Over the past 2 years, there have been a boatload of articles, posts, books and informative pamphlets about Generation Y. Most of them have either focused on “dealing” with us or how wrong we are. Every time I’ve read one of these, I’ve felt like it was written about somebody else. The facts have been accurate, but the conclusions drawn have been way off base.

Rather than assume I was some strange anomaly, I put the word out on Twitter to see if my fellow Generation Y friends would be interested in answering some questions. I received 14 responses to the following questions:

1.       In what year were you born?
2.       Are you well employed, underemployed or unemployed?
3.       How would you like to be identified in the post?
4.       Would you consider yourself Civic minded?
5.       Do you believe that the US government is effectively representing the US people?
6.       A common stated trait of Generation Y is the “Everybody Gets a Trophy” philosophy. Do you think this applies to you and is it a good thing?
7.       As employees, Generation Y often chooses jobs that provide opportunities for growth over jobs that provide purely financial rewards. Would you agree? Has this influenced your career decisions?
8.       Are you comfortable sharing personal information publicly or with people within internet-based communities? Do you feel that you are more open about your opinions and personal life than previous generations?
9.       Do you assertively seek more feedback, responsibility, and involvement in decision making in your career? Would you rather have feedback on a frequent informal basis or within a formal review structure?

The best part of the responses is that they are surprisingly diverse given the small sample size. The respondents included almost the entire age range of the generation, included a range of political affiliations and included an almost even gender balance. The surprise is that every question has at least 9 similar answers and 1 question was unanimous.

My original plan was to write a single post covering all of the results, but my new plan is to write several posts focusing on specific topics. Stay tuned for the results and analysis. I will probably tackle #5 or #6 first.