The future of the job market: an insightful reflection
Emily Jones: First, tell me a bit about your position in Guelph and how you became interested in this area of study.
Prof. Sean Lyons: I came to Guelph in 2007 after having taught at St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia. I’m an Associate Professor in the Department of Management, and I teach courses in Leadership, Human Resource Management, and Organizational Behaviour. I’m excited to be teaching a first-year seminar course in September on Careers.
I started studying generational differences in the workplace during my doctoral degree. It was actually the topic of my thesis. I’ve been active in this field of study since before 2000. As a Gen Xer, I faced a really tough labour market in the 1990s when I graduated with my undergraduate degree, and it seemed like nobody was talking about it. The people who did have something to say about it blamed young people for being lazy and unmotivated, and that didn’t seem right to me. Then, after I did my Master’s degree and PhD, I started to see big changes in the students I was teaching. Around 2000, people started talking about Generation Y, who were later re-labeled as “Millennials,” and there were really mixed messages about them. Some people said that they’d be a new great generation of workers, and others complained that they were entitled, greedy, and self-centred. I wanted to get to the bottom of this, so I made this my main area of research. Around 2008, I started focusing more specifically on generational career issues and that’s what I’ve been working on ever since.
EJ: How would you describe today’s job market? Why is it different than it was 10 or 20 years ago?
SL: The labour market has changed significantly since the 1990s. Globalization has moved jobs all over the world that used to be done in North America. Technology has made a lot of jobs redundant or has lowered the level of qualifications that are required. For example, banks used to have trained finance officers to make loan decisions, but now they just need someone to enter information into a centralized system that applies rules and checks credit ratings. The finance officer was a good job that required skills and experience. Now it’s gone, and it has been replaced with lower paying entry-level jobs. But jobs like this require university education. Since the 1980s, when Baby Boomers were in their 20s, the percentage of people with university degrees has more than doubled. So now a degree is a requirement for even lower level jobs, and it’s getting more competitive. The other big change is that job tenure has dropped significantly. Employers don’t hire as many people for long-term relationships. There are significantly more term positions, part-time jobs, and contract positions that require people to be self-employed contractors. Companies also routinely lay off employees, even when they’re highly profitable, simply to improve profitability. The idea of a long-term employment at one employer is a thing of the past. People are much more mobile these days, which makes it really hard for people to settle down and make long term plans for their careers and lives.
For those people who are in the middle of their careers, it’s really hard to see how much things have changed around them. A lot of people don’t really think about these changes until they look back and think about them, so they tend to judge young people based on standards that are outdated. It’s difficult for young people when their parents give them career advice without really considering how different modern careers are from the ones that they enacted.
EJ: What kind of advice would you give students getting an undergrad degree upon entering university? What kind of advice would you give those who have recently graduated?
SL: To those just entering university, I would say that today, you aren’t expected to be a “grown up” until late in your 20s. This was not the case for your parents when they were your age. You can take this time to party and delay thinking about your future, or you can use it to really explore your options, interests, values, and competencies. You can try lots of things in university and stretch your mind to really see what inspires you and what your passion might be. You will need to adapt and upgrade your knowledge continuously throughout your career, so you need to find the field or occupation that you want to continue exploring. You can take full advantage of the resources that the university offers, like student services, social interaction with peers, clubs and associations, volunteer and community service opportunities, learning relationships with professors, co-ops, etc. Having this time to grow as a person is a real gift. If you just treat university like an extension of high school and go through the motions of taking classes and writing exams, you are squandering it. The other thing is to think about your career marketability throughout your degree – not when you’re getting ready to graduate. You have to work for the whole four years to find ways to develop your best self in the area you’re studying. Some majors have less job opportunity than others. If the field you love is not a highly promising job field, you need to think about how to position yourself to create opportunities – it might mean taking a minor or a certificate or extra classes or just doing volunteer work that adds breadth to your skill set. Also – be very careful about taking on student debt to sustain your lifestyle. It can be tempting to take lots of student loans so you can live more comfortably while in school. But when those loans come up for repayment, it can be a huge burden on your life starting out. Be smart with your finances.
