Millennials offended at being portrayed as easily offended

Manufacturing reasons to feel superior to younger people is a time-honored American tradition.

 

The company I work for is obsessed with what it needs to do to hire and retain millennials. The entire performance review process has been changed so people will be told how they are doing frequently, perhaps even daily. Certainly, employees should get timely feedback. However, the system also is set up so one gets only positive feedback. If you want to tell someone they should stop doing something they are doing incorrectly or poorly or whatever, you can't say "that was wrong, you need to do it this way." In fact, I don't think we are even allowed to say the employee did anything incorrectly or poorly. Rather, we are supposed to say "have you considered doing X" as if they have a fucking choice between doing something the stupid thing they've been doing or doing what they should be doing.

 

One difference is that younger people - along with most people - have access to easier information and content.

Yet this also quickly splits those who "get it" and want context and information from life and history to those who want to rant about Kanye.

 

In such an environment, I suspect that people have "strengths" and ... "opportunities for growth"

 

"Does anyone else think this test shows great room for improvements?"

 

So it's Al Gore's fucking fault.

 

I taught a class of millennials last fall. I didn't think it was that bad at all. One girl quit the student newspaper when I told her I thought she did a nice job on a humor piece, but I wanted her to take the weekend and try a second draft because I thought it had the potential to be funnier. But for the most part, they were smart and funny and ok with being challenged. They did like feedback, but they were pretty receptive to it. I ripped them a couple times and they were ok, and it helped them improve. One kid didn't cover a football game for the student paper because he wanted to go play basketball with his friends and he "Just wasn't feeling it" according to him. He almost cried when I held him after class to talk about it. He also turned into one of my best writers and reporters by the end of the semester. It was important to keep in perspective that they're just figuring shit out, the same way that I was at that age, and I think it's harder now for 100 different reasons.

I watched the clip of the show that inspired this thread. Poor Joel McHale. What a garbage show. Funny concept, maybe, but really bad jokes.

 

And then, as is turning out to be the case, after the company bends over backward seven different ways, the millennial leaves after 2-3 years because he or she is "bored."

 

2-3 years isn't an acceptable amount of time to put into a job?

 

The creator, Mike Gibbons, is just using this theme to promote the show. He told the story about testing the show to provoke the same reaction from the press. Or the reporter was a plant.

 

Millennials are 18-35.
Millennials | Pew Research Center

 

If you're hiring people for important jobs (and what jobs do hiring managers consider not important), do you want someone who's using you as just a stepping stone? Do you want to keep going through the same shit with every position every 2-3 years?