Managing Gen Z

[Amy8]

I’m an experienced senior manager who took some time out to work as a consultant – partly to avoid exactly these kinds of situations!

Something happened last week that’s made me question my management style, which I’ve always thought was fair. The CEO asked me (quite urgently) to get something done. I was in a meeting, so I asked a junior team member to help out. It would’ve been easier to just do it myself, but I genuinely needed the support.

He replied that he needed to check with his line manager first because it wasn’t in his work plan (I manage his manager), and then added that he was logging off shortly for a long weekend which had been pre-agreed.

I stayed polite on Teams and explained that sometimes we have to be reactive to senior requests — but honestly, inside I was thinking, just do it! At his age, I’d have just cracked on.

It’s not the first time I’ve had this kind of pushback — others in the team (same age group) have also been quite firm about working from home and not wanting to come in when asked.

I’m genuinely wondering: is this just how the workplace is now — a generational shift and new boundaries — or is it a bit of a disregard for authority and should I be adapting better ?

I’m 48.

my parents were boomers.

my dad often told the story of how he’d been working at a TV rental place when they asked him to cancel his holiday and work that week instead.

he told them to go fuck themselves and got a new job for Monday. Jobs were weekly paid in those days so no income interruption at all.

he used to feel sorry for me when I started work in the 90s because as he said “if the bosses weee being bastards you couldn’t just tell them to fuck off and walk into another job the next day”.

think the boomers had it right.

I was going to say… as a manager I’ve found I get way more push back from men - it’s like they need to know the exact reasons and motivation and full details behind what and why I’m asking them before acting, instead of… well, just getting on with it! Or even saying yes of course and then asking their questions. No sense of urgency or recognition that as someone more senior I might have more info than them and not be able to share immediately.

OP, you’re completely out of touch here. Micromanaging is very old hat and you need to stop it. You might be “experienced”, but what you’re experienced in is creating a toxic work environment.

You’re also very rude, coming on here to ask if you’re being unreasonable, being told by dozens of people that you are, and then arguing with them all about why you’re not because you don’t think so so there.

What were you hoping to achieve by doing this?

I’m retired thanks so don’t care.

And we wonder why productivity in this country is so low...........

It was low before gen Z entered the workplace....

"if a pattern of behaviour persists I’ll be asking for a performance review"

God, you sound awful- he was only following protocol, plus he had stuff planned (in his free time!)
You shouldn't have put him on the spot in the first place, but to labour the point with a junior is shitty.
I'm impressed with him standing his ground.

Believe me, when I saw your thread title I was all ready to lambast the Gen Z "snowflake", but you're the one who sounds entitled, not him.

I think (hope?) that a lot of these responses siding with the OP are rage bait. If not, it does explain why I’ve had so many crap senior managers who fill their diaries up with non-essential meetings, fail to organise their own tasks and then send out ‘urgent please do this by 2pm’ emails out to everyone else who they assume can’t possibly be as busy and important as them - even though they’re the ones actually doing the work most of the time.

If my HOD gave me a task that needed doing immediately, I’d need to check with my line manager IF it was going to prevent me from completing something that she was waiting for in time - and the OP has no way of knowing whether that was the case or not. The simplistic hierarchal structure doesn’t really work in most organisations.

Lol what? You are legally entitled to annual leave. Why on earth would you delay it? I'm a mental health nurse, and I'll always help my colleagues out, but I wouldn't at the expense of my pre-booked leave. I need it to not burn out. The only time I'd delay is if I had a patient in crisis who rang as I was about to leave or something. I will always prioritise patient care within work hours, and I'm happy to move things around to support a colleague struggling on duty/needing some back up with a patient, but when the day is done, it's done. I won't work unpaid overtime unless it's an emergency. I used to be on my laptop everyday until 7pm, and it wasn't healthy for me at all. I now finish dead on 5.

Same here , I ended up being the go to person, fixing other people’s (often management) crap.“Take it as a compliment “. Still had to ask for a pay rise/going up a band. Just fuck off.

Gen X here and I completely agree with you.

Fair play to him also for having the confidence to say no. How many of the posters on here have pages long threads about a situation where they could just say no and assert boundaries!

He could have just done it and then left. When his LM was back, he could ping them an email or Teams just to say ‘I did so and so for Amy8 as an adhoc request’. If that bothered him, he can then discuss with the LM at a less pressing time.

No one should be a doormat and accept unreasonable requests/workloads, but this was a one off, quick urgent request. Him questioning it must have been exasperating (and time wasting).

I think there are positives to being empowered, but it doesn’t trump seniority. I did start work when the work culture and expectation from senior people was sometimes awful and the change is great. But it’s going too far now - work still needs to be done, and less experienced staff should do it if asked. They can feedback and question as appropriate, but as a manager of younger staff, it can be exhausting sometimes having to navigate their attitude. God I’m old 🤣

I would never ask anyone who managed by people I manage to do anything for me without checking with their line manager first. Obviously if the line manager is not available and it is urgent I may occasionally make an exception but I would always ask about current workloads and what is happening first before delegating the task. You need to choose the right person to ask

Having said that if it is really urgent ( usually because I have been asked by my boss without enough warning) I might ask someone to do something in the way you have. I would explain that I would talk to their line manager and that they would need to drop everything to do what they could.on my request before they left. I would also need an update as to where they were when they left. Then I would pick up the slack if necessary after they went home

So no I would not expect someone to put pre booked plans on hold for a last minute work request. I do however appreciate if someone does work a bit longer then their set hours in this sort of situation to help me out and I would bear that in mind when considering my recommendations for promotion and pay rises.

