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14 Jun 2019
by Debi O'Donovan

Dan Lyons: why employers need to stop fetishizing Millennials

Does anyone else out there think we’ve got our knickers far too much in a twist about young people in the workplace and how we should be treating them differently, and re-thinking our old ways?

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The REBA team asked Dan Lyons, author of Lab Rats: why modern work makes people miserable and keynote speaker at the Employee Wellbeing Congress on 20 June 2019 what he thought needs to be adapted or improved around employee wellbeing strategies now that there are five generations in the workplace.

 This is Dan's straight-talking answer:

“I'd love to see a return to some old values about how to manage people of different ages in the workplace.

“Not so long ago (I'd like to think) I was a young recent college graduate suddenly working with people who were the same as my parents, and a few who were closer to the age of my grandparents. My peers and I very much enjoyed working alongside these grizzled veterans in the newsroom. We learned a great deal from our older colleagues, and they learned a bit from us, I suppose. We took the piss out of each other, and cherished each other. We socialised together after work.

“I think today we make a big deal out of managing the multigenerational workforce, and we do things like creating affinity groups and holding sensitivity workshops. In the old days we just thought of this as ‘going to work’.

“We made real and deep friendships regardless of age. It may be the answer is to change our thinking about age, and generational differences. Stop fetishizing Millennials, and treating them as if they're a different species.”

He has a point, doesn’t he?

  • You can hear Dan Lyons’ speak at the Employee Wellbeing Congress on 20 June 2019 in London. Reward, benefits, wellbeing and HR practitioners qualify to attend for free.