Firing Gen Z

I have done my best to keep you apprised of the fate of Gen Z in the workplace. After all, they are our future, so one does well, while offering sage thoughts about how we are going to stoke an economic recovery, to take a look at the human capital needed for said recovery.

Politicians of every stripe explain how they are going to return manufacturing to America. They do not bother us with the simple fact that the American educational system is not producing people who can function in the workplace, in any workplace.

One recalls the comment by one Kenny Xu regarding the people who run Silicon Valley. It turns out that nearly two thirds of the tech staff at these great firms are Chinese. Not Chinese-American, Xu pointed out, but Chinese-Chinese.

And one knows that the efforts to build new semiconductor plants in Arizona have been delayed because we do not have the human capital necessary to build or operate the plants. We spend our time shipping in engineers from Taiwan and sending poorly trained Americans to Taiwan to learn how to do the job.

It ought to be evident by now that our educational system and even our parenting has failed Gen Z. Some companies have resigned themselves to the need to provide special training for this singularly inept group. Others are simply firing their Gen Z staff. They have very little tolerance for spoiled brats who cannot do the job and who do not even want to learn how to do the job.

The Daily Mail reports:

Companies are axing Gen Z workers just months after hiring them fresh from college, a new report has found.

Six in ten employers had already fired some college graduates they had recruited earlier in the year, a survey conducted by Intelligent.com found.

One in seven the employers said they also might not hire fresh college grads next year after finding a raft of problems with young workers. 

Business leaders listed concerns in areas such as communications skills and professionalism that made them wary of hiring Gen Z. 

They also said the workers of that age are often unmotivated and need to be constantly told what to do - rather than using their initiative - is another issue. 

One appreciates the pungent irony. A generation of young people who never learned how to follow directions or even rules cannot take any initiative. Perhaps they know how to express their sacred creativity or even to follow their bliss, but they do not know how to make decisions on their own.

And they are not even motivated. They do not want to learn. They do not want to show up on time. They do not take pride in a job well done. 

The picture is bleak, indeed.

The Daily Mail continues:

'Many recent college graduates may struggle with entering the workforce for the first time as it can be a huge contrast from what they are used to throughout their education journey,' Intelligent's Huy Nguyen wrote in the report. 

'They are often unprepared for a less structured environment, workplace cultural dynamics, and the expectation of autonomous work,' he explained. 

Three-quarters of companies surveyed said some or all of their recent graduate hires were unsatisfactory in some way. 

A half said their Gen Z hires had a lack of motivation, making them difficult to work with. 

I have mentioned it before, but why not bring it up again. In a world where people are supposed to be hired and promoted based on extraneous characteristics, that is, to fulfill diversity quotas, people do not have any incentive to work hard to get ahead. Why would you bust your butt to do a great job when you might lose out on the next promotion to someone who was promoted on the grounds of skin color.

The Daily Mail quoted one consultant who explained that the school system is not preparing students for the rigors of the business world. And this, on the most elementary level. Young people do not know what is appropriate dress or grooming. They do not think that they need to show up on time and put in a full day’s work.

Colleges teach theory, not practice. I have no problems with theory, but most of what passes as theory is vapid and vacuous. And yet, placing too much emphasis on ideas, and on ideology, makes young people believe that they need to hold certain correct beliefs, and that if they hold the right beliefs, they do not need to do much more. 

Demonstrated competence is out of fashion. We even have a presidential candidate today who has never demonstrated any competence whatever. When the jobs start moving overseas, don’t say you weren’t warned.

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