Sociologist Francesca Coin: “Here’s how (and why) Gen Z is changing the world of work.”

The world of work is about to experience a phase of profound change: Gen Z is poised to outnumber the Baby Boomers in the full-time workforce and will bring with it desires and expectations that differ profoundly from those of previous generations. We asked sociologist Francesca Coin, author of the book “The great resignation. The new rejection of work and the time to take back our lives” (published by Einaudi in 2023), to help us understand the changes taking place. Coin teaches in the Work Welfare Society Competence Center of the Department of Business Administration Health and Social Sciences (Deass) at Supsi, Switzerland. He writes in International.

Generation Z has a different approach to work than the generations before it. Based on your research what does this different approach consist of and what causes it?

For several months the press has been wondering about this issue. In general, Gen Z grew up in an era marked by continuous crises: the pandemic crisis, climate crisis, war, and financial crises since the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy. In 2023, the consulting firm EY compiled a report on Gen Z youth living in the United States, showing that they arrive in the labor market in a different context than past generations. Housing, health care and education impose high economic pressures on the younger generation. At the same time, precarity, inflation and low wages mean that Gen Z has concerns that previous generations did not. According to the report, Gen Z’s main concern is money, and with it wage transparency, social or gender inequity. For Gen Z, earning a lot of money is crucial, but the goal is not to get rich, it is to survive.

Can we talk about work disaffection for this generation or is it a broader, intergenerational phenomenon due to changed economic and social conditions?

It depends on the definition we give. If we think of disaffection as the tendency not to accept a job at any cost, but to consider the costs and benefits involved, economically, professionally and socially, we could say that disaffection is an intergenerational phenomenon, linked to the growth of precariousness and deteriorating working conditions. It is intergenerational, for example, the increase in the number of voluntary resignations, which we could see as one of the symptoms of this trend. In Gen Z, this is often linked to wages that are too low, and the inability to accept jobs that offer inadequate financial compensation. This also seems important to me in light of the fact that, for Gen Z, doing multiple jobs at once is often necessary. The generation born in the economic boom grew up in a time when work was, still, protected and characterized by loyalty to the company. Gen X was born in the age of precarity. Millennials grew up doing “side hustles” (odd jobs) in the gig economy. Gen Z, on the other hand, has, often, the need to work a second job in addition to their main employment. We are, in other words, in a context where working conditions are deteriorating generation after generation. EY’s report, for example, showed that 39 percent of respondents under 26 held either a full-time or part-time job or freelanced. “For Gen X, having a side job was a source of shame, often accepting it out of desperation or to make ends meet and get by,” the report wrote. For Gen Z to do (at least) two jobs is often a necessity. Forced to work harder, in order to stay afloat in a precarious and low-paid work environment, it is not uncommon for Gen Z to be quicker to leave a job that does not pay enough, out of a need to make up sufficient income.

Hourly flexibility, after salary, seems to be one of the main drivers of Generation Z’s work choices. Why? Is this phenomenon related in any way to the increase in the number of people having double (if not triple) jobs? Or is it related only to the desire for a better work-life balance?

I would say that this trend is strongly related to the need for control. In an era of uncertainty, made up of crisis and precariousness, Generation Z seeks to counter this high perception of insecurity by maintaining control at least over its work. As such, they often try to maintain control over schedules, work arrangements (remote or otherwise), shifts, and payroll. Growing up in a time of crisis marked by uncontrollable circumstances that disrupted their families, Gen Z feel they have no control over the events that shape their lives and destinies. Hence, I believe, the emphasis on how to work, how much to work, when to work, and in what way, and the tendency to move toward companies that can meet one’s needs.

More and more people belonging to GenZ are entering the workforce. Can it be an engine for cultural change within companies?

I would say so. However individually and disorganized, the pressures Gen Z exerts in workplaces are grafted into a general context of difficulty in which companies are struggling to find staff. In this sense, they are symptoms that perhaps it is time to rethink the way we work. Our labor model is still based on a Fordist society, founded, for example, on the 8-hour workday and factory hours, even though Fordism has been gone for decades. In recent decades, production capacity, technologies, and society itself have changed dramatically, along with their priorities and context-just think of the climate crisis. In this sense, the four-day work week, smart working, and universal basic income are all issues that suggest it is time to think about how to reform work in the third millennium.