Exactly this. ^ As I said, I am glad the younger generations now (Gen Z, and the younger milennials) are refusing to be dominated and bullied into working waaaay more than their contracted hours. I wish I had been brave enough to say NO back in the day, I may have not suffered stress and low moods and dreaded going into work back then!

But it was work time !

Whereas I would describe a junior playing the “I must ask my (conveniently on holiday) manager” routine, before lifting a finger for a minor task as a jobsworth who probably isn’t going anywhere.

The junior works for the OP. The junior’s manager works for the OP. The OP will be the one accountable for her department. The OP asked one of her own juniors to access the system he manages for info/a document needed by the business.

He will even have a record of the request on teams if he feels that strongly about it.

Boundaries and honesty are a good thing in the workplace. You shouldn’t have agreed with senior management to such a short time frame without first checking you had the staff in place to complete the work. Grow a back bone and push back to senior managements unreasonable demands before pressuring a junior employee.

Being out of touch would have been persisting with an approach that wasn’t saving me time - and noticing the pushback , so therefore deciding to do it my way, I just don’t think he’s cut out for the work the more I think about it - I also think he has an excellent line manager who’s been disguising his poor performance and what I thought was acceptable has most likely been her doing it

Then someone mostly likely would have had lost their life, so no - I’ll always get it done.

No it wasn’t. You were asking them to eat into their own time that had been pre-agreed. Not big or clever to expect anyone to adjust their scheduled and agreed leave.

FFS - OP explained why. His knee jerk obstructiveness impacted patient care. That is not a good work ethic.

I am all for people having boundaries, not being slaves at work. But at work sometimes you have to do something for the team. The fact that so many people at work and on this thread feel that it is them above all - not even when it does impact them, but when it might possibly in future - is not a good sign.

This move to individualism and away from collectivism is not doing anyone any favours. Especially people like this young man, who now has a question mark over his work ethic. Rightly, imo.

I'm 52 and I wouldn't be prepared to do it if I'd arranged to leave early. People request to leave early for a reason? My Gen Z child is probably more likely to have agreed to it than me though, unless he had urgent travel arrangements.

To answer your original question, every generation has slackers, jobsworths, diligents and overworkers. The styles may be different between generations and IME readiness for work is a much bigger issue with gen Z than their predecessors but once up to speed they are no different.

I’d be unimpressed with a juniors (even if there is an intermediate layer) who was so rigid they couldn’t do a short task in their own domain during working hours. I’d also be talking to the line manager who needs to explain the business needs hierarchy and ensure said junior has management cover at all times as they lack the maturity to work independently.

This whole thread is about you pulling rank!

Seriously go back and read your own posts and how vindictive. They didn't do as you asked so now your on about performance management.

If you truly want to learn start with recognising why your attitude and gut response is wrong.

Also saying well you weren't there to input if the decision made was the wrong one then surely you then challenge it despite being in a meeting especially in relation to patients!

Aaah sounds like it's the NHS... in which case the hierarchical bollocks is ridiculous. I work in a very non-hierarchical team - people will get brought into projects and tasks according to their strengths and interests and some people don't do stuff that's part of what they "should" do because they've been asked and OKed to do other stuff instead behind the scenes.

I'm a B6, and I'm line managed by a B8 who only works part time and we work well together because she knows I can get on with it, I'll come back to her if I need some direction or if I need permission to do something spectacularly off-pieste, but generally she can check in on me in supervisions and leave me to it - and if something comes in that it makes more sense for her to do because of where she lives or her particular interests - I'll pass it over to her and vice versa.

In between us we have a new B7 who thinks she's gods gift, is ragingly incompetent, 6 months behind on her admin and came into the job with the attitude that she wouldn't speak to anyone of a lower band than her. She does not like the fact that she's been told by her line manager that she's got to listen to me when I explain processes and stuff, and that I really do know what I'm doing and the service incredibly well - but she's now reluctantly accepted that, has no ability think independently at all so somehow I seem to be managing her 90% of the time. She will offload EVERYTHING onto any lower band than her at any opportunity going - to the point she'll go into the shared folders and email me something to move to another shared folder - and I point blank am not doing it, my line manager (and her line manager know and agree). I've bailed her out and supported her for 6 months, she's paid much more than her - she can bloody well do it herself now.

I am NOT a Gen Z and normally I'll go out of the way to help anyone out - I regularly end up finding info, resources, documents for colleagues across the entire MDT but I am starting to say no, I'm busy doing my allocated work, to people who come to me with an attitude on them like "I am a higher band, kiss my arse." However I know my manager has my back and encourages me to push back sometimes so I can get my own actual work done (I'm probably the most productive at my pay grade in the team anyway) and someone threatening with a performance review would not scare me at all these days.

I'm not Gen Z pushing back you need to fear - it's peri and menopausal women who have really ran out of fucks.

It was in his contracted hours
it was in his job description
it was an urgent but short task

It was a request for data to enable an urgent MDT decision that has just come in - planning for all scenarios isn’t suitable in all professions. If he progresses he’ll have to be more reactive , or even if he wishes to stay an administrator he’ll have to be more responsive to seniors . It is the Job. I may be awful but you’d want me doing this job and getting the results as it has direct impact on the quality of life of those vulnerable and in need. I am a senior clinical consultant - maybe management speak not my forte and although I’ll learn and tailor my language and expectations , I can’t work any other way in the setting I’m in