Over the next 17 years, much happened in Scott’s personal life.
Shegot married and had a baby.
A few years later, she got remarried.
She held several different roles andgot promoteda few times.
But she stayed with her employer until December of 2021.
“I stayed so long because the job offered career progression.
I kept learning and growing,” she says.
Take a step back, though, and the data paints a different picture.
Andstatistics from other countriesmirror this, too.
As it turns out, thejob-hoppingtrope is a myth one that raises a bigger question about the workplace.
“Of course, younger workers behave differently than older workers.
But that’s because they’re young.
Not because of their generation.”
The variations we do see in tenure have more to do with demographic changes and larger boom-bust cycles.
One example is educational attainment:Some researchhas found thathigher degreeshistorically correspond with longer job tenures.
It’s not that Gen Z is extra flighty the nature of work itself is changing.
“For millennials, many entered the workforce when the 2008 recession hit.
Many millennials were scarred by that experience and today still prioritize security over growth.”
So what exactly stoked the myth of generational flakiness?
Wilding has another theory.
“Before social media, only your close friends and family knew when you switched roles.
But now we broadcast it to everyone in our connection,” she says.
“But expressing those frustrations doesn’t mean they take action on them,” she says.
Indeed, generational labels themselves are only loosely helpful in understanding what’s changing over time.
She isn’t sure why her generation has developed a reputation for being flaky.
“Perhaps we just like blaming millennials for things,” she says.
That may be a harder conversation to have but a much more important one.
