Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff, Lauren voc obam here. Thanks to popular books like Generation Me and A Rash of Kids these days cover stories and major magazines, it's easy to believe that millennials, usually defined as people born between one and nineteen nine, are wildly different than their co workers from Generation X born between nineteen sixty five and nineteen eighty and the Baby Boomer generation that's nineteen forty six to nineteen sixty four.
Employers have so much faith in the millennial mythology that they've changed the way they recruit, higher, train, and develop employees. Teams of well paid consultants have convinced CEOs that millennials represent an entirely new species of worker that's less focused, less loyal, and far less willing to work hard than preceding generations. But is it really true. When researchers have gone digging for hard data to back up the negative
stereotypes of millennial workers, they've repeatedly come up empty. The real explanation for the perceived differences between the work ethic and commitment of millennials versus exers versus boomers has much less to do with the year that they were born versus the age on their driver's license. If you're thinking,
isn't that the same thing, Well, not exactly. We spoke with David Costanza, Associate professor of psychology and organizational sciences at George Washington University, who co authored an influential study on generational differences in He explains that generational assignments like boomer or millennial are somewhat arbitrary, but age is a strong predictor of work experience, and more experienced and tenured workers tend to have a stronger work ethic and more
corporate loyalty than younger workers. In other words, being a boomer is a weaker predictor of work ethic than simply being sixty five. Castanza said, if you look back twenty forty or sixty years, the same pattern of differences shows up again and again. The youngest generation is always the least dedicated, the least satisfied, and the most mobile. Twenty years ago, that was Generation X. Forty years ago, it
was the boomers. Now it's the millennials. For example, an article published in the American Sociological Review in nineteen sixty one bemoaned the decaying system of values apparent in people's work ethic. The argument went that the so called Protestant work ethic, the belief in the importance of hard work and a disapproval of too much leisure time and activities, was responsible for the economic success of Europe and the
United States. But apparently there was widespread consensus that the younger generation of Midwestern farmers were straying from the rugged self reliance of their fathers and quote finding meaning and strength through constant associations with others rather than themselves. They were also quote shameless consumers. Just imagine if those farmers
that had Facebook and Amazon Prime. A new study from Wayne State University backs up Costanza's conclusion that age is a much better predictor of work attitudes than being a millennial or boomer. The researchers performed an in depth meta annelis of seventy seven work ethic studies published between nineteen sixty and twenty fifteen, and they found absolutely no empirical difference between the responses of say, eighteen to twenty two year old college students in nineteen sixty eight versus two
thousand eight regarding the Protestant work ethic. The real change happens as these young punks get older and more experienced. The authors suggest that when the current group of millennials has aged forty years, they'll think the new kids are
lazy too. The most important takeaway from this research is that the popular public perception of lazy millennials is not only inaccurate, it's also bad for business, because Stanza said, it leads to these sweeping generalizations that can prompt organizations to make these really poor decisions and to invest in training,
development or compensation systems that don't do any good. If managers are telling the CEO that younger employees don't seem to be engaged and committed to their work, that's definitely
a problem, but it's not a millennial problem. Becustanza equates the millennial myth with these stereotypes that employer has had about women workers half a century ago, that there was no point promoting a woman to a management position because she would eventually get married, have kids, and leave, or the painful racial and ethnic stereotypes historically faced by minority workers.
Because Danza said, if workers aren't committed, or they're not satisfied, or they're not sticking around, find out why that is and address it. Don't rely on these myths and stereotypes. Today's episode was written by Dave Ruse and produced by Tyler Clang. For more on this and lots of other productive topics, visit our home planet, how Stuff Works dot com