The Downside of Parental Connection : The Intern Advocate

A little over a week ago, Chicago Tribune reporter Angie Leventis Lourgos wrote an article entitled “Are students, parents too connected?” in which she asserted “advice [is] just a click away, but some say easy access hinders independence.” This could not be more true. And it isn’t such a new phenomena. In fact, a few years ago a colleague of mine, Carol, was meeting with a student – we’ll call her Stephanie – to discuss her course selection for the coming semester. As they discussed some of the options, it was clear that one of the decisions that Stephanie needed to make was to choose from two different sections of a course that she needed to take. Let me be clear here…Stephanie was choosing between two different sections of the same class, taught by the same professor, one offered at 9:15 AM on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and the other offered on the same days of the week at 11:30 AM. Let me be really clear here…the only difference between the two classes was that one ran about two hours before the other. Stephanie was not sure what to do and told Carol that she needed to call her mom. Carol suggested, as I think any reasonable person would suggest in such a situation, that Stephanie make a choice at that time and she could come back later and try to make alterations if she changed her mind. So Stephanie chose a section, they got her registered, and she went on her merry way. One might think it ends here, but the story continues. The next day Stephanie returned and met with Carol again. She had spoken with her mom, and her mom felt that the other section was better. Stephanie asked to change her registration to the other section.

In the end, it’s not the change itself that is imporant. What is important, and is, in fact, a bit worrisome, is that Stephanie was paralyzed in making this relatively minor decision. And Stephanie is not alone; I could go on and on with hundreds of stories from my experiences and that of my colleagues around the nation that illustrate this same point: Millennials are sheltered. They have wonderfully close relationships with their families, and feel truly supported, but they have little experience figuring things out for themselves. And they and their families often perpetuate this arrested development long after they reach young adulthood. We may assume that this is behavior that a young person would grow out of as they leave high school and get adjusted to college, but in fact what we see is that college students are more than willing to cede control or decision-making to their parents (at least around the majority of issues) – and that it doesn’t stop at commencement in May four years later.

Let’s cut to the chase – though there is so much I could say about this (in fact, an entire chapter in my book, MIllennials on Board: The Impact of the Rising Generation on the Workplace, is devoted to Millennials as “The Hovered Generation”) – what does this mean for the companies that employ these folks, and the managers charged with leading them?

For one thing, I have spoken with numerous audiences of employers or career counseling professionals who cite examples of Millennials asking for their offer letters to be sent to their parents instead of to them, parents coming along on job interviews, or networking events at which a parent will be asking question on behalf of their child and through the conversation the recruiter will come to realize that the adult child is actually standing right there. I have serious worries about what this infantilization can do to the development of professional self-esteem and self-efficacy. Secondly, with all of the care and attention to their needs throughout their lives, Millennials have grown to have very high expectations, not just for themselves, but for others as well. The disappointment that they then sometimes experience is not just confined to not getting the salary or promotion that they desire, but also has to do with not having their needs met in the way that they expect. Remember, they are quite accustomed to a focus on their needs from the ultimate authority – their parents – and this sets a pretty high bar for authorities down the road, such as supervisors, with whom they often share a lot about themselves, even personal information. They have very high expectations for others and will lose trust in those who do not live up to those (sometimes quite inappropriate) expectations.

So then, what can organizations do in the age of such significant parental involvement? A major aspect involves sadly accepting the role that parents have to play with the career decisions of their adult children. Here’s a few quick ideas:

• • Career development seminars for parents – we have to teach them the limits…for their kids’ sake!
  • Parent-Liaison Departments – colleges now do it, maybe businesses should as well.
  • Parent Newsletter – a good way to keep them at bay, while still keeping them just a bit connected.
  • Enhance training regarding this issue for recruiters and managers – they need to know how to work with potential new employees.
  • Mentoring new employees – if parents have not been doing a good job cultivating this kind of self-efficacy, then we have more work to do!

P.S. If you want to read some pretty titillating and extreme examples, read Danielle Sacks’ article “Scenes from the Culture Clash,” published by Fast Company (January 2006)…I PROMISE it is worth the Google search!

Tagged as: Gen-Y, Millennials, parents, Rachel I. Reiser

Share This Article With Your Colleagues...

| More

via internadvocate.com

Posted via email from soulhangout's posterous