Generation Hopeless

I've expressed my concern for awhile now on how young people have become so engrossed in their digital lives that they don't truly understand how to function effectively in the real world. It's more than an inability to speak coherently, dress professionally or interact meaningfully. It's a lack of basic life skills like balancing a bank account, cooking a meal, cleaning an apartment. I've talked here before about the scary inabilities of seniors in high school to look up information in an actual book. We are now faced with a generation that may not be able to write or read cursive, making them less knowledgable in spite of their digital access credentials.

My own children have complained about peers at work who use student loans to fund vacations, who are mystified that my kids have paid of their student loans, who switch jobs on a whim and take off whenever. What's sad is my own kids, some of whom work more than one job, show up ready to work and are impeded by policies that have to be implemented because of the ineptitude of their work peers. For example, my son has worked for five years for a very well known high end bike store. He's sold three million dollars worth of Treks and other triathlon bikes. He knows how to size a bike, how to repair one and how to deal with people in a way that everyone usually ends up happy. But because of new hires-some only a year younger than my 28 year old son-they now have to have a manager check every single transaction. This slows up service and prevents paying customers from having the attention they should. What's more, is that new hires are often being paid more than long time employees-which is what my daughter discovered at her job at a well known national bank. More and more it seems that responsible employees are penalized because of the goofball millennials who can't seem to do their jobs.

So I came across this story which I am putting here: Generation Hopeless

Just a few quotes-and they will sound familiar:

A survey of American millennials by One Poll found 65 percent don’t feel comfortable engaging with someone face-to-face, and 80 percent prefer conversing digitally. As a result of this, they’re less likely to understand how they’re perceived by others in real life. They struggle to strike up a conversation and can’t navigate tricky problems like workplace conflict. Their time management is shocking and they desire senior roles they can’t possibly hope to hold down.

“They’re so used to being able to filter themselves before they post something online that they get stuck in a kind of real-life stage fright,” Launerts said. “I’ve spoken to teenage girls who are more frightened of eating in public than putting a provocative picture of themselves online. That’s so frightening to me.”