stylegirlfriend.com: A 24-year-old and a 56-year-old describe the same Wednesday.
The younger one says it was brutal. Back-to-back calls, a manager who wanted a revision, a Slack message at 6:40 that she answered from the couch. She uses the word burnout twice before she gets to what happened after work.
The older one says it was Wednesday.
9 comments:
This article was interesting when thinking about it in the frame of theatre. I think a lot of times in the theatre profession we’re expected to give 200% because it’s considered a privilege to do what we do. For a lot of people, what we do is a hobby. Sometimes this mindset is helpful for me when things get difficult as a way of staying positive; but there are other times when I leave rehearsal at night and want to leave it at the door.
The thing that stood out to me the most was the section about receiving a message during dinner and the different perspectives on how big of a deal that is. In the AEA Lort handbook it specifies that stage managers don’t get paid to answer emails. I have always found this ironic because it’s so much of the stage manager’s job to answer emails – although I never fault someone for emailing me outside of working hours, I do think it’s reasonable for them to assume that it may take me time to respond.
Comment By Sophie Bilodeau
I found this topic very important as I become part of the working world. I have seen my parents work jobs that include long hours after they come home from work and deal with stressful situations and unrecognized efforts to get their work done. I think my biggest argument against this article is that it primarily looks at the extremes and discusses them as if they are the absolutes. I think that the complaints they explained Gen Z has isn’t what I have found in practice while talking with older friends and family members with jobs and that the strain on the older generations is downplayed. I think this article was insightful to display this conflict in terminology but could have also focused on the more realistic days of a current worker. Personally I wonder where I land on this scale from accepting struggle for assurance in a better future and creating boundaries in the present especially in the industry I am expecting to go into. I know there has been a history of overworking in theater and I wonder how I will experience and deal with this.
Instead of staying at the surface level of observing Gen Z, I like how this article delves deeper into exploring the cultural and familial reasons behind these behaviors. Nowadays, a lot of social media content targets this generation negatively without considering the reasons behind their behavior, so I appreciate how this article takes the time to unpack them. Explaining such a broad concept by breaking it down into smaller scenarios and comparing how Gen Z might react differently from Boomers and Gen X was really effective to me. It allows readers to understand the issue through different perspectives and situations. I do question how definitively the article presents the differences between younger and older generations. It presents these behaviors as though they are certain to occur, without acknowledging alternative possibilities or individual differences. This could potentially reinforce negative misconceptions and stereotypes about Gen Z, causing people who do not behave in these ways to still be stereotyped as being part of the same group.
I really appreciate how this article is worded. In the ongoing conversation of what appropriate workplace expectations look like, the way the article acknowledges that the younger and older generations both have similar work experiences but handle them differently as not a good or bad thing is refreshing. I think it is a good thing that Gen Z is putting up more boundaries to hold their employers accountable so that when they can enjoy a healthy work-life balance that Gen-X frankly didn’t know was an option. Although, I do think there is a certain limit of what is deemed irresponsible of employers. A one time event of helping out a coworker if they are out is not too much to ask in my opinion, as long as then an expectation is not established. In fact, I think, as the article observed, many of the issues that Gen Z have are the patterns that are established if they allow an expectation to be set that is beyond their boundaries.
When I started this article, I expected it to just admonish Gen-Z workers for doing things such as setting boundaries and saying no in the workplace. Which we do tend to do more than other generations. While it did acknowledge that fact, I appreciate that it wasn't treated as a bad thing. I also appreciated the way that the article attempted to give context and reasoning to why different generations react differently to each scenario. I was surprised how much I was impacted when the article described that a large contributing factor was that other generations always had the expectation that they could leave the job if things got too bad, or that things would get better when (not if) they were promoted, but Gen Z doesn't have that. The job market has become unstable, many have to work several jobs to afford rent, and there's not always a promise that things are going to get better. Gen Z workers are setting boundaries and saying no when necessary in order to make the situation survivable long-term.
I will always say it’s a good thing to have boundaries at your job, I feel like Gen Z is better than other generations at keeping a good work life balance, I feel like that aspect of our generation is critiqued more than it should. I still conditioned to a lot of older generations that you owe your work more than you should but in all actuality you just owe your job the work that you were hired to do, nothing more than that and while if you want you can go the extra mile you should never feel pressured to do so by your work environment or your boss. The majority of work establishments make way too much money for you to feel guilty for anything, a job site will always prioritize their profits and business so it makes sense for a worker to prioritize themselves since a lot of the time the job won’t
I feel as though this is being seen as a much more concerning action than it actually is and is almost being blown out of proportion. Especially in the theatre world, people are often are not as extreme as this, and many of the managers are also Gen Z. While there is undeniably a shift in workplace etiquette for the younger generation, it is almost certainly the product of witnessing what corporate America can do and has done to Gen Zs parents and the warnings they gave. On the flip side the current economic scene is the perfect time to be impleentnign such tactics as described in th article as Gen Z is not only the largest upcoming working class but also is statiscially a lot more effective of a working class due to both being raised with the technology, being one of the most educated generations in history, and having lower drug, alcohol, and substance rates.
I understand this articles thesis, that gen-z vocalizes and sees issues in the workplace that previous generations have not felt the need to criticize, and I do think that is a product of a changing world where it feels like there are no jobs and no ways to be promoted, and no way to get a job without having a job and all of these things, but I also think the term burn out gets overused in today's society. Sometimes you do just have to buckle down and work at a shitty job because it is your job. No job is going to have completely clear outlines of what is and is not your responsibility, and whether or not it gets noticed someone has to get things done. I think there are arguments for both sides, but at a certain point it feels like talking about micro problems just because they are slightly inconvenient makes small problems into life consuming dilemmas.
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