You're listening to Taking Stock with Kathleen Hayes and Pim Fox on Bloomberg Radio. Well, judging by the throng the crowd that enveloped our next guest as she came in to join us, I can tell you that Billy Jen King still has it. Billy Jean King a former world number one professional tennis player, winner of thirty nine Grand Slam titles, including twelve singles, sixteen women's doubles, and so on, and she's also had a tennis center named after her.
She joins us with Stephanie Turner, co author of the Millennial Majority Will Transform Your Culture. She's also a manager in Deloitte's Survey Research and Analytics Center, and they're here to tell us about some of the latest findings in their millennial work. Welcome, Thank you both for being here. I gotta say, Billy Jen King, it is a little bit uh awe inspiring to be in the same room with you because of all of yours. Don't worry. I'm
as a blue collar kid from long Reach, California. So that in a public bar kids, Okay, Well, that's in the National Tennis Center of the one that was that has my name on it now, I can't say I'm too embarrass is actually a public park. I don't think
people realize that sometimes. Well that that all. That all leads me to my right question, because you have something called the Billy Ching King Leadership Initiative, and I'm wondering if you could describe that in the context of what Stephanie has been working on having to do with millennials and leaders. Well, when we started the Billyging King Leadership Initiative,
I said, we've got to have some data. We can't just talk about what's going on in the workplace because what we want to do in our with the Leadership Initiative is to change the workplace to be more inclusive where people can be their authentic. So so Delay, Deloitte and US teamed up and they have been unbelievable because without Delote, we couldn't really have started the Leadership Initiative
without them. So they've come up with all kinds of data about millennials because, believe it or not, you know, millennials are going to be the workforce's not very just a few years from now, so uh, it's very important and what they're thinking, what they're feeling, what's going to drive them? Uh, what's going to give them purpose? And that's the things that Deloitte went out and continue to collect data on what the millennials are feeling and thinking,
especially in the workplace. We want to go to the data in just a minute, but I also want to ask you from your perspective in the tennis world. Uh, so many tennis players start out long before their millennials and they're like three years old exactly, you know. And we we've had Nick Bleteria and once again we did our show out at the Open for a couple of days, was growing out that he's he's best tennis Hall of Fame,
et cetera. But what do you see in your in your in yourself growing up and when you look at kids now, how are they different from us, from us older folks when we were at that point in our lives. What do you see? Well, first of all, they still have some of the same problems and that's excess to get started. I would say that access is a challenge no matter what. But as they get going at they
show promise. Uh they have there's more money, there's better coaching, better nutritional and information on how to train all the things that I would have loved have had growing up as far as information, and that's what where technology is so important and continues to you know, the software just exponentially keeps changing all the time. I mean, it's just
you can't keep up with the software. The hardware is a little bit a little bit easier, but it's it's unbelievable what that brings to the table about for stats, when you play, gives you it gives you instantaneous feedback. Um, it's just amazing. What I would love to be a kid today playing I do think, Uh, if you show promise, usually someone will help you, will sponsor you, or mentor you. Um.
But it's amazing what's happening. And then you know, I retired at forty, went into Team Tennis World Team Tennis, which is about equality. We have men and women on the same team. And now the the Ability and King Leadership Initiative. If you think about it's just an extension of what I've always believed in since I was twelve, and that is fighting for equal rights and opportunities for boys and girls, may women, for all genders. Uh. And I knew I was so lucky to have a platform
that tennis is and tennis is global. But I knew I had to be number one if I was going to try to help change the world, not just my own tiny university tennis, but help others and help the world to be a better place. And I have inclusion. And as a girl, I already knew that life was going to be different, that people would not probably listen to me, but I thought, if at least be number one, maybe they will. But thank god, you know, tennis is global.
