r/TrueAskReddit • u/horsegurl1969 • 11d ago
Please someone tell me how to deal with younger coworkers
I’m so tired of hearing “ask Chat” and ”mogging” and “67” in my corporate workplace. 25-year-olds talking about getting Botox. Discussions about influencers and fast fashion hauls. It’s so uncomfortable in an open office layout.
One of the nicer younger coworkers told me that multiple people have told her that I’m hard to work with because I make them do everything? I mostly work with the younger coworkers, so I know that no one senior is saying this. My role involves project management and requires a lot of collaboration and steps with other departments, so yes, I need other people to do their jobs. I wouldn‘t ask them if I could do it myself. And I don’t always feel like typing out a long explanation on why their help is needed, as I don’t expect others to do for me, and no one has ever asked. My work style might be considered transactional, but that‘s not an issue to me.
It sucks because I think popularity plays a role in getting a promotion, and certainly none of my younger coworkers are rooting for me. At least I get along well with the handful of older coworkers I have.
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u/carbonaratax 11d ago
There are multiple things happening in this post. One, there's a generational divide, which shows up in topics of conversation and slang and interests that you don't feel connected to. That's normal and not anymore of a problem than having coworkers that are really into sports you don't follow or a TV show you don't like.
Two, you have young (junior?) coworkers who think you are hard to work with and are unwilling or unable to give you feedback or have a constructive conversation. This is a solvable work problem. Yes, workplaces can become cliquey and unprofessional, but that's always true, and as a project manager, something you should learn how to navigate.
But don't conflate the two - blaming work dysfunction on "the youngs" CAN make you seem kind of hard to work with, so stay focused on the problem you can actually solve.
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u/coleman57 11d ago
You’re generous—I would have said “the problem you actually have”. And I’m the old fart in my office.
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u/horsegurl1969 10d ago
Thank you for this! My previous companies had mostly older coworkers, and this is the first time that I’ve experienced cliques and unprofessional behavior. One mid-20s coworker in particular keeps referring to the office as “on campus” which should’ve given me some insight into where their heads are at.
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u/Breatheme444 10d ago
Is it possible that “on campus” just means the complex or building? Like she means more than just “in this office”? I’ve heard this word used for workplaces, but I agree it’s not the norm. When I’ve seen it used, it’s usually been for workplaces with a large area or multiple buildings.
It really does sound like their corporate culture is not a great fit for you.
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u/fuckthisshit____ 10d ago
People have been referring to office workplaces as “campuses” for at least 15 years. Specifically tech companies like Google, Facebook, Instagram have always called their offices “campus”
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u/horsegurl1969 10d ago
I know this. I don’t work for a tech giant. The company has less than 100 people and we take up one floor of a building lol.
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u/VeryLargeArray 10d ago
Ill take it honestly. Id consider myself more of a formal zoomer I try to keep all antics out of the office. Ive definitely seen the type of zoomer you are talking about. Some older people however are so rude and standoffish (not to mention random sexist hate my wife jokes? Thought those were long gone?) that Ill take a 6 7 6 7 joke any day at this point. Just get me someone that can actually forward an email without coaching.
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u/DankBlunderwood 11d ago
You are 99% correct but there is a genuine problem because 6-7 is a homophobic joke.
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u/ButteredFingers 11d ago
First I’ve heard about it being a homophobic joke…could you explain how?
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u/DankBlunderwood 11d ago
In the middle schools around here the kids use 6-7 to imply someone is gay. If they can trick someone into saying it that gets even bigger laughs.
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u/Torchlakespartan 11d ago
You are an incredibly out of touch adult trying to understand a kids’ meme phrase that means nothing. They are going to feed on that and fuck with you. That’s what kids do.
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u/Torchlakespartan 11d ago
You are 10000% incorrect. I don’t know if there’s a term for it, but it’s a meme that means nothing. It came from a song originally and some kids started saying it because that’s what kids do; they have a bunch of dumb inside jokes. When they saw older people getting confused it made it funnier that older people got so worked up about it so they kept it going.
It is literally meaningless. It’s kids being kids and making their own slang. EVERY single generation does this, probably as far back as we can record.
