Every generation gets its turn as the workplace punchline, and Gen Z is currently in the spotlight. Alison Green, who writes the Ask a Manager advice column, has a blunt response to the grumbling: she called the complaints about Gen Z workers “BS” to CNBC and pinned the real problem on inexperience, not birth year. Newer surveys show the gap in perception is still wide, which makes her argument worth a second look.
What Alison Green Actually Said
In a May 2025 CNBC piece republished by NBC Boston, Green rejected the idea that some generations are better workers than others. She noted that millennials faced the same complaints about work ethic when they entered the workforce, and called that criticism “BS.” The same claims, she said, were made about Gen X.
Her proposed rewrite of the headline is not exactly clickbait: “People new to the workforce don’t know about work.” She conceded it is “not an interesting headline.” The point is that when people are new, inexperience shows, and managers who label it generational may be misdiagnosing the problem.
Green made the case again on her own site in a May 27, 2025 post previewing a Slate column. “It’s about their inexperience, not their generation,” she wrote, adding that most complaints about young workers come down to age. Readers curious about how older and younger staff clash can compare it with a survey on Gen Z and boomer work conflict, or with the take that boomers and Gen X call selfish what Gen Z considers normal. Whether those clashes are about social norms that some say should be abandoned or plain unfamiliarity is the open question.
The Pandemic Wrinkle
Green does not wave away every concern. Both her interview and her blog post point to the pandemic. Virtual school and internships, she told CNBC, may have cost young workers chances to develop some social and learning skills, and graduating or starting a first job during the pandemic could affect how they show up professionally. On her site she wrote that the pandemic and the shift to remote work hit just as this group was establishing careers, so they “might actually be grappling with a different set of challenges.”
Even then, she doubted the underlying problems are new. The pandemic “created a new level of challenge,” she said, but the basic story is still one of people learning the ropes. Managers, meanwhile, may struggle with workers whose early-career experience differs from their own, which is a very different thing from a generational character flaw. Millennial managers have their own frustrations, as a piece on reviewing Gen Z job applications shows, while practical life skills Gen Z learned by age 13 show the strengths on the other side. Anyone sorting out workplace habits might also enjoy tips for how to stop procrastinating and a look at ways to navigate a fulfilling life, including the common regrets adults report.
What Recent Surveys Show
The numbers suggest the perception gap Green describes is real. A Monster poll of more than 2,100 U.S. workers, published in September 2025, found that 54% of non-Gen Z workers described Gen Z colleagues as lazy and 49% as selfish. Meanwhile 59% of Gen Z workers said they display professionalism, compared with 8% of non-Gen Z workers who agreed. Monster’s own caveat is that the poll measures beliefs, not job performance.
In the United Kingdom, a July 2026 report from the Chartered Management Institute, covered by The Next Web, found that 45% of 18-to-24-year-olds think they entered work with the skills to succeed, while only 6% of managers agree. The group polled more than 1,000 managers and 514 young people, and 61% of managers said younger staff are more likely to lack resilience, professionalism and communication skills. CMI chief Ann Francke said it is time to ask whether work is ready for young people.
Young workers tell a different story. A survey of 2,000 workers aged 21 to 25 for Kahoot!, reported by HR Review in December 2025, found that 44% said older colleagues judged them on age rather than ability. Only 5% felt fully prepared when they started their job. Both studies back a point that fits Green’s framing: new workers feel under-prepared, and veteran colleagues notice.
What Managers Can Take From It
Advice on managing Gen Z leans toward adapting rather than complaining. The Muse, in a March 2024 piece, quotes marketer and professor Mark Beal saying that “the archaic approach to managing employees as a task master will never work with this generation.” Beal recommends building career goals around each person and giving them chances to reach those goals while delivering measurable value.
The Muse also quotes Gregg Witt saying that “Gen Z workers don’t expect to stay at a single company for the long haul,” and Beal observing that “older generations live to work while Gen Z works to live.” The same article carries a caveat that echoes Green: Witt and Dr. Zachary Ginder say broad generational stereotypes are not reliable, and that many challenges come from applying one generation’s norms to another.
Taken together, the experts land in a similar place. Clear expectations, coaching and treating early mistakes as part of learning come up again and again, and every gray-haired manager was once the confused newcomer asking where the stapler lives. The evidence cannot prove that the problem is never generational, but the voices closest to the data keep returning to experience, training and expectations, not birth year.
Get stories like this by email. Sign up for Crafting Your Home.
This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
