and committed various offences against Hellenic tastes, such as crossing their legs. They tyrannised over the paidagogoi and schoolmasters. - Socrates

🤣🤣🤣

It's a similar story in nursing.

A few recent students didn't haveabasic dsy to day skills. They arrive late, but still expect a full handover. They are unable to communicate on different levels with different people. University seem wash their hands of all responsibility in making sure their sare tudents are able to function.

We had one student who was constantly hours late, was rude, refused to perform sbu personal care and would loudly shout 'he's shit himself' or 'this one stinks of piss'. Despite multiple conversations gentle and harsh, when I contacted uni they said 'his directness was part of his learning disability and it would be wrong to chastise him for it'. I ended up getting a dressing down by them for being 'ableist' for insinuating that no matter the reason for his behaviour it was inappropriate for the ward environment.

As an ex teacher, its not the fault of the teachers but of a system that has restorative justice and follows fools like paul dix.
Throw in inadequate management and governments past and present that want to undermine teachers and actually reduce the ability of students whilst at the same time backing gobby parents (and posters on SM) that complain when teachers try and sanction pupils for not doing the work this is what you get.

To be fair, we've always had crap teachers. One of my sons is a teacher and he's often shocked when I tell him what some of my teachers used to be like (drunk in class, ogling the girls, physical punishment, rolling the TV & video in, putting on a film and leaving us to it). It seems to me like standards are much higher now. The PGCE course he did, he told me a bit about what he was learning and I was impressed by how stringent the standards and the various education theories he learned how to apply. So I think the standard is probably better than it was in the 70s & 80s!

On the quality of graduates in general, I think the Covid lockdowns played a big role. A lot of these kids are joining the workplace never having had the full student experience of physically socialising and learning and all the communication skills that can be gleaned from that. So socially, it's more akin to getting a bunch of school leavers. I think that's a big part of it.

I've noticed this too in my area of work too. Not all but some act like they're doing you a favour turning up and have an immediate list of things they don't want to do or be expected to do.

We recently had a newly qualified too who seemed at first to be great, really enthusiastic and personable then very quickly lots of last-minute requests to WFH or take leave. At the end of the first month they complained they hadn't been paid correctly and it transpired they didn't know what pro-rata meant and hadn't bothered to ask or look it up so thought they were going to get paid full-time for working part-time. Then seemed to think they were being magnanimous by saying they weren't blaming anyone but going forward, they recommended it should be made clearer on the job spec that you wouldn't get FT pay for PT work.

They 'worked' but didn't actually do much for 2 months then put their notice in, then withdrew it. Then put it in again and were arguing that they wanted to take A/L for all of their notice period because they had x amounts of hours entitlement when the x amount of hours was their entitlement for the year and they were only working a few months and had already taken a lot of leave.

We let them go early in the end, we just wanted rid.

I manage a learning and development dept. We've had people on admin apprenticeships, and while a few have been great, we've also had a few that were disastrous. Parents ringing in "sick" for them. All kinds of excuses for being late or not coming in, from my grandma's cat died (staff member was not a carer for said grandma, otherwise that would have been understandable they needed to help deal with that), my sister spent too long in the shower, I was up late doing my assignment for college and I'm tired, twisted my ankle and can't walk 5 mins to the bus stop, parents' car in the garage and can't possibly use public transport because ew buses.

I can absolutely work with an apprentice or placement student that has a steep learning curve to go on but wants to learn. But I'm afraid some of them have been taught no kind of work ethic, and are lazy, they have no problem solving skills, the slightest thing goes wrong and they can't cope. They've had parents and teachers who have made excuses for poor behaviour at every turn and never challenged them. This is borne out by the angry phone calls we have had from parents when their precious has had a mild talking to because they messed something up or did something they shouldn't, like take a 2hr lunch to go shopping to buy a prom outfit, because "when else can I go, the shops aren't open after work and I don't go into town at weekends". The team leader had taken the apprentice aside and said that wasn't acceptable and asked them to make the time up over the next couple of days. They dissolved in tears and went home and didn't come in the next day because too anxious, mum phoned and carried on as if someone had physically assaulted them.

I understand the kids had it rough during the pandemic, I really do. But the sort of behaviour we see sometimes from the 18-25 age group has been embarrassing for some time now, beyond the point where it can all be put down to covid.

So true. Half of my teachers were horrible, abusive (one was actually later sent to prison for historical physical and sexual abuse) and letchy.

One teacher had an affair with a 15yo student whom he later married and had children with (he wasn’t fired - this was the 80’s!)

I'd say the same. I think most of the trainees in my firm are excellent. Not sure they'd have selected me - the bar is much higher now in my view.

Imvho, the bad manners and laziness of new trainees is mirrored by the bad manners and laziness of a lot of employers these days. I’ve heard so many people complain that employers often don’t even bother to acknowledge applications any more, or will even interview people then not bother to get back to them. It seems to me, the whole of society feels it is far too busy and self-important, not just young people. As for “customer service” - only if you think going round in circles with AI is serving anyone at all…

I understand the kids had it rough during the pandemic, I really do. But the sort of behaviour we see sometimes from the 18-25 age group has been embarrassing for some time now, beyond the point where it can all be put down to covid

I agree covid isn't the only explanation. But what is? Is it the fact that schools are so strict over stupid things and the kids don't learn initiative unless they learn it elsewhere? I know people like to complain it's the parents, and I think in some cases that complaint is justified (I am definitely guilty of being a helicopter mother) but it's not just that. A mix of factors I guess. But as mentioned above, our trainees are really good.

I've experienced that too, but it was some years ago and from people who were definitely old enough to know what pro rata meant. That's not down to age (I don't think)!

God yes, this is so true.
People have become…I don’t know what.
Even this morning at the traffic lights. They changed to green and within less than a second the car in front of me was beeping their horn at the first car. Impatient, selfish, lazy, self indulgent, entitled…that is what society is turning into. So sad.

On a side note, and totally unrelated, I’m currently watching a 1997 episode of Blind Date on YouTube, and the show and the adverts are almost like they’re from another lifetime. Making me pine for the good old days. I’m officially old!

We've noticed this too, not just students/trainees though. I find people just don't put as much effort in anymore, perfectly capable of doing their job at a bare minimum level but won't go the extra mile. I think it's because now it's difficult to let people go from a job, which is great that we have more rights etc, but they know they don't actually have to work hard. It's really disheartening. I work in paediatric nursing & some people don't even try to be nice to the kids, obviously they don't have to as part of their job but it's really poor imo.

We have lots of trainees (solicitors) and they've all been brilliant. Extremely hard working and quick to learn.

Same re the leches and inappropriate relationships!! It was relatively common and not really talked about!