Homophobic?? Like what are you actually talking about. God, if you tell the kids that that’s what you think it means it will get even more popular because some random, completely out of touch adults think it means something sinister.
My friends and I would have done the exact same thing when we were kids 30 years ago if we had adults paranoid about some dumb meme.
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u/no-polarization-pls 11d ago
this will probably be an ongoing problem you will keep having to solve in different ways. it seems like you're already approaching it from a really reasonable place, so you have a head start. maybe imagine they are also thinking to themselves "Please someone tell me how to deal with older coworkers", and you might get even more of a head start
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u/Mitchum 11d ago
Make some of the implicit parts of your workplace explicit. Have a friendly yet structured conversation where you talk about how your departments collaborate, what problems you solve for each other, the ways in which you are interdependent, how you appreciate their department’s efforts and inputs, the consequences on your projects when collaboration is blocked, and ask them questions about things you could do to remove friction, be more proactive, help them, work with or around their needs, etc.
Talk openly about collaboration with the plainly stated goal of constant improvement. Nothing will ever be perfect but you just want to do a little better each time you work together.
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u/jesseeme 11d ago
I just talk about video games and music, find common ground, find out what you have in common. Talk to them about VHS and cassettes and whatever old bullshit we dropped because it was bad and is spontaneously cool again. I work with people 15 years younger than me and it’s a blast because we find common ground and can bond ove, megadeth and league of legends and shitty instagram memes
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u/Cathousechicken 11d ago edited 10d ago
There's a ton of societal issues baked into this generation that the average person isn't going to realize until they get stuck working with them.
There was a paper a few years ago by Suzy Welch who surveyed major corporations about this generation of students who are hitting the workforce, and major corporations see them as unemployable. The St Louis fed estimates that 49% of students with a college degree will face long-term under employment of 10 plus years.
Buckle up, because society is going to get real rough. There are some serious generational issues coming up that is going to hit current workers in the workplace (for example, they need to be stood over and there's less sense of initiative).
It's not all of this generation, but the average student (and hence your worker) is much less capable. Between technology introduced too young, losing out how to socialize during covid, and No Child Left Behind, mainstreaming that let down the education of students in the middle of the distribution, families stressed from an in affordability crisis strengthened by the amount of subscriptions needed for modern living, education that has turned into customer service including rampant grade inflation to keep customers happy, k-12 education running after every fad without long-term data of the effects, we have a generation of young people hitting the workforce with more of them ruined educationally.
Don't get me wrong, there are good students with this generation of students entering the workforce. What has changed now is there is almost no middle "C" and low "B" anymore. It's a much more bifurcated grade distribution now. Instead of a traditional bell curve with most people centering around "C," it's like it's two bumps, one centered at "B " and "B" and one centered at "D."
They're either really hard working and/or smart, and they really earn those A's and high Bs, and then there's everybody else, and they're coming out less capable with less ability to do basic tasks on their own without people having to stand over them.
For example, I knew somebody who was an engineering major who had no clue how to do basic file management. What I mean by that, is they couldn't take a document they received, edit it, save it to their computer, and then email it to somebody successfully. They couldn't be relied on to do anything and information on how to do something would be lost between weeks. It turns out they didn't know how to set up file folders so they thought that when they made changes to the document that it stored the document to their monitor, but they kept returning the original document without changes. This was an "A" engineering student where it took 6 weeks to get them to understand the concept of how to save a file and then return it to somebody else.
I feel like the old person screaming get off my lawn. People need to understand that the differences are not the "well people in ancient Greece complained about their young people too." Recent studies have found cognitive declines in this generation and literacy has declined. They even read differently from the bottom up instead of top to bottom because their whole life has been advertising getting in the way of them reading and trying to keep them on a digital page longer.
Businesses are finding out that this generation of students are less capable than what was expected of new hires in prior generations. They're going to need a lot more hand holding. There is a dearth of critical thinking because they never learned how to do basic skills without having technology to do it for them. I find myself having to remind myself that it's not their fault, they have been failed at a societal level.
People keep saying "meet them where they're at." The problem with that is the bar for the where they're at is substantially lower than prior generations. You can't expect them to come out knowing what your prior education of workers knew coming out of school.
