For years, employers have been ragging on Generation Y for their supposedly lousy work ethic.
But it seems Gen Y are finally off the hook, because a new study suggests Generation Z — those born in the 1990s and now entering the workforce for the very first time — are absolute shockers when it comes to attitudes at work.
The UK survey, conducted by the LifeSkills programme jointly with the publisher Pearson, found that 43 per cent of employers were worried about young recruits using their mobile phone while at work or taking too long on breaks, while 41 per cent believed young people lacked time management and punctuality skills, The Daily Mail reports.
The newspaper reports that the study of 500 small and medium-sized businesses found 61 per cent of employers said entry-level workers had poor “self-management and resilience”, while 50 per cent said they’d noticed a lack of problem-solving skills.
While those figures may seem shockingly high to some, they were no surprise to the managers we asked — who regaled us with entry-level employee horror stories ranging from bared midriffs in a corporate workplace to unexplained no-shows.
While we’re sure there are a lot of Gen Z-ers who don’t fit this stereotype, here are a few of examples of what definitely, absolutely, positively not to do at work (and if you know anyone born in the ’90s, you might want to pass it on):
Turning up late… or not turning up at all.
“We had an intern who didn’t turn up one day and texted at 4pm to literally say: ‘soz, doesn’t look like I’ll make it because UNI’,” one manager told us, adding: “I had another employee who not only turned up whenever she felt like it, but once fell asleep at her desk.”