Millennials in IT
On millennials’ work habits, professional independence, and what they can sometimes learn from Gen Z.
Disclaimer: these are my observations, not an attempt to judge anyone’s professionalism by their birth year.
Over more than ten years in project management, I’ve worked with people of different ages, personalities and working habits. Among millennials (a generation I belong to myself), I’ve often noticed an interesting combination: a lot of initiative, a broad skill set and an almost competitive interest in tasks nobody understands at first.
A lot of people in this generation seem fairly comfortable with uncertainty. No instructions? We’ll find some. Unfamiliar tech? We’ll figure it out. Outside our area of expertise? We’ll at least look into it. Younger colleagues often see work differently. They’re more comfortable discussing workloads and clarifying who owns what. They’re not always willing to give up their own time for the latest ASAP request either. And honestly, their approach makes a lot more sense.
Don’t know? You’ll figure it out
Say a client brings you a task involving an integration you’ve never worked with. There’s no developer around to ask, and you’re supposed to discuss a ballpark estimate tomorrow.
What happens next? You open the docs, check what the API actually does, look into its limitations and put together a list of questions. The technical solution is still the team’s call. But at least you can start the conversation knowing what you’re talking about.
I’ve met plenty of people who work this way without thinking twice. There’s no shame in not knowing something, especially in IT. What matters more is knowing where to look, who to ask and how deep you actually need to go.
That last point is an interesting one. Curiosity can get expensive. Instead of spending 15 minutes with the right specialist, someone goes down a three-hour rabbit hole and learns two related technologies along the way. Fascinating stuff. Not exactly cost-effective.
Taking ownership
Initiative is particularly easy to spot in project management. When a task gets stuck, an experienced PM will often start investigating before the problem even makes it into a status report. They check dependencies, chase up the right people and suggest options. Basically, they get things moving again.
That’s useful for a company. You don’t have to tell this person what needs attention. They can organise the work themselves and spot when things are going off track.
There’s a catch, though. Capable people are sometimes a little too willing to do everyone else’s work. If doing it yourself is easier, why spend time explaining? If you already know the answer, why not just sort it out?
In the short term, that really does speed things up. Over time, it creates dependencies on one person, blurs ownership and holds the team back. Especially when the manager is so used to controlling everything
Employers should think about this too. Someone who constantly picks up work beyond their role can look incredibly productive. Until they take a holiday and it turns out half the processes only work when they’re around. I’ve been guilty of that myself.
Gen Z and their suspicious attachment to having a life
I enjoy watching how some younger colleagues handle things older employees have learned to put up with in silence.
An extra task lands? Let’s check the priorities. Asked to stay late? Let’s find out why and on what terms. Someone needs you to jump on another person’s issue ASAP? Probably worth asking why it has landed with you.
For a manager who’s used to saying yes first and finding the time later, that order of events can feel unfamiliar.
Of course, healthy boundaries sometimes get confused with refusing to adapt. I’ve also met people who expected work to be comfortable at all times. But age is a terrible way to diagnose that. Immaturity comes in every age group.
Still, I like the idea of judging results rather than hours spent at a laptop. You can look insanely busy all day, sit through ten meetings and move almost nothing forward. Or you can get the important work done, agree on next steps and call it a day.
And that’s where some hardworking millennials start having questions for themselves.
Why finding a job can be so hard now
As your expertise grows, you can run into another curious career problem. You become overqualified for a job you actually want.
A company is hiring a PM for complex digital projects. Along comes a candidate with years of experience, a technical background and a track record of running a department. Suddenly, instead of discussing the projects, they have to explain why they don’t want a management position. Won’t they get bored? Won’t they leave for something bigger in six months?
Some candidates trim their CVs, cut less relevant achievements and play down their management experience. You don’t have to hide your skills. You do need to get the emphasis right. Still, it’s pretty sad that this is even a problem.
A strong developer doesn’t have to become a team lead. An experienced PM doesn’t have to chase a Head of title. Career growth can mean harder problems, bigger projects and deeper expertise.
You spend years building your expertise. Then you have to explain why you’d like to keep doing the job you’re good at.
What businesses can do about it
For a manager, differences in working habits are far more useful to understand than arguments about which generation is better. Give one person a goal and they’ll find a way. Another needs to agree on scope, ways of working and the expected outcome first. With a sensible setup, both approaches can work really well.
With experienced people, pay particular attention to who owns what. Their ability to work independently isn’t a licence to keep expanding their role without reviewing the workload. Otherwise, you end up with an expensive dependency on one person instead of a process that can stand on its own.
With younger colleagues, it helps to talk about initiative as well as responsibilities. What should they figure out themselves? When should they ask for help? Which decisions can they make without sign-off? Clear boundaries are perfectly compatible with caring about the work.
I’ve also noticed that good teams stop caring about age pretty quickly once people know how to work together. One person knows the technical side inside out. Another spots broken processes. A third asks the awkward question nobody else thought to ask.
On a project, people with different strengths are far more useful than a team where everyone tackles every problem the same way.
And maybe millennials could borrow one useful habit from their younger colleagues. Before you kill yourself getting yet another task over the line, at least find out who the hell needs it and why.
I’m a project manager. About working with russian clients and teams, sharing experience and things I’ve noticed.