The Baby Boomers were loyal to the firm. Generation X learnt to not take having a job for granted. Millennials leaned into side hustles and asserted their worth in a skills shortage.
Since entering the workforce, Generation Z (born after 1996) have been accused of being entitled, needing too many compliments, somehow most egregiously, leaving at 5pm without a second thought. That is, if they are even working from the office that day.
As Australia follows France, Ireland and Belgium in legislating a right to disconnect, will the drawing of boundaries and muting of notifications be Generation Z’s workplace legacy?
Modern technology means employees can no longer leave the office behind when they finish work for the day.Credit: Stephen Kiprillis
Perhaps. However, workplace culture experts warn against seeing the post-pandemic, remote-working, under-staffed forest only for its most recently planted trees.
Chris Wright, an associate professor of work and organisational studies at the University of Sydney, believes the right to disconnect has not been driven by Generation Z but by the circumstances in which they entered the workforce.
“COVID really brought this existing conversation about work/life balance to a head; the pandemic blurred boundaries between work life and personal life,” he said.
“The smartphone had the massive advantage of allowing us to work through COVID, but at the same time those boundaries between work and personal life blurred significantly, and they were never really restored.”
A 2022 report by the Australia Institute’s Centre for Future Work found 44 per cent of Australians regularly worked outside their scheduled hours to meet the expectations of their employer, concluding lockdowns had “accelerated patterns of overtime through the blurring of lines between work and home life”.
The survey found employees in managerial roles were more likely to feel overtime was part of their job. Wright said senior employees would also have more power to ignore an unreasonable request after hours.
Is the right to disconnect Gen Z’s workplace legacy? It’s complicated
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17.02.2024
The Baby Boomers were loyal to the firm. Generation X learnt to not take having a job for granted. Millennials leaned into side hustles and asserted their worth in a skills shortage.
Since entering the workforce, Generation Z (born after 1996) have been accused of being entitled, needing too many compliments, somehow most egregiously, leaving at 5pm without a second thought. That is, if they are even working from the office that day.
As Australia follows France, Ireland and Belgium........
© The Sydney Morning Herald
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