I think it gave me an unbelievable platform. Sports were very fortunate to have it. Stephanie Turner, I want you to come in and tell us how is the millennial majority going to transform the culture that we live in. Yeah, well, I think in Billy, you have created this amazing platform that we can conduct the research on. And what our research is showing is that technology is an accelerator. Millennials want purpose in the organizations, but they're using technology in
every form that they have to be an accelerator. And how they collaborate, communicate, how they become innovative in their work that drives that purpose, and then also and how they seek work like flexibility. This is a generation that wants to solve problems fast, and they want to be able to do it wherever they are around the globe, and they want to be able to do it with whoever is around the globe. They don't want to be confined to an office or a particular area of solving
those problems. Okay, well, we know that lots of times stereotypes and jokes have some truth in them. And when you see all the jokes right about, oh they expect this, Oh they don't want to do that. Oh they want to go in and get a raise. Um, you know three months after there there is there any truth? Is that the downside of a millennial. So so I think that part of what our research has done is actually a little bit of myth busted the generation that we
once knew it. Right, So, this is a generation that has since matured. They are in their thirties, they are leaders in our organizations today. They are at least fifty per scent of the workforce, and like Billy said, they're going to the workforce. This is a generation that is very ambitious. To your point, they do want to be able to excel, and they want to excel quickly, but they want the right tools and experiences and that purpose in the organization to be able to do it well.
They also seem to live through the financial recession of two thousands in Tennis bad. You have a bad run at times. What do you find reminded me of my parents a little because they were depression parents. And of course I don't think it's as tough as back in the thirties, but it was still. I mean, I have god children who are still having trouble finding jobs. It's it's tough, and I'm saying, you know, you remind me
of the old days when there was a depression. So I think it's very sobering when you go through that experience. But I also think they're very resourceful. I think they're innovative. I think the kids want to do good. I think if you look at the elections even how excited they were to be a part of it. And hopefully we can keep them involved that but they are going to be are there are future leaders. There are leaders now
and our future. So we have to find a way to be inclusive and each other, help each other the best we can, and that's where the boomers have a chance to mentor But you know, what I feel like the millennials are mentoring me sometimes, especially when it comes to technology. But I think it's really important that we that we have more equality in the workplace. I want equal pay for equal work. I want more women in the c suite. I want not only just white women,
I mean all women. I want people that live with disabilities. I just want inclusion. That's what I want. I want and now people have a voice. When I was growing up, we were fighting so hard to just to get a seat at the table. Now people expect to have a voice, and it's so much healthier. You're making me think. We're at the Pershing Insight conference down in Florida earlier this year,
I believe it was in June. One of the executives was giving a ted talk the event about and and and his mentor, a millennial was with him and they're can back and forth on how older people can be mentored by millennials. How about you both The comments starting with you, steffany something you encourage people to do something that makes a difference. Yeah, I think so. And Deloitte's done this. We have millennials and leadership positions that are
also doing what we would call reverse mentoring um. But also we're seeing this with our clients more often than not. Our clients are starting to say, we want our millennials to reverse mentor us because we want to understand how this generation thinks. We also recognize that it's not at the sacrifice of other generations. So a lot of the things we found in the research, purpose, technology, innovation, collaboration and benefits all. I think it's great. Listen, I'm always
asking the young ones. First of all, I'm still very involved with the Bility King leadership. We just hired our new executive director, Shari Sperit. She's in her thirties. There we go, she's mentoring me. I'm helping her. Also, I do some coaching in tennis with the kids, so I'm always having them help me with technology. I go to the kids for guys, come over and help me with this technology. How can I learn? How can I get better? What gets me? The only you gets me irritated sometimes
at the millennials, and I love dearly. I wish I were one. Uh is that I don't sometimes well, even like we're talking about the elections, I said, have you looked up everyone's story? They didn't know anything. I said, you guys, I would have given anything that had the information at my fingertips. The way it is today, it's so exciting. I said this, you have no idea, so please use it. And so I said, just know everyone's journey. It's right there. You can look it up, what their
journey has been. Get an idea, who they are, what they've done. That's what's important, and then you'll make better choices. Well, I think you've been an excellent choice to join us here on taking stock today. Thank you so much, Tennis sugeon, Billy Jean King. That's all you need to say, Billy Jene King, and everyone knows who you're talking about. But
also nice to meet you two. Stephanie Turner, co author of the Millennial Majority Will Transform Your Culture Manager in Deloitte's Survey Research and Analytics Center, some great information on millennials in the work place and workforce. We thank you so much for joining us, Thanks for having us. Kathleen Hayes Long and Pim Fox and this is Bloomberg. Yes,