Lessen Gen Z Workplace Anxiety – Make Training Deliberate and Engaging

by Stacey Lett, Director of Operations, Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.

In an article in Business Insider entitled, “Gen Z is bringing a whole new vibe to the workplace: anxiety,” author Eve Upton-Clark tried to shed some light on a contemporary topic considered enigmatic by some and over-blown by others; Generation Z and its journey into the workplace. Understanding generational shifts in behaviors and expectations are a never-ending role of employers and their management. Having a better insight can make the experience a little less challenging for everyone.

In her article she writes, “Anxiety is driven by uncertainty,” Ellen Hendriksen, a clinical psychologist and the author of “How to Be Yourself: Quiet Your Inner Critic and Rise Above Social Anxiety,” said. Because they grew up in the digital age with nearly unlimited amounts of information at their fingertips, Hendriksen said, Gen Z has the least experience with uncertainty. “When you need to know where to go, you can pull up Google Maps,” she said. “If you are going to a new restaurant, you can look at the menu ahead of time. There’s a lot of certainty in this world now which didn’t exist before.”

She continues, “But at work, there’s often a lack of certainty — which gets exacerbated in a remote workplace where it is easy to avoid confrontation. “Anxiety is maintained by avoidance,” Henriksen said. “Our first reaction when we are anxious is often to avoid the thing that is making us scared, and so if we are anxious about speaking in a meeting, we might remain silent. If we are anxious about taking phone calls, we’ll let those calls go to voicemail.” Further, “Whether sensing when a presentation has gone on too long or understanding the subtext of what someone is saying, managing how you work is a fundamental skill.”

Whether a Gen Z or Baby Boomer, how we are trained once hired is a crap shoot. The ubiquitous “Bob, this is Julie. Why don’t you show her around” is institutionalized as what most employers call “on-the-job training.”  The fact that it has survived many stages of technological advancement is not surprising. Products being shipped and services being provided takes priority over how that was done…until significant lapses in quality or efficiency are exposed. The investment it would have taken to train a worker right versus the cost of the lapse is the age-old battle of “cost versus benefit,” where here the cost is really an investment and benefit is in the eye of the beholder.

The 90-day probationary period set by the employer is the typical “trial period” for a new-hire. This is the period when it is determined if the new-hire can self-train and compensate for the enormous, and unorganized, amount of new information encountered, the lack of role definition, the clash between mentor and supervisor styles and commitment – all while trying to produce enough output to be considered worthy of retention. It would cause anyone anxiety, some more than others. Often good workers leave prematurely thinking no one is bothering to train me so I will not make it to 90 days or are washed out because they “don’t seem to want to learn.” Either way, it is a unfortunate loss of undeveloped talent and opportunity for both the worker and management.

For those that survive, the struggle is not over. Since the company hasn’t taken the time to define the tasks an employee is expected to master, there is also no way to measure each worker’s progress to reaching mastery of the job classification. Each incumbent “Bob” has developed to different levels of task mastery but are usually way short of full job mastery. Some even specialize in the tasks they like, others are good at certain tasks so management decides that they are not to be trained on any others. Yet, with each generation coming through, these become the next “Bobs” showing the new person around. Eventually companies find themselves in a downward spiral of hiring too many people to compensate when they had plenty of undeveloped and underutilized workers already employed.

Without structured on-the-job training, every “Bob” trying to play the role of trainer exhibits a different understanding of task mastery based on who was their “Bob.” Each “Bob” has different styles of training – some thoughtful, some resentful – but all are under a lot of pressure to not slow output. There is no telling what new-hires will encounter. With the skilled labor pool reportedly drying up for some industry sectors, improving this experience for new-hires should be at the top of every employer’s to-do list.

Author Upton-Clark adds, “The lack of experience navigating uncertainty has contributed to what Michelle P. King, the author of “How Work Works,” calls the “ambiguity skills gap.” King said this showed up in two ways for younger generations: “First, it is ambiguity in tasks, like solving problems that don’t have a clear-cut solution, working on complex tasks with a high degree of novelty, and creative thinking on the fly.” As a result, a number of Gen Zers are struggling to manage how their work gets done and lack confidence in making decisions at work without all the necessary information.”

Structured on-the-job training can alleviate a lot of anxiety by removing the ambiguity that determines continued employment. It accelerates the transfer of expertise, drives new-hires and incumbents to full job mastery, and keeps everyone engaged in the continuous improvement of each worker. Mastering a job gives employees confidence and creates a thirst for continual self-improvement. Structured on-the-job training for all of the jobs for a company creates growth and credential opportunities, and paths for a worker that were previously out of reach.

Creating a structured on-the-job training infrastructure can right the wrongs of the past for how incumbent workers were trained and provide a healthy and encouraging entre for any type of new-hire, including Gen Zers. Look into it. It is not as difficult to set-up and implement as you might think.

If you recognize these challenges and have shed your fear of even looking for other solutions, check out Proactive Technologies’ structured on-the-job training system approach to see how it might work at your firm, your family of facilities or your region. Contact a Proactive Technologies representative today to schedule a GoToMeeting videoconference briefing to your computer. This can be followed up with an onsite presentation for you and your colleagues. A 13-minute promo briefing is available at the Proactive Technologies website and provides an overview to get you started and to help you explain it to your staff. As always, onsite presentations are available as well.