First jobs. Uh oh.
What did I learn at my first job?
Well, quite a bit about tools because I worked at an Ace Hardware.
Other key lessons for 15 year old me included…
You will regret sobbing in the break room over a boy. (And no, he wasn’t worth it. At all.)
Actual follow through is rare and will get you noticed
Working with the public is wild and the customer is not always right. So don’t be an asshole.
How to apply, interview & advocate for myself even if awkward
Since 1980, the percentage of teens working summer jobs has fallen from 51.7% to 30.8% (BLS).
And I am NOT SAYING that no one wants to work anymore.
Many of these kids are taking extra classes and gearing for college. They are stressed out. This isn't laziness.
They are learning about how to check boxes and follow a path. A path that’s tiring and pandemic interrupted. They can leverage AI for a paper. They might be in 10 clubs to shape the right existence for a 4 year school they're skeptical about anyway. They’re learning about career tips in 30 punchy seconds on TikTok rather than long nuanced discussions.
All of this means that becomes more and more about the answer instead of the thought process. About the impression more than the reality.
Before we get all “kids these days" - as a millennial I can confirm that I never gave myself a participation trophy. Neither did my peers.
And these new grads didn’t create the systems they’re coming up in.
New and recent grads largely came up in a hot hiring market (exception only early 2023) where they could find another role seemingly with a Tinder-like swipe. There’s another one around the corner. There’s another “we’re hiring” sign down the street.
Add:
+ that stress to show achievement
+ an unending stream of seemingly glamorous career options like influencer
+ underlying sense of depression under "humor" in #worktok
+ grand expectations to find meaning and full alignment with their work and employer
It’s easy to see how ideas about what “work” means can take a life of their own.
Bad managers and soulless leaders become the enemy (rightfully so). But if you’ve never had a manager, you’re not quite equipped to gauge managers from "just ok" to truly terrible.
If you’ve never worked with a lot of adults - it’s so dang easy to attribute mistakes to malice. With experience comes awareness of good ole incompetence. Even worse, I’m worried about early workers finding themselves naive to more insidiously subtle abuse or harassment.
On this new path, early workers are not learning how to muddle through unclear expectations. Or (horrified gasp) talk on the phone to a stranger. They’re not getting to cry in the break room at 15. Some of these lessons don’t arrive at 15 or 18. They’re showing up at 23+ when the stakes are higher and the work is more complex.
So am I saying I was ready for the workplace because I spent 4 years at an Ace Hardware?
Ummmm NO. But that kernel of experience paved the way for my internships to be more about polishing. And it made every subsequent step an easier one.
So what happens when we skip the “first job” right to the internship? And wohoo, big perk…it’s remote.
Or we skip the internship and jump into a full-time role at a company?
Or what about the students who work out of necessity but aren’t coming in with a network or professional advice from their personal life?
I shudder to picture 20 year old me working remotely. Not because I was lazy or stupid. But because I didn’t know what I didn’t know. I didn’t know about professional subtext. Or what it means to build or lose credibility or capitol within a company.
In those early jobs, I could see how leaders they carried themselves. I could watch them solve problems in front of me. I *absorbed* the norms rather than having to practice them from a computer.
We’ve already had a shortage of senior level talent available to mentor the next gen of talent. (Note: this is not because they are unwilling! It’s because the shortage means they are too busy and in demand with urgent priorities!) And many of those leaders who are career-positioned to be the best mentors are life-positioned to want to be at home.
So, this problem isn’t going anywhere.
This all means that we need to universally redefine “entry level”.
And what if we don’t? If we just decide that kids these days don’t want to work anymore? What if give it the ole sink or swim?
Something that I’ve seen be a near universal truth is that when you give someone an opportunity (even a fair one) to sink or swim and they don’t swim… they will blame you or blame the company or blame the job. Maybe not forever but it’s certainly easier for humans of all ages and levels to blame the circumstances than to learn the toughest of lessons.
And then what do we get?
Turnover rises and tenure falls.
TikTok sets the expectations instead of you.
We never pace supply to demand as workplace demographics shift and AI eats more of the “entry level” jobs
Not so hot, right?
So what do we do instead?
Accept that we will need to give trust and time first. If MasterLube in Billings, MT can change hundreds of lives, I am sure we can give people some ongoing development.
Focus on onboarding. Assume you’ll need to teach the world of work not just teach the tasks.
Share stories not just to-dos Leaders who share their own journeys build trust and trust breeds productivity.
