Oh, Those Millennials

Tyler Podcast Episode 2, Transcript

Our Tyler Technologies podcast explores a wide range of complex, timely, and important issues facing communities and the public sector. Expect approachable tech talk mixed with insights from subject matter experts and a bit of fun. Host and Content Marketing Director Jeff Harrell – and other guest hosts – highlights the people, places, and technology making a difference. Give us listen today and subscribe.

Episode Summary

Jason Dorsey is back to dive into the myths and truths about a generation that often gets a bad rep. And a surprise division is uncovered.

Transcript

Jason Dorsey: We are constantly shocked. I mean, I would argue, just stunned by how many 30-year-olds we meet who have never voted. Don't know how to vote. Don't know what they need in order to vote. Don't know where to go to vote.

Jeff Harrell: From Tyler Technologies, it's the Tyler Tech Podcast where we explore issues facing communities today and do so in a way that's both interesting and entertaining. I'm your host, Jeff Harrell, and my promise to you is to help break through the clutter and provide great information in a format that's super easy to consume. And maybe, just maybe we'll have a little bit of fun along the way.

Jeff Harrell: If you didn't get a chance to hear our episode on Gen Z, I highly recommend going back and listening. But today, Jason Dorsey and I dive into millennials. And interestingly enough, Jason is a millennial. So he has some extra insight for us today. I wanted to get you fully into the millennial mindset, and I teased this on the last episode, but I was able to get my hands on some secret audio of a millennial in a job interview. I think you'll find this fascinating. Have a listen.

Interviewer: Amy, it says you are trained in technology. That's very good. Are you adept at Excel?

Amy: No.

Interviewer: PowerPoint?

Amy: No.

Interviewer: Publisher?

Amy: Not really.

Interviewer: Exactly in what area of technology are you proficient?

Amy: Snapchat, Pinterest, Instagram, Vine, Twitter. You know, the big ones.

Interviewer: I'm surprised you didn't say Facebook.

Amy: That's for old people, like my parents.

Interviewer: Well, Amy, when you're working for me, you have to have those kind research skills because I'll send you things for you to comb through and get the answers and send them to me. So for that, you got to be really good at technology.

Amy: For stuff like that, no problem. I'll just ask Siri.

Interviewer: You'll just ask Siri?

Amy: You know, Siri, tell me this, Siri find me that. We're all good at getting you the answers.

Jeff Harrell: Okay. Obviously that was not secret audio, but rather a funny YouTube video riddled with stereotypes. We certainly do not want to rely on this kind of content as our source of truth, which is exactly why we did the research with Jason. So to help us understand better, millennials, and separate myth from truth, here's my interview with generational expert, Jason Dorsey.

Jason Dorsey: Really thrilled to be here and share some of these great insights from the research study. For those of you who are not familiar with my work, I've written a bunch of books, a lot of times about millennials, and also for millennials. So really passionate about this. Done studies all around the world, looking at how do we separate generational myth from truth. And millennials, unfortunately, my generation, we have been beat up through these myths. And it's great to do a study that actually shares the positives about the generation, similarities, and what leaders need to know to unlock and engage this generation, particularly in government. So thanks so much for having me on, Jeff. Fired up to dig in.

Defining Millennials

Jeff Harrell: Well, I'm fired up as well. Let's start at the top. How do you define millennials?

Jason Dorsey: When we look at millennials, what we're trying to define a generation based on is what we call predictability by scenario, and generations in terms of the birth years. We're looking at this consistency, when do generations start being consistent, and you can tell when one generation ends and another one begins. Sometimes there's a clear marker that says either you remember this, or you don't, which is the case of millennials in terms of the end of the generation. Our youngest were born about 1995, and the oldest were born somewhere around 1977, all the way up to 1980. So when we look at defining millennials, the key thing is they're born between approximately 1977 and 1995.

Jason Dorsey: But another way to think about them is they're people in their late 20s all the way through their 30s, and right now they're around 40, 41. They're the largest generation in the workforce. They're the fastest growing generation of consumers. And they're predominantly the trend drivers right now in most industries. So millennials, as much as they're harped on negatively on cable news and other outlets, the truth is millennials are incredibly important to governments, to enterprises, to communities. And it's very important that we separate this myth from truth about them.

