Dear Earthlings,
We have been observing your primitive ways from afar for thousands of years. Finally, we are breaking our silence to stop you from silencing the first generation on your planet that reminds us of ourselves. You are on the verge of seriously messing up your future – the very people who will pay for your retirement if you don’t kill them first with abject stupidity.
Millennials were born under a different star than their predecessors. The scientific details of this difference are beyond your comprehension, but the consequences of it cannot be ignored. Earthlings for years have engaged in useless and destructive wars. They have carried these warring traits into business and their personal lives. The only way they have sometimes kept peace is by creating rules and hierarchies. Millennials don’t want to make war, so they also don’t want to play by your rules.
What Millennials — and Martians by the way — do want to do is succeed and have fun doing it. Working for a dull manager is not fun. It is also not the way to succeed. Being constrained by organizational layers also is no fun, and no prescription for success. So here’s some advice from afar on how to make work fun and Millennials successful:
1.Let’s face it, you have a big logjam at the manager level that you need to break. Replace one-half of your managers with Millennials now. We are not kidding. You will be amazed at the results. It’s like bringing flame-throwers up from the minors.
2.Replace the remainder of your managers with Millennials over the next two years, except for those few managers who are really stars.
3.Turn your displaced managers into individual contributors. That’s all they’re really doing now anyway. Give them individual metrics and let them contribute as long as they can. They will add value without poisoning the next generation.
4.Encourage your Millennials to find their passion [INSERT INC blog link]. Think of it as running a continuous job fair. Use assessments to help them figure it out. Millennials love assessments.
5.Assign as many Millennials as possible to important project work. Evaluate the project team based on team vs. individual metrics and make them meaningful: innovation that delivers measurable ROI; opening new markets; generating new customers. You get the idea. Challenge them and recognize them.
6.Conduct regular focus groups with your Millennials and find out what’s on their mind and how they think things can be done better.
7.Put at least one Millennial on each succession planning bench. Now you really think we’re crazy. Before you toss your mobile device out the window, consider how old Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison, Warren Buffet and others were when they became great leaders — younger than today’s older Millennials.
It’s time for real change. Do you have the courage? Because if you don’t really want these people, we’ll take them. And believe me, we have a lot to offer based on millions of years of experience!
Regards and hope,
Four Caring Martian Billennials
