Gen Z's 'conscious unbossing' : they're avoiding promotions into leadership roles

Then they'll whine about their pay despite not being willing to take on the extra stress and work in social areas that management can require.

R1 Any wonder why this generation currently has such high credit card debt at their age ? They like to spend more than they earn, and they could earn much more if they were comfortable 'adulting'.

I avoided promotions onto leadership roles for many years in return for the ability to work entirely from home, to choose my projects and the staff who would perform them, and to have what for the US is a huge amount of leave time (14 weeks plus the usual holidays and sick leave.)

I did get regular frequent promotions (above the annual adjustments), I just wanted to stay free of having to visit an office and having loads of flexibility for personal travel.

It worked for me. I might have climbed the ladder more, bit doing so only on my terms meant I enjoyed my work and made it what I wanted.

Its hard enough to have any kind of work life balance when you aren’t the boss, but any kind of management position requires being on call 24/7 nowadays

Lazy and lacking in ambition.

I'm Gen X and have been consciously doing this for a decade.

I make fairly good money now, so I know it is easy to say, but money isn't everything.

I work with a fair number of directors and their bosses (VPs) demand results, are often impatient, have unrealistic goals, don't know the business, etc.

Just not worth it.

This is why we have politicians in their 80s who are still running the show.

Gen Z is ensuring millennial employability and political leadership for life. Muahahaaha.

That wasn't my career path. That said, I cannot get away from being in charge of others or projects fast enough. I am going to retire earlier than I probably should to get away from it. I hate it.

This feels like anecdotal bullshit meant to enrage the olds about how awful kids are these days. Of course people are going to fall for it.

Consciously unbossing? Give me a fucking break.

This is really more about Gen Z from "woke" households," who tend to be lazy and immature and don't believe in leadership roles.

Gen Z conservatives are more mature and industrious and willing to be leaders.

R11, you the little morons who voted Trump? Yeah you're right, they're a real brain trust!

More Gen-Wars clickbait.

Imagine thinking that an entire generation comes in one temperament.

I was in a senior leadership role for years and refused to manage people. (It was an intense role where I provided counsel to the CEO so got away with it.)

Eventually I gave in. Big mistake.

They started forcing us to offload the bottom ten percent. But I hired well, actively supported and coached, held people to high standards, so they were forcing me to let go of solid employees.

It killed my soul, because it was terribly unfair.

"I knew I couldn't walk in the paths of joy and my truth when a move up to shift supervisor was offered to me. I was literally crying and shaking and had to request a leave of absence for the rest of the week."

It's totally okay for someone to know that they don't want a leadership role. It's not for everybody.

I had direct reports who didn't want to be promoted but were really great at the levels they were, in the jobs they were in. That didn't make them lazy at all.

As I was passing hour 55 at work, while they were at home living their lives, they were definitely onto something.

I'd rather be a really great admin assistant than a mediocre boss.

People are increasingly aware of the horrible politics of higher-level positions, the kind of politics that eat away at your soul, even if you have 4 homes and a Porsche. Trump and his acolytes have been using technology and the market to drive America towards increasingly brutal and cruel competition for resources, and it's been trickling into the corporate world for the last few decades, with hustle culture BS and the increasing impersonality of all business processes. Customers and employees are just a marks to exploit, things to be abused for efficiency, no longer integral parts of a larger community. Some of us just can't naturally move in that direction. Especially if you're a true introvert, you sometimes have to lay low & mind your own business just to stay in the game. Best of luck to the climbers though; nothing wrong with having ambition.

I hear ya, R6. I’m a middle manager director and all the shit accumulates at my door and I’m not really compensated more than those I supervise. I’d rather go back to being a peon and not having the stress.

I’m in that role by choice now. Making $115K as the “department MVP” with no staff reports, no office politics and no crazy long hours. I could make $150K if I were the boss, and I have a decade of management experience but it’s SO not worth it. Been there, hated it.

r10 Of course it is, look at the source

[quote]according to research by the management consulting company Development Dimensions International

Gee, could a management consultancy have any ulterior motive in pushing such a story? Of course it'll work for the bunch of DL posters who want to whine about young people for any possible reason.

[quote]Its hard enough to have any kind of work life balance when you aren’t the boss, but any kind of management position requires being on call 24/7 nowadays

But why? Few people work in matters so critical that they might require a manager to jump out of bed at 4 in the.morning to work on something for the bosses in Tokyo or Geneva or wherever. A few people at some critical moment of the sake of a company, say, maybe. But to think that any manager need be ready to stop everything and work at any day and any hour on some project as if it were a house on fire is fucking nuts. Americans lap up this Kool-Aid like crazy, with people who are not mangers believing that the whole success of the company turns on the their weekly reports of contract printer maintenance costs...how could they possibly take a holiday of more than couple nervous days when the weekly report is at stake?