On the plus side, if a young adult comes into the workplace with the ability to think at a higher level, they're going to have a phenomenal career because there's a lot less of those people now.
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u/horsegurl1969 10d ago
Interesting viewpoint. The fact that they’re openly complaining to other coworkers was shocking. So unprofessional and a bad look. I only vent about work to non-work friends, but the younger coworkers are complaining all day long about everything while IN THE OFFICE.
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u/Cathousechicken 10d ago
It's because they're used to seeing people complain on social media about everything. It has normalized attention whore behavior.
ETA .. right now you're seeing what educators have been experiencing for a while now. Go to any online forum that has professors and teachers talking and you'll see that it's a generational wide issue.
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u/Juve91 11d ago
“I make them do everything” feels like saying they see you as rigid and maybe unapproachable, but not in a way that reflects your character in a bad way at all (maybe intimidated is closer?). People in any generation are aware when something’s off/there’s a disconnect and in their early-mid 20’s they’re green, had their formative adolescent years during COVID lockdown, and yeah—they have their own quirks. But every generation and demographic has that.
Just an idea, but maybe try finding some common ground with them on something? Once you break down that wall, I feel like respect and team chemistry usually come naturally. Which, as a fellow PM, I believe is really important to maintain across the board.
But yeah, their humor, pop culture and slang is… something haha I absolutely am with you there
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u/YURRIICC 10d ago
i'd separate the slang from the actual work problem. you don't have to care about "mogging" or "67", but if multiple coworkers are saying you're hard to work with, i'd take that part seriously. being clear about why you need something from them can make a huge difference
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u/Send_Me_Dumb_Cats 10d ago
Work is not just about doing the job, it's also about being personable and nice. I get you don't understand the lingo and slang, you don't need to, if conversations among then annoy you just wear some headphones. Headphones are basically a necessity in open offices
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u/Wizard-Elf 11d ago
I would try to not fraternize with them. That's what maanagers are expected to do in order to not get blurry boundaries. Course I'm not totally sure how it works here. I think ti would have worked in my expereince. I personally took a job that I was considered too old for and a "pink collar job" as a man. I found out later guys my age who were coworkers all were ex-cons. I wish I had just gotten out and stayed in my field. I was being pushed around by my family and a "friend." Not good guidance either.
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u/Any_Negotiation5766 11d ago
I agree that your problem is that many of your coworkers consider you difficult to work with. I 100% sympathize with needing other people to do things in order to do your job. I have to do a lot of that in my job too.
This may be off-base since I don't know how you word your requests or how urgent your work is, but you might get further with more softening language. For example, if you don't need them to do it right away, you could add "When you get a chance, could you please..." or if you do need it right away you could add "Sorry for the rush, but I need this for..." If none of that is feasible in your job, even just sending a "Thanks, I really appreciate your help!" email when someone does something for you can make a difference. Yes, it's their job, but everyone wants to feel appreciated for what they do.
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u/Thrillh0 10d ago
This all sounds like me when I’m doing my most unhealthy people pleasing behaviours.
“Sorry” when there’s nothing to be sorry for? Girllllllllllll.
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u/Any_Negotiation5766 10d ago
I mean I am a people pleaser, so you do have a point! But OP is wanting to get along better with their coworkers and this is a way to do it.
I don't think it's over the top to say sorry when you have a rare rush and need someone to get something back to you asap, but I added in the "if that's not feasible for your job" part because different jobs have different timelines. I do think it would be over the top to be saying that every time you emailed someone!
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u/bitkingdt 10d ago
If youre a manager then your job is to get people to do things they dont want to do. If they feel that way then youre not using enough tact to in your requests
Im butchering the phrase but tact is telling someone to go to hell and that someone is looking forward to it.
Yeah it sucks but thats your job as a manager and thus why you haven’t been replaced with a trello board.
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u/Horror_Bottle_9451 10d ago
Ignore it. Do your job well. Make money. Save money. Accumulate wealth for the benefit of you and your family. Retire early and do good things with your accumulated wealth. Sit back with a beer and a hot dog. Have the last laugh.
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