For new graduates, I would hope that they have been thoughtful about their future for the past 4 years and that they’re not just getting around to thinking about career options. My advice would be to not get too anxious or paralyzed by fear as you consider your job options. There’s no such thing as an “ideal career path” – you will have to constantly change course and adapt. Don’t worry about making the wrong choices, because every road will lead somewhere and you can learn something important from every opportunity – even ones that are not positive. Nothing is forever these days, so it’s important to not limit yourself because you worry that an opportunity might not be the “best one for you.” The other thing I would say is to seriously think about how you want your life to unfold, as well as your career. Where you want to live, what kind of family life you hope to have, and what kind of values you want to live will all have impacts on your choices. You can’t plan every detail of your life and expect that plan to work out for you, but it’s important to know what your personal “rules” are for making choices when they arise.
EJ: What are your thoughts on students choosing to take post-grad programs, or who opt for professional schools?
SL: Graduate school is becoming a necessity for a lot of fields. It’s important to know whether this is a requirement for the type of work you want to do in your career. In many professions, it’s simply not an option that you can avoid. Graduate school really changes your perspectives on the world, and for those who pursue it enthusiastically, it can change their lives. But grad school is not for everyone. It’s very different than undergraduate education. The workload is much greater and it takes a lot more dedication to be successful. It’s certainly not something to do just because you don’t have any better options. It should not be a way of avoiding the real world for another year or two.
Students often agonize about whether to go right into graduate school or gain some work experience first. Some programs require experience before you can be accepted. This is a tough decision and it’s a personal one. On the one hand, if you are not a mature person and feel that you need to “grow up” a little before you can benefit from graduate school, you should consider taking time off. On the other hand, taking a job and starting your professional career is a big investment and transition to make. It’s expensive and it often requires you to relocate and invest money in clothing and transportation and furniture and things like that. Once you get into that lifestyle, it’s hard to drop it all and go back to full-time studies.
My advice for people starting grad school is similar to that for undergrads – make the absolute most of your time in that degree. Being among other graduate students is an opportunity to really stretch your mind. But if you squander the opportunity, you can be older and more educated and deeper in debt and still unemployable.
EJ: What do you think are the most desired and appreciated skills a student can develop to be a strong candidate entering the work force in today’s day and age?
SL: Skills really depend on the type of work a person wants to do. You need different skills to be an artist than to be a teacher or an engineer. But there are some competencies that everyone needs to develop both in school and in life in order to really be effective in the modern economy. You need to know yourself – what your strengths and weaknesses are, where your passion lies, what really matters to you in life, and what kind of work life you want to have. You can’t communicate your strengths if you don’t know them yourself. You can’t address your weaknesses if you don’t take stock of them. Also, you need to be able to express yourself effectively in writing and verbally to different audiences. It’s getting more and more important to be able to get your ideas across in very few words. You also need to be a critical thinker. There is so much information available to us today; it’s critical that you can critically assess the quality of information and authenticate it rather than accepting it as true or good. You also need to be adaptable and resilient. You have to be willing to change directions when an opportunity emerges or an obstacle blocks your path, and you really need to persevere when you fail.
Everybody fails and learning from it is how you grow. But most of all, you need to work hard. Hard work is much easier when you do something that engages you, so knowing what that is is very important.
EJ: Is there anything else you would like to add?
SL: This is a challenging time to be a young person starting a career, but it’s also the most exciting time. The internet and social media make it possible for you to do amazing things. Be creative and work with your friends to see what opportunities you can create for yourself. I think it’s great when I see former students starting business or not-for-profit projects and funding them through crowd-funding. If you can’t find a way to have the career you want, then make a way. When you’re young and free from the responsibilities of family and mortgage, it’s a time to take risks and do things that might lead to great opportunities.