How to deal with Millennials?

There is a lot of buzz about Millennials. And it is very frequent to find senior people complaining about them, as well as listening to statements like "how difficult is to manage them".

Some days ago, I found a short video of someone talking about them. And to my surprise, I was deeply shocked up to the point that I shared it with family and friends, and everyone had the same reaction. We've never seen before someone explaining in such an interesting way what is happening inside millennials' minds, why they behave like they do and which are the main causes of this behaviour.

For instance, does this quote will sound familiar?

"Apparently millennials as a generation are tough to manage and they're accused to be entitled, narcissistic, self-interested, unfocused and lazy. And because they confound leadership so much, what's happening as leaders are asking the Millennials 'What do you want?', Millennials will say: We want to work in a place with purpose, we want to make an impact (... whatever that means), we want free food and bean bags. And so somebody articulates some sort of purpose, there's lots of free food and those bean bags and yet, for some reason, they are still not happy..."

Such statement is just the beginning of the great interview done to Simon Sinek about "The Millennial Question", in which he answers in a very profound way:

• What Millennials think?
• How to deal with them?

Watch this video to find the answers to the above questions:

As you can see, Simon points out four characteristics about Millennials:

1. Parenting: They were told that they were special all the time, and told that they can have EVERYTHING they want in life just because they want it. Some of them got "A's" not because they earn them but because the teachers didn't want to do with the parents.
2. Technology: There is an entire generation that has access to an addictive numbing to chemical call dopamine through SOCIAL MEDIA and CELL PHONES as they are going to the high stress of adolescence.
3. Impatience: Millennials are grown up in a world of INSTANT GRATIFICATIONS. You want to buy something and you go to Amazon and arrives the next day. You want to watch a movie, log on, and watch a movie. You want to watch a TV show and... BINGE! You don't even have to wait week to week. You want to go on a date, you don't even have to "learn" that skill, you just only "swipe right". EVERYTHING you want you can have it instantaneously.
4. Environment: We are putting Millennials in corporate environments that ARE NOT HELPING them to build their confidence and aren't helping them to learn the skills of cooperation and aren't helping them to overcome the challenges of a digital world and finding more balance. It's the corporations, the corporate environment and the total lack of good leadership that it is making them feel the way they do.

Also Simon explains how cell phones are seriously affecting us and the way we build relationships.

He describes daily behaviours in which we depend on our phone like addicts do on their addictions (drugs, alcohol) and recognises that the only way to get out of this tramp is to take out the temptation, in this case the phone out of our sight. In his words:

We cannot trust our will power, we are not strong enough. But when we removed the temptation it actually makes it a lot easier. If you don't have the phone you can actually enjoy the world. And that's when ideas happen. Ideas happen when our minds wonder. None of us should charge our phones in our beds, we should charge them in our living rooms....

And I leave his final words to think about our role as a generation and how we want to play it.

We now have a responsibility to make up the shortfall and to help this amazing, idealistic, fantastic generation build their confidence, learn patience, learn the social skills, find a better balance between life and technology, because is the right thing to do.

I do strongly believe that we can learn a lot from them, and we can teach them a lot of things based on our experience and acquired skills. Both generations can have a very active and fundamental role. It's only a matter of will and trust.

Something very interesting is that the behaviours that Simon attributes to Millennials, are also frequent in "Non-Millennials". For instance, teens and little kids are that don't fall into the Millennials definition, are behaving like "Uber Millennials" in three of the categories mentioned above: Parenting, Technology and Impatience. And exactly the same applies to "older people". How many people +40 do you know that is addicted to its mobile? And impatient enough to need everything NOW? Or want to make an impact in the society/world (...whatever that means)?

This is my only criticism to Simon. He fell too narrow on the age group he is describing. Many of the characteristics he mentioned, apply perfectly well to Millennials, but also to +40, and also to -20 (teens and kids).

I'd love to know your opinion about it, and if you agree with:

1. Do millennials behave like Simon's description? and
2. Do the described characteristics only apply to Millennials?

Any feedback and example that you can provide is highly appreciated.