What's Up Gen X & Baby Boomers? Wanna chat?

Tomorrow I am going to be a panel for Washington Women in Public Relations (WWPR) called "Mind the Gap: A Generation Panel and Discussion." I will be the Millennial on-call for the panel to chat with and ask questions.

This is my first time being on an official panel. From what I know, I need to prepare a little blurb about myself and why I'm there, and be prepared to come up with quick answers to tough questions. I'm a bit nervous, because it seems the only reason we're having a panel or talking about this, is because of my generation.

My generation (Gen Y, Millennials, etc.) have obviously caused an uproar in the workplace. I've enduring many mass generalizations that I am either 1) super lazy and never want to work or 2) an Internet genius that should know everything at the click of the button. Hopefully tomorrow I can shed light on the fact that the majority of the workforce in my generation is just like me, and just like Boomers and Gen X were at our age.

We want to succeed, we want to learn fast, but we also need to slow down. We need to take a moment and learn how to listen. But in return, we need bosses who don't forget how to listen to us. I know I am not the perfect employee, but I try, and to be generalized as a "slacker" because a select few in my generation somehow found themselves at the receiving end of a "very important poll that made it into the Post" just isn't fair. I don't think every word I have to say is super important, but if a boss will listen to me and mentor me (as most bosses should do, right?) they'll find that I'm competent.

So, off to more preparation for this panel. I just had to do a mind dump on my blog to think through some of these issues and possible questions in my head.

Cool thing though: while doing my research, I pulled up the Porter Novelli Millenials white paper that came out in Summer 2008. That thing made me so angry, but instead of taking to my blog, I read it top to bottom, made comments in the margins, and contact the company. Together we created a generational panel and I came up with a game plan. Unfortunately, it never came to fruition, but it was cool to see that I'm finally able to do something I've wanted to do for four year now.

Here goes nothing...



Oh PS - here's the trophy I received for writing this blog post. Thanks ;)