Why Should I Care About Helicopter Parents? Part II: The Strategies

1.11.10

Armed with this information, what can you do to help cut the umbilical cord and increase self-management skills and behaviors in your Gen Y employee?

1) Don’t Accept Excuses in the Workplace: Although this sounds pretty easy, because we are human, we tend to let people slide and feel badly when they react poorly to feedback given regarding productivity, responsibility taking or accountability. More than ever, we need to increase our abilities as leaders and managers to help develop responsibility and accountability taking in the workplace by being consistent with our message and holding people accountable.

2) Problem solve together when an issue occurs: Rather than passing the buck back when a problem occurs, spend some time brainstorming and problem solving solutions with your Gen Yer. This process will help them learn different ways of enhancing their own problem solving abilities and also develop confidence in their abilities to create useful, productive, and effective solutions, thereby incrementally providing them with confidence in their own independence and autonomy.

3) Help Them Build Their Parachutes: If a Generation Y employee’s parent adds their input when there is a problem, set up a meeting with your Generation Y employee to discuss this issue immediately. Talk about the importance of handling their own problems, discovering independently the steps they need to get there, and the importance of ownership and personal power with regard to their decision-making and problem solving. In addition, discuss the importance of reputation building within organizations and how it directly impacts promotion, increased responsibility, and relationships.

4) Enlist Parents Productively: Set plans and policies in place about how your company is going to handle overly involved parents. Be consistent with your follow through when implementing these policies.

5) Friend and Family Day: Family and/or friends are important to almost everyone, so it will serve you well to incorporate opportunities for employees to bring their families and friends to organizational events and/or to create special opportunities and events that allow your employees to learn more about one another by including the people that are most important to them. Having the opportunity to include the people that matter to you most and integrate them with people who you spend most of your time with (work family) enhances one’s experience of work being integrated with life.

6) Spend Some Time: Getting to know your Gen Ys that is. One effective way for Gen Y to feel valued at work is to receive positive feedback and to develop interpersonal closeness with their supervisors and colleagues. Taking time out of your day to develop your relationships with your employees is not exclusive of business/work; it is an integral part of good business management.

7) Leadership: Talk to your Gen Y about the qualities of leadership that are important to your organization (e.g., independent thinking, personal power with regard to problem solving and decision making, maturity and emotional intelligence with regard to inter and intra-personal functioning) and have them set up goals to work on these qualities with your monitoring.

8) Set Appropriate Boundaries: Do not allow your Gen Y employee to treat you like a peer (with disrespect) or like their parent (with dependence). Lay out your expectations clearly and point out concerns, in a supportive and emotionally intelligent manner. If you are shocked by certain behaviors then speak up. This will enhance the lines of communication and will create a mature work relationship, while also modeling for a Gen Y employee what appropriate and successful work relationships look like.