Are recent college graduates who turn down jobs amid the recession doing the right thing?
Image by gadgetdude via Flickr
The New York Times reports that college graduates are turning down job offers.
Some students, like Ms. Parsons, say they can afford to hold out a while. So does Robert Sherman, a finance major at Syracuse University who rejected a $50,000-a-year job as head of technology for a consulting company because he did not get a good vibe from his potential bosses. Instead, he said, he is “doing odd jobs to support myself, and I’m O.K. with that” while he tries to get two technology companies of his own off the ground. via New York Times
Are they mad? Have Gen Y:ers taken entitlement to a whole new level?
Settle down.
It’s really not surprising that bright, ambitious college students aren’t falling all over themselves to accept jobs they aren’t interested in.
For one thing, we don’t have mortgages and kids to support, so living on the cheap for a while isn’t such a catastrophe. In fact, it might be a good thing. Perhaps Gen Y:ers, realizing that you can get by with less and still be happy, will stem the tide of rampant consumerism in America—the kind that has us filling up landmines with disposable crap, so that we can buy more crap—even when the economy improves. A girl can dream, anyway.
More pointedly, recent graduates’ reluctance to take any old job is a necessary wake up call to employers. It’s not all about the money. Mr. Sherman turned down what sounds to me like a small fortune (lowly grad student that I am), because “he did not get a good vibe from his potential bosses.” Instead of risking being unhappy at a job he doesn’t like, Mr. Sherman is trying his hand at entrepreneurship—also a good thing for the economy.
There are plenty of things that employers can do to make themselves attractive to top graduates aside from offering higher salaries. Astri and I have interviewed quite a lot of Gen Y:ers about what they want from their jobs and here is some of what they told us: the ability to work from home some of the week, flexible hours, more horizontal hierarchies, increased vacation time, the option to spend some of their working time on personal projects (don’t balk, Google does it). In return, Gen Y:ers are willing to give themselves wholeheartedly to their work, weisureites that we are.
Of course, Mr. Sherman and others like him won’t be able to be so picky forever. When he finally has a family, for example, he will need health insurance. In America, unlike most rich nations, health care is tied to your employer. Several of my own friends feel tethered to jobs they don’t like for that very reason. But the answer is not to insist college students get off their high horses and simply accept whatever muck is being offered. The answer is to tune in to the desires of the youngest generation of professionals and improve the workplace for everyone.
- Liz
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A few issues here.
You need health insurance at any age, not just when you have a family. The cost of living without it is brutal if you need surgery or expensive treatment. With all due respect, suggesting living without it because they’re young and single is madness. Even freelance, you can find something to protect you from medical catastrophe. If it’s a choice between affording new shoes or health insurance, guess which should win.
You can turn down a decently-paid job because you don’t like the vibe — but you may not get 20 or 10 or even 3 other offers. Like many of my generation (yes, the suck it up crowd in a highly competitive field), I’ve accepted jobs knowing full well they would not be at all amusing, but would pay bills, build my skills and lead to the next, hopefully happier, situation. Please. The working world is not filled with shiny, happy people whom you either really like or avoid. Some of the worst bosses are those who can teach you the most, whether soft or hard skills.
It’s nice to dream big but some of the people who are in the position to hire Gen Yers who show up with all these wishes roll their eyes and hire someone a little less…fussy.
You bring up good points and I don’t disagree that 1) we all need health care and 2) sometimes it’s a good idea to take a job you may not be crazy about.
I’m just saying that if this is a real trend– I’m not convinced one New York Times article makes it so– then there’s a bigger picture problem with the way jobs are structured. And “suck it up” isn’t the only or best solution necessarily. /Liz
In response to another comment. See in context »There’s a practical side to this that’s not obvious: your first job out of college can set the tone on your career earnings. Gone are the days when your next employer will double your pay without blinking. (How I miss 1997.) When you change jobs, expect your employer to base your offer on how much you made at your last job, with enough adjustment to make it worth the leap for you.
And that’s it, until you find yourself in another hiring spree where they can’t find enough warm bodies to stick in Aeron office chairs, not the half-empty cubicle farms of today.
Liz, I don’t think “suck it up” is a career standard, by any means. But, seriously, every job has its shortcomings and if you only accept jobs you think perfect, you’re setting an impossible standard and, I do think, not forcing yourself to grow. My first NYC job was not a great fit in some ways, but after six months’ cold-calling in a recession, I was not about to say no to the first real offer that fit my skills, if not my temperament.
When it comes to increasing your earnings, I disagree as well on this point. I doubled mine between 1994 and 1996. A great book, for women of all ages, is “Women Don’t Ask”, which focuses on when and why women have such difficulty negotiating more money when offered a job when men, they found, almost always do. Even if it’s a 5 or 15% difference each time, it really adds up.
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