We're seeing an epidemic of passivity. Would they even look up from their phones if the Russian tanks rolled in?

I'm a Boomer who turned down 4 promotions. Consequently I was able to take trouble free vacations and weekends, while performing at the top of my level and surviving dozens of layoffs as a result. I also was able to retire at 59 with plenty of money.

[quote]But to think that any manager need be ready to stop everything and work at any day and any hour on some project as if it were a house on fire is fucking nuts.

You see, most (if not all) CEOs are batshit crazy. That’s usually how they got there. The closer you are to them, the crazier your life gets. They make everyone around them nuts by proxy.

So you’ve got CEOs doing it to VPs. VPs handing it off to Senior Directors. They push it to Associate Directors, who unload it on Senior Managers. Then the Managers drop it on the Leads. By the time it reaches the contributor level, the chaos is already being shouldered by half a dozen people above them.

Also: if you’re in any of those higher-up roles, you’re probably the kind of person who can take a lot of shit and insists on doing everything yourself.

This is exactly why Gen Z looks at leadership and says, “Absolutely not.”

I do love that they think they currently have the option of saying yes or no to these leadership roles, as if it's their choice and there aren't a legion of professionals before them. That's very cute of them. Zoomers are unintentionally hilarious.

Maybe they should try holding down a job for an actual year first?

[quote]As the older Zoomers are hitting their 30s, and still suffering from 'delayed adolescence', they have decided that any job in a 'leadership position' is not for them.

And how right they are.

Next!

Yikes at the misspelling of “Gwyneth” in the lede of that article.

Trump has been doing what for decades, R17?

r21 Martha Stewart said she expected to be able to call her staff (not just management) any time she wanted. It was stunning how many people tried to defend her for that.

If only the baby generation had shared this aversion

No doubt, R29. I like Martha Stewart but I wouldn't work for her. As someone up all hours who needs very little sleep, I strongly suspect she doesn't sleep at all.

Who would want a call at 04.30 with M.S. shrieking at the tiny reflection of a camera lens in the the second photo of a place setting of one of her favorite 19thC American silver flatware patterns, "I mean there it is, larger than life, that tiny little dot, the perfect reflection of the photographer's camera lens. I want you to phone him now to arrange a photo shoot and let's get this hideous error fixed before the stock markets open!"

Most of the shit that people are in a great fucking hurry to fix is not much above the level of Martha's flatware woes. Who needs that? Or needs to be part of the chain of management to get it fixed yesterday.

R29 you ever had an important job with lots of responsibility and demands ? Government or Industry military ? I really doubt it.

It can be and was hard. Worked on weekends got calls at odd hours was often up at 3 am heading to work. And I’d hear stories from other young managers and staffers who were working longer hours than I.

One of those working even harder as a young staffer became Head of PBS or something like that. Others went on to a life of amazing success and riches.. some ended up as heads of agencies or working in the White House and some became really rich. I ended up posting on DL.

Young people today that want to live like a monk who have little earthly wants and not worry about riches or homes or buying shit maybe they are the future to a brighter better America. Or not.

I worked from 16 to 52 when I retired, I never once applied for a promotion in any job.

r32 Martha Stewart is not doing governmental or military work.

[quote]Young people today that want to live like a monk who have little earthly wants and not worry about riches or homes or buying shit maybe they are the future to a brighter better America. Or not.

Americans elevated mindless consumerism to a religion. Maybe Gen Z doesn’t see the acquisition of material wealth bringing more happiness or fulfillment looking at Gen Xers and Millennials.

R35 and good for them if so. I m happy for them.

But they need to realize their life choices and decisions. No bitching later about no house, an apt with 3 room mates, having to move to cheaper state to live, no life savings, maybe crappy medical, no retirement and having to work to 80.

Especially when times turn tough it’s a real sink or swim world. Maybe they think boom times are ahead ?

“I make fairly good money now, so I know it is easy to say, but money isn't everything”

This is me. I worked my way up in advertising to creative director then after burning out demoted my self to senior copywriter at another company.

I know high-earning former work colleagues think I’m nuts…even feel sorry for me. . And yeah, Im making 1/2 of what they are, but I now have time to exercise, cook, spend time with my husband and dog.

My years of 50+ hours a week were not worth it in the end.

r36 Why shouldn't they bitch about those things? Those things were available to previous generations without having to get promoted to executive levels. Meanwhile companies keep recording larger profits and pay out larger dividends.

R38 Who said anything about being promoted to exec level?

