Gen Z are less satisfied with their jobs

Individuals who are born between 1997 and 2012 are known as Gen Z. This generation is defined by the fact they are the first true digital natives; they have known a time when the internet was not accessible 24/7.

Glassdoor has been exploring what Gen Z wants from the world of work. The research collated information from Glassdoor’s company reviews database and found that Gen Z were less satisfied with their jobs than older generations – scoring them 3.80 out of five.

The figure was the same for millennials (born between 1981 and 1996), but Gen Z (1965 to 1980) scored their jobs 3.85 out of five, while Boomers (1946 to 1964) gave their jobs a score of 3.93.

Gen Z balance meaningful work with security

The research went further than if workers were satisfied or not, and looked at which jobs Gen Z were most keen to do.

The top five highest-rated jobs were corporate recruiter, marketing manager, social media manager, data scientist, and product manager.

For Glassdoor, what these jobs have in common is they allow Gen Z workers to influence company culture, as well as a broader social impact.

Glassdoor’s associate economist Richard Johnson wrote in a blog: “For Gen Zers, corporate recruiting roles offer them the most job satisfaction  as it provides them the opportunity to shape how companies attract and retain talent, including helping to build diverse and inclusive workforces.

“Gen Zers working as marketing and social media managers (ranked second at 4.56 and third at 4.46 respectively) play an important role in shaping a company’s brand.

“Also highly rated for Gen Zers…are data scientist roles. As a data scientist, Gen Z employees analyze big data and develop solutions to inform strategic decision making.”

Glassdoor further explored the most popular jobs with non-Gen Z populations. For Boomers, the most popular was president, for Gen X it was CEO, and for millennials, it was a realtor.

This shows that older generations “are instead finding satisfaction in roles that require more years of experience, have more responsibility and wider impact across the business”, according to Glassdoor’s Johnson.

However, while work that has a social impact and meaning is important to Gen Z, this generation is also looking for job stability.

This finding corroborates data from Visier that shows that Gen Z are not keen to job hop, they want to build their careers in their current employer.

According to Johnson at Glassdoor: “For Gen Z, working for a larger, more established company provides them with greater job security and career opportunities that smaller and newer companies often lack”.

This focus on career development explains why Gen Z prefers to work for larger companies that are older than 20 years old – whereas other generations are less bothered about working for big, household names.

The top five employers Gen Z want to work for are Microsoft, Google, Morgan Stanley, Trader Joe’s, and Total Quality Logistics. None of these employers are ranked in non-Gen Z populations’ top ten.

Interestingly, many of the employers listed by both Gen Z and non-Gen Z workers “have taken a public stance on issues ranging from racial equity in the workplace to environmental sustainability,” according to Glassdoor.

Thereby showing it isn’t just Gen Z that want to work for socially conscious. Individuals no matter their age want to work “for companies to engage in public discussions around social issues impacting their employees, and the reality that many companies have become more openly engaged in social and environmental issues in recent years”, wrote Johnson.

Employers, are you struggling to hire workers of different ages and seniority in the ‘Great Resignation’? If the answer is yes, then maybe it’s time to rethink your social and environmental commitments.

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