To think that gen Z is completely disengaged in service industry

[Hocuspoc]

...and to just stop hoping I will get any value for my money.
No offense, generalisation is never good, but just this last week:

• Clarks, shopping for toddler shoes, usually there is this older lady there who knows exactly what are the bestsellers, what works for little ones depending on age size etc... anyway - nowhere to be found, the floor is cover by two youngsters. Neither approached to help, on their phones, I had to chase the girl around to notice us (empty shop) so I can get DS foot measured. She measured him 2 sizes up (took us some time to establish that) but long story short - every answer is 'I don't know' and shrugs. Started explaining school shoes - I reminded her he is 2. Didn't know what is discounted, what is in stock, one can only dream of some initiative like trying a similar style to confirm a size and than order...

Anyway - completely clueless, borderline rude and no indication that she cares or sees herself working there longer than a month.

Then, the other day... Entering a train station, my usual platform closed, I asked the young bloke operating the gates about it - he was literally shocked he is being asked anything, looked like I woke him up from daydreaming. Also glancing at his phone.

I will stop here, but same everywhere. No cutlery pre-set or brought with your food, rolling eyes for asking for a coffee in a proper mug because it is to stay in, I can go on forever.

Just rudeness everywhere, no professionalism, no taking pride in your work, just abysmal...

The problem is even "higher skilled careers" have been completely devaluated in two senses.

Our household income is over 70k, we're earning double what my parents earned at our age and my mother didn't need to work as we we're fairly comfortable on one income of 40k. 70k now means we need to shop at Aldi, use budgeting apps, we haven't been on holiday in years and we've all but given up the idea of having children as we can't afford it. We cover all the bills sure but it becomes a debate if we want to go to the cinema, go for a day out, have a weekend away. We have to budget for Christmas five months in advance to ensure we can cover everything. When I was growing up a 70k household income would've been living the life of riley.

Secondly because minimum wage has gone up so much there are "skilled careers" that are now minimum wage because businesses are trying to cheap out. Entry level jobs should be on minimum wage requiring no experience and you should work your way up, but we're now in a position where jobs are requesting a degree, a masters and three years of experience at "entry level." Things like nursing and teaching USED to be considered highly skilled, the time and effort they have to put in just to qualify get them...earning less than the cashiers at Aldi, why would they bother ?

Minimum wage should at the very least award a basic standard of living, a small flat, covering the basics, maybe a day out with friends. Now minimum wage gets you...living at home at 30 barely scraping by with a retirement age that keeps rising and basic housing becoming more and more unaccessible. What exactly is the incentive to work harder when there is literally no payoff at the end?

Are your mortgage/rent payments really high or your area expensive because there are lots of people in the country living the life of Riley on a 70 joint salary with no kids.

DP and I were recently on that salary between us with a child in part time nursery and we went on many trips and outings but our mortgage was only £689 in the north west and we had a second hand car, never had to worry about money.

Totally agree on the careers not paying enough, I looked into teaching and the salary was 10k less than I’m on now due to a recent promotion in the private sector, not even senior.

Shops don’t train their staff properly.

I used to work for M&S and spent a week training. A lot of companies just give the new employee a lanyard, and let them loose on the shop floor!

This! At my last job, newbies were given a roller cage by a manager and asked to put it out. No mention of the requirement to rotate stock if doing fresh, produce, bread, cakes and eggs! This was the last store manager

So myself being a code checker plus other other code checkers had to waste time in rotating stock ourselves as the newbies just put out at the front or on top (with produce) and putting stock in the right place. As often found chicken thighs under the ticket for chicken legs. Sometimes moved the ticket to accommodate the thighs.

Because of us wasting time on rotating stock, we got told off by management. We did say that if the newbies were told to rotate stock in the first place, we wouldn’t be wasting time.

A combination of all staff are responsible for keeping waste down. Code checkers make sure this happened. Both on shop floor and in the chillers and overs of bread , cake and eggs.

All of the store managers were conscious of waste. The last one wasn’t. He wanted us to work deliveries first before overs. Result - found stuff in the back chillers with 2 days left v 7 days on shelf. I found some pork chops in the back and in the process of swapping them about as 2 days left. SM saw me asking what I was doing. I said these are on Wednesday’s date and ones on shelf are Sunday’s. I was told to put the chops away. Once he went to another store for a meeting about an hour later, we swapped them over. Other managers would said well done for spotting that.

Raised grievances for the above and his bullying due to my dyslexia. Blocked by his area manager. That was the reason why I left and still no job almost 9 months later

Until 8 years ago there was a store trainer that took the staff to train on new areas. Now staff train the staff and shadow them. Don’t get any extra money for this.

Gen Z ranges from 12 yos to 28. That’s a pretty wide gap of skill, experience and maturity.