Gen Z: The Wrong Question We Ask Ourselves Every Day

Every time I speak with a manager about a Generation Z employee who left their job after six months, or who cried in the office after negative feedback, or who asked for remote work before even knowing where the coffee machine is, I always hear the same question.

There it is. That is the wrong question.

What is wrong with them?

There are no better or worse generations

Every generation is a product of its time—of the historical, economic, and cultural context in which it grew up. Saying that Gen Z is fragile, lazy, or spoiled is convenient. It is also partial. And above all, it is hypocritical—because we are the ones who built that generation.

I belong to Generation X, as do most of the managers I work with. We grew up with a work ethic based on total dedication and sacrifice, often at the expense of our families. Many of us are divorced. Many women of our generation had to manage on their own. We learned that hard work was the price of results, and we took it so much for granted that we never explained it to anyone.

The young people entering our companies today do not want that anymore.

And before judging them, perhaps we should ask ourselves: who passed this on to them?

Rubber floors

In most cases, Generation Z are the children of Generation X. They are literally our children.

The ones for whom we installed rubber floors so they wouldn’t get hurt. Helmets so they wouldn’t hit sharp corners. The ones for whom we solved problems, reviewed homework in the evening even when we were tired, studied Aristotle together (and after studying, I might even know more than my son), and protected from every defeat. Then they reached high school, and Covid hit. They took their final exams in their bedrooms. University was spent in front of a screen. They learned to relate to others online more than in the town square.

Michele Serra called them “the couch potatoes” (gli sdraiati). From a certain angle, one can understand why. But that is a partial perspective.

Because these young people are not lazy. They are full of real contradictions: they want a good mentor and they want autonomy. They want responsibility, but if the pressure is too high, they freeze. They want continuous feedback, but if it is negative, they go into crisis. They look for a serene environment—it is the first thing they tell you in an interview, even before saying they want to learn. They ask for a development plan and, after a year, they ask for a raise. And if it doesn’t come quickly enough, they leave.

This is not a character flaw. It is the result of a system—familial, educational, social—that has stopped training resilience.

The manager who is afraid

I have heard managers ask me to stabilize an apprenticeship contract after six months because the person showed great commitment—and then, poor thing, with an apprenticeship contract, they didn’t feel like assigning them projects with more autonomy, mainly because HR struggled to find them and they are afraid of losing them.

My answer was no.

Not because that young person wasn’t worth it—and besides, the idea wasn’t even theirs. But because continuously offering shortcuts is not management; it is the continuation of the same system that has already done enough damage. In life, there aren’t always shortcuts. But who taught them that? And who is afraid to teach it now if they haven’t understood it until now?

The problem is not just the young person. It is that the managers themselves do not know how to manage this generation. They are afraid: if the intern or apprentice leaves, they will be judged as incompetent, and unfortunately, that often happens. So they give in. They organize happy hours to build the team, or bring pastries in the morning to create an atmosphere. These are nice things—but they do not replace substance. Such as, for example, constructive feedback, without the fear that it might hurt.

What to do, concretely

First: let’s train managers. Not to make them kinder to Gen Z—but to make them capable of balancing rigor and relationships. Negative feedback, when given well, does not destroy; it builds. But one must know how to give it. It is not a natural gift. It is learned.

Second: let’s create real spaces for intergenerational encounters within companies. Not events, not team building with a Saturday spent rafting together. Workshops where viewpoints truly clash and compare—where a fifty-year-old manager and a twenty-two-year-old sit at the same table, listen to each other, and understand each other instead of looking at each other with suspicion from opposite sides.

Third—the most uncomfortable point: companies today must do the work that schools and families have partly stopped doing. It is not fair. But it is real. And pretending it isn’t so means wasting precious time while the gap widens.

Ten years from now

If we do not change our approach now, in ten years we will have a middle management crisis that we will not be able to fill. The young people who are not undergoing the necessary growth path today—because no one is truly guiding them—will not have the tools to lead our organizations tomorrow.

It is not about choosing between the Gen X sacrifice ethic and the Gen Z need for well-being. It is about helping these young people become capable adults: able to take responsibility, manage effort, and handle a “no.”

They are our children. It is up to us.

And no— a happy hour is not enough.