If you are idle chick, you will served as soup - you will be chicken soup for someone's dinner. As more Gen Ys are supposed to join as workforce, it is very important that a leader understands the typical attributes of Gen Ys. There is a intelligent Gen Y in my team. He uses his mobile and says that I will send status report in SMS. I can hardly understand what he types and I am totally incompetent before his SMS English. After sending SMS, he justs laughs at me. But he completes his job well and inspires others with his workmanship.
It is not only life style that is different, the apporach towards work changes between Gen X and Gen Y. All intelligent and focussed Gen Ys aspire to become project managers within 5 years and the important point is that those people are willing to stretch. They look work as place to learn, they want their managers to be their mentors. In this scenario, one needs to exercise atmost care in spoting the talent and grooming it. This is unusually difficult because they expect to grow faster. For the modern day manager and particularly Gen X managers, it is going to difficult to keep up the pace with Gen Y's expectations. One needs to spot the talent and wait no time to delegate it to next level. Delegation has been there in dictionary and management books for a very long time but it is the time to put that into practice. Else, the leaders job will be difficult in handling Gen Ys.
The leader's job is to identify talent, delegate work and move on to take up something big. This has to be a never ending loop :-).
It is not only life style that is different, the apporach towards work changes between Gen X and Gen Y. All intelligent and focussed Gen Ys aspire to become project managers within 5 years and the important point is that those people are willing to stretch. They look work as place to learn, they want their managers to be their mentors. In this scenario, one needs to exercise atmost care in spoting the talent and grooming it. This is unusually difficult because they expect to grow faster. For the modern day manager and particularly Gen X managers, it is going to difficult to keep up the pace with Gen Y's expectations. One needs to spot the talent and wait no time to delegate it to next level. Delegation has been there in dictionary and management books for a very long time but it is the time to put that into practice. Else, the leaders job will be difficult in handling Gen Ys.
The leader's job is to identify talent, delegate work and move on to take up something big. This has to be a never ending loop :-).
2 comments:
What you say might not be true regarding Gen Y becoming project managers in 5 years. They may acquire the title but they will never be true project managers. For many, it takes a life time to understand the definition of a Project manager.
Becoming a project manager consists of different dimensions.
1) Understanding and growth of the self.
2) Understanding about relationship between self and team members.
3) Understanding the relationship between client and self/team.
4) Goals/business focus/vision ..
and a lot more..
From my experience, project managers are made in the way clay pots are made(remember crash courses on different managerial topics offered to them). They don't evolve. We need project managers who evolve/transform as managers.
However, there could be people who can act as project managers from the day ONE of their career just because THEY are PROJECT MANAGERS.
Five years ,that is just a number. As you said, some may become in 2, 5 and some take even life time and some never become one. Gen Y are more aware and attuned to career growth than Gen X (when they joined the workforce). Whether they can become one, the time has to tell.
But as more and more Gen Y join the workforce, it is imperative that the existing project managers are aware of Gen Y and fine tune their way before they become irrelevant which again boils down to the making of class B managers.
On other insights, I agree with you.
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