{"id":23498,"date":"2017-12-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-12-01T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ceric.org\/2017\/12\/generations-next-lessons-from-the-atm\/"},"modified":"2017-12-01T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2017-12-01T05:00:00","slug":"generations-next-lessons-from-the-atm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ceric.ca\/fr\/2017\/12\/generations-next-lessons-from-the-atm\/","title":{"rendered":"Generation(s) Next: Lessons from the ATM"},"content":{"rendered":"

What career development professionals can do to prepare young jobseekers for a labour market defined by precarious employment<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

By Donnalee Bell <\/em><\/p>\n

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When I was doing my undergraduate degree in the 1990s, I had a History of Labour professor that had an apocalyptic fear of ATMs. Instead of being innocuous places to get cash quick, he believed that ATMs would eliminate full-time, decent teller positions globally. As a result, he implored us not to use them. I\u2019m still a bit wary of ATMs today.<\/p>\n

Almost 25 years later, it seems his prediction didn\u2019t quite pan out. There may be fewer teller positions overall but, like so many technological advances created to automate work throughout history, ATMs actually created more jobs than they replaced.<\/p>\n

So, what does this story have to do with the careers of the next generations of job-seekers? Perhaps, quite a bit. According to Brynjolfsson and McAfee\u2019s Second Machine Age<\/em> (2014), my professor wasn\u2019t exactly wrong, just ahead of his time. Since 2000 there has been what they call the \u201cgreat decoupling\u201d, meaning that developments in technology are no longer resulting in aggregate job creation, but rather been responsible for sluggish employment growth. Combine this with shifts in business practices (i.e. downsizing, outsourcing) and the rise of the gig economy and Generation(s) Next finds themselves transitioning to work in a world that lacks dependable employment and that, for many, does not pay a living wage (Zizys, 2014).<\/p>\n

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Precarious work, the \u201cnew normal\u201d?<\/strong><\/p>\n

In Canada, the dominant result of these trends has been a growing rate of underemployment, with more young adults either overqualified for their job or unable to find enough work hours to comprise full-time employment. The latest statistics show that 40% of university graduates are underemployed, often due to precarious work arrangements (PBO, 2015). Foster (2012) found that the number of Canadian 15- to 29-year-olds working in non-permanent jobs (i.e., jobs that are temporary, contract, part-time, low paid and low skilled) has nearly doubled from 6.9% in 1997 to 11.6% in 2011. According to the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound), a stage of precarious work has become the \u201cnew normal\u201d for young adults transitioning from school to work (2014).<\/p>\n

All of this adds up to economic and psychological challenges for m. Research shows that the hallmarks of a full transition to adulthood are being delayed. In a 2014 survey of Canadian millennials, 43% of 30- to 33-year-olds remained reliant on their parents for financial support and 29% of those aged 25 to 29 still lived with their parents (Carrick, 2014). Youth are also reporting psychological impacts. For youth aged 18 to 24, nearly 90% reported feeling uncomfortable levels of stress; 86% in this age group attributed the stress to underemployment (Sun Life, 2012).<\/p>\n

This \u201cbrave new\u201d labour market calls for individuals to market themselves differently, manage personal finances to ride out fluctuations in pay, adapt constantly and create work where it may not already exist.\u00a0 This is a tall order for anyone especially for new entrants who may not have the networks, skills portfolio, experience or the finances to mitigate ebbs and flows in employment. So, what can career development professionals do to prepare Generation(s) Next for this labour market?<\/p>\n