Managing Generation Z

Book excerpt: Expert advice on attracting, training, managing, retaining, and succeeding with America's newest generation of hard-working, tech-savvy employees. A new generation is entering the American workforce—Gen Z, the age cohort born after 1996. Having grown up with smartphones, social media, emoji-speak, helicopter parenting, and no expectation of privacy, Gen Z has a unique culture and working style that can be baffling to their Millennial, Gen X, and Baby Boomer managers. In Managing Generation Z, Robin Paggi, a veteran HR manager, and Kat Clowes, an educational consultant who has worked with hundreds of Gen Z'ers, join forces to give employers and managers a practical, easy-to-understand guide to the new generation defining the future of work. Based on Clowes's in-depth knowledge of Gen Z habits and Paggi's real-world experience of how generational miscommunications can cause expensive personnel problems, Managing Generation Z gives managers at all levels a plan for getting quality work from Gen Z employees while avoiding cultural clashes at the office. Gen Z is highly educated, extraordinarily tech-savvy, eager to meet expectations, and loyal to employers, but many Gen Z workers have never been trained in the basics of professionalism, workplace communication, and the unwritten social rules older generations instinctively expect. Managing Generation Z teaches managers how to bridge the communication styles between Gen Z and older colleagues, how to train Gen Z staff to make work objectives clear, and how to evaluate and correct Gen Z employees so they will listen, accept, learn, and improve. Like having an expert HR manager at your fingertips, Managing Generation Z is essential reading for both front-line supervisors and C-level executives who want to get the most from the newest generation in the workforce.