1 post tagged “women”

After reading this article in Dame Magazine about the entitled generation (my generation), I found myself annoyed, and admittedly, a bit defensive. And perhaps a bit guilty for having such high expectations of the "real world."

As a twenty-something one year out of college, and one year into my first "real world" job, I am still always trying to gain that extra tidbit of experience. I accept tedious proofreading assignments with a smile, because I know that I need to prove myself worthy of the little stuff before being trusted with the more thought-stimulating projects. And while I can't say I'm happy in my current position, or that I've even learned much beyond how to deal with office politics, I can say that I am lucky to have been offered my position in the first place during a time when a) the economy's not so hot and b) some of my other classmates were still scrounging around for work - or in some cases, because there were no other options, unpaid internships meant for those still in college.

I feel like while the younger generation may have different perspectives about the work place than, say, our parents, and while some of us do indeed act (maybe overly so) like it, we can't all be clumped into one category of being entitled.

"Younger women arrive at a new office pumped up on Suze Orman and you-go-girl self-empowerment, and are quickly deflated by the necessary drudgery of copying and collating. Older women, who have paid their dues dealing with sexism and grunt work for decades, are chagrined that younger women assume they can just show up and take over. Commence an intergenerational clash."

Hmmm. Okay. I can see that. But my big issue with this whole "intergenerational clash" is that the seasoned professionals are unwilling to move along and change with the times, including crucial know-how in a technologically advanced age (managers who don't know how to use Excel? Yup - heard of 'em). We are already engaged in a generation where men and women are (or should be) treated equally in the workplace. And while, yes, we're still working on perfecting it (statistics show that for every dollar a man makes a woman makes only 3/4 of it), allowing our managers and executives to treat us (younger women) like they were treated does not help anyone. In fact, I'd say it moves us, as a soceity, backward.

As a 43-year-old founder of a financial blog for women boldly mentions,

'I’m glad they have confidence, but boy do I wish they also had the savvy to realize that they can be pretty offensive to the veterans when they clearly don’t expect to play by the rules.'

Wait - what rules? ...that younger women should expect to be treated poorly just like how some older women were when they were our age? You must be kidding.

I know that we have to start at the bottom and work our way up. But why is it that our eagerness to learn, so that we can make those moves, is being shunned? I would hope it's appreciated. "Dear Manager, I'd love it if you gave me something-anything!-to help me learn so I can become a better, more profitable employee to you." ...Where's the harm in that? There's also a fresh batch of college graduates every quarter waiting to apply to those bottom-of-the-barrel, coffee-fetching, copy-making jobs. So why not move everyone through the line?

It's 2008. I most definitely expect to work my ass off to move to next levels and to be successful. And I will. And I'll even wear a broad smile and designer jeans while doing so. But I have some expectations, too, and refuse to let someone utterly take advantage me. You take on internships for a reason - to me that's your stepping stone. Your first glimpse into the "real world." But now, I have my degree, so yes, my expectations have risen. There's no way you can get me to consent to putting up with sexist, well-I-had-to-so-you-have-to bullshit from executives who grew up in a completely different generation. We must keep up with societal changes (We all use e-mail now, and feel naked without our cell phones...right?), including those changes that imply that certain young people are graduating from college smarter than generations before, and that they are probably smarter than a lot of people already in the workforce.