Generation Y Women: Revolutionizing a Work Environment Near You - Building Gender Balanced Business

There are currently over 80 million members of Generation Y in the United States, a segment of the population that includes those people born between 1978 and 1994. With numbers exceeding those of the powerful Baby Boomer generation, this generation is likely to equal their predecessor’s influence and ability to change the status quo, particularly in their places of employment. The Business and Professional Women’s (BPW) Foundation recently released a profile of how Generation Y women think, act and dream when it comes to their jobs—revealing female workers that are redefining the boundaries of work-life balance, pushing for agendas of self-autonomy, and focused on goal-oriented management that favors results over time spent in the office.

• BPW found through interviews that Generation Y workers tend to reject the traditional work/life dichotomy, finding work to be an intrinsic—rather than inevitably necessary—component of a meaningful existence.

• These Gen Y women fully expect to minister to the important familial and personal relationships in their lives, and don’t want or desire to sacrifice those relationships for the sake of their careers. Those Gen Y women without families of their own often evaluate their future at a company based in part on whether that company allows workers to successfully balance family needs and work expectations.

• Female Gen Y workers also believe that job performance should be evaluated less by how warm one’s office chair is, and more by how well one’s duties are being performed. These results-focused work environments involve non-traditional work hours, the ability to work from home, and flexibility to accommodate the needs of personal lives, even within the “sacrosanct” hours of 9-5.

• The need for intrinsic reward—the feeling of creativity experienced by a worker when engaged in a project—is a strong one with Generation Y women, and speaks to their desire for levels of self-autonomy that directly question the traditional vertical management style of most employers. These young women simply want “the freedom to do the job,” with expectations and goals clearly outlined, but execution left up to them.

• Further, the BPW interviews revealed that Generation Y women are conflicted by what they see as their drive for change and accommodation, and the reality of obstacles that exist for female workers in traditional work environments.

• As many of these young women move forward with their lives and begin having families of their own, how and whether companies adjust traditional models to incorporate these workers’ expectations may, according to BPW, make a real competitive difference.