If someone applied to a construction company got into an apprenticeship program , they are hiring, get paid, work, go to class, graduate today after 4-5 years of training they are making over $100,000 a year to start. More with over time. Not a day spent as an exec.

And not one day of college needed. But you do have to work your ass off and get dirty and get up early . If the future is great and the money keeps rolling in and the good times continue to flow these people with a more relaxed attitude toward work should continue to do ok.

The tiny raise in salary is not worth the headaches. Plus, when heads roll for any reason, the firings start at the top.

r39 Because construction doesn't come with any kind of health problems once you reach your forties. And the country itself certainly doesn't need any more college grads, hey kids everyone just become a builder.

[quote]If the future is great and the money keeps rolling in and the good times continue to flow these people with a more relaxed attitude toward work should continue to do ok.

Because construction is well known for not being reliant on a healthy economy.

[quote]Bitching is sure not going to help

Says the person bitching about young people

“You’re not my real daddy!”

[quote]The tiny raise in salary is not worth the headaches. Plus, when heads roll for any reason, the firings start at the top.

This is EXACTLY it R40. I'm a senior manager (with no direct reports) and I've had ... 10-15 directors over the past 10 years.

I asked a director (whom I'm actually friends with), "WTF is with this turnover?"

Director gets unrealistic ask. Tries to do his/her best, but in the end, the ask was just unrealistic. Director is given the boot 1-2 years in for failing to produce "results".

Rinse & repeat.

HARD pass.

I don’t blame kids one bit for looking at the state of the world and what’s projected to come and deciding, fuck it. I’m going to live how I want before it all falls apart.

I'm a Millennial, and I have no interest in a management role. The extra amount of work and the hours would likely amount to a pay cut.

R44 I knew people that grew up during the depression . I knew people that fought terrible world wars. I knew a whole generation of men over 300,000 of them that died of aids. People often have it tough in life that is why good decision help..

Yes the issue is these kids want more free time and an apt or house

These GenZ you claim don’t want to put in the extra hours work hard and they want to bitch about their station in life while they don’t want to do construction, they don’t want to join the military, they want someone else to pay their school loans and get them easily into a new house or their very own apt.

Harris Walz should promise them everything inc cheap houses and paying off their school loans for their run at 2028.

Gen X here and while this annoys me, I think its out of jealousy. We are not here to do paperwork and kill outselves for a paycheck. Many of my generation, later in life realised theres more to life and who wanted to throw caution to the wind and quit their job couldnt, due to family financial needs. I think Gen Z plan on not having those hefty bills of a family. We all just bought into the 9 to 5 rule and realised its crazy when we were trapped.

r46 Now do the boomers who got everything you said is unreasonable, and then still complain and act like victims.

[quote]I do love that they think they currently have the option of saying yes or no to these leadership roles, as if it's their choice and there aren't a legion of professionals before them. That's very cute of them. Zoomers are unintentionally hilarious.

If Gen Z did everything that they've been scolded for not doing, posters would still be lined up to bitch at them for something else.

Who in any older generation is harmed by a subset of a generational cohort that *does* think they have choice in how aggressively they want to climb a corporate ladder to...to wherever it leads? At worst it might inform some aspects of hiring and promotion and employee retention, something those managers and execs at the tippy-top ought always to be alert for anyway.

Some younger person's notion that they would prefer a career that isn't built is licking the boss' ass and echoing his or her jargon in order to move ever upward, managing managers, who mange lower level managers, who mange still lower level managers... FFS, if someone did that for the money, well good for them, I hope it worked out and made them happy. But if that doesn't appeal...it's down to a younger generation being each and every one of them a lazy cunt? Of course not.

It seems that some who are so protective of the management ladder they climbed didn't arrive to a place with any room room for a bit of grace.

Money is indeed not everything. But for some it is, especially those who need it. And for some it is mental stimulation. Admittedly I'm not the most ambitious millennial in the world. I'm just mid-management. But I'd get bored out of my ass if I had stayed where I was twenty years ago. I give the anecdotal Gen Z at OP's link a couple more years. The urge for more money or for mental stimulation may come up for them in their thirties or forties. But I'm sure it's coming.

This is another click bating us vs. them drummed up conflict. There have always been people deliberately choosing a career without being a people manager. And praise the Lord for that decision. Some really shouldn't be managers of people. And do we actually want entire generations be managers without individual contributors? Thinking of DISC I'm sure there will always be enough Ds who cannot help themselves but leading, 2 - 10% depending on how 'pure' they are Ds. Gen Z won't be an exception.

[quote] I give the anecdotal Gen Z at OP's link a couple more years. The urge for more money or for [bold] mental stimulation [/bold] may come up for them in their thirties or forties.

You're giving them far too much credit.