Not Everyone Gets a Trophy – How to Manage Generation Y
By Bruce Tulgan

Bruce Tulgan is internationally recognized as the leading expert on young people in the workplace and one of the leading experts on leadership and management. He is an adviser to business leaders all over the world, and a sought-after keynote speaker and management trainer. Since 1995, Bruce has worked with tens of thousands of leaders and managers in hundreds of organizations ranging from Aetna & Wal-Mart to the Army and the YMCA. He is also the founder of RainmakerThinking, a successful management training firm.

Generation Y (people born between 1978 and 1990) is the most high-maintenance workforce in the history of the world. Gen Y, according to Bruce Tulgan, is like Gen X on-fast-forward-with-self-esteem-on-steroids. They are very tech savvy, and comfortable in fast-paced environments. Not only do they want to know what they get in five or ten years, but they really want to know what they are going to get tomorrow. They walk in the door from day one with very high expectations, and they think they know it all. They are confident because they grew up in the Decade of the Child. They were over-supervised, and told that “we are all winners” and “everyone gets a trophy.” The message of the book is simple: If you want high performance out of this generation, you better commit to high-maintenance management.

Start with getting them on board fast with the right messages. The most common complaint heard from managers when it comes to hiring Gen Yers is that they often feel blind...

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