Millennial Myths

Jeff Harrell: Well, let's start with myths. What do you think is the biggest myth about millennials?

Jason Dorsey: The biggest myth about millennials is that millennials aren't working. Everybody says, oh, millennials, our pants are falling off. We live with our mom. We don't want to work. We're entitled, all this stuff. But the reality is there are more millennials in the United States workforce than any other generation, period. I just think that's such a big statement. People all know some entitled millennial. Well, it turns out we also know entitled Gen X-ers and entitled baby boomers. That's not limited to anyone generation.

Jason Dorsey: Unfortunately, with millennials, it's stuck. Now that's become our reputation and people just automatically see that. And we actually got into this work because a lot of executives ... this was 13 years ago. Were saying all these terrible things about millennials. They'd bring us in to help them fix the millennials. And when we got their data, we realized that their data didn't actually support what the narrative was. Yes, they all knew one millennial who showed up late for work, dressed for their promotion on their first day or all that kind of stuff. Sure, totally happens. However, that didn't represent the vast majority of their great millennial workers.

Jason Dorsey: In fact, one of our biggest discoveries that we found ... and this goes into separating myth from truth. We believe millennials have split into two different generations. And this is a discovery that's in the media all the time. I've done 200 television interviews at this point. We talk about you have mega-llennials, which are the millennials that really have their act together. They're out there, they're making it happen. And then the me-llennials, who are the ones really struggling to build that self-reliance and pull themselves forward.

Jason Dorsey: And within the millennial generation, this I think is the most fascinating piece. The group most offended by millennials acting entitled, are other millennials who do not feel entitled. Because they think that the rest of the generation is giving them a bad reputation. And this is such a great insight for leaders. When I say this in my speeches, the millennials in the room will literally start cheering. Because it'll be like, finally, somebody's talking about us accurately.

Jeff Harrell: Yep. I think we can all cheer for that. Now that we know the biggest myth, what's the biggest truth about millennials?

Jason Dorsey: Millennials do have a very different native relationship with technology than other generations. Now, some people say that millennials are tech savvy, and you've heard lots and lots of people say that. We came out pretty strongly at our research center and said, that's not true, but it's slightly more nuanced. Which is millennials aren't tech savvy, what we actually are, we are tech dependent. And the difference is we don't actually know how technology works. We just know we cannot live without it.

Jason Dorsey: And I think that's really a nice setup for the research that we did with you at Tyler because what you're seeing is that tech dependence really play out in how millennials want to engage with government. How they want to access information, solve problems, and work with others. So this is a really exciting time to get accurate information about millennials and be able to share that with so many leaders.

Mega-llennials Versus Me-llennials

Jeff Harrell: Jason, I'd like to go back to something you said earlier, and how millennials have split into two groups, the mega-llennials and the me-llennials. What's the causation for that?

Jason Dorsey: One of the key things we see as parenting. How you're raised is one of the greatest influences of what you will go on to do. Teaches you all kinds of different skills, like resilience. Is a job beneath you? How you view money. Those types of things all have influence about how you think about jobs in your career and so forth. And what we see when we interview millennials and we talk about this me-llennial or mega-llennial concept, there's a pretty clear distinction within the generation.

Jason Dorsey: People identify with one and say, I really feel like I'm out there, I'm making it happen. And I'm very frustrated by this other part of the generation that is holding us back in terms of this negative narrative. On the flip side, when we interview people that fall more into the millennial camp, they tend to tell us a lot that they feel like things are not really fair. And it's been very tough and difficult for them to get a chance to be successful.

Jason Dorsey: What really is important is that these two groups no longer identify with one another. And I think that is really powerful. We see this a lot on social media, where particularly millennials who are in their 30s now, they can't relate across the different groups. And they tend to point fingers or blame, which is we think, frankly, not helpful, rather than seeking to understand, empathize, and all work towards a common goal, which is obviously our purpose.

Jason Dorsey: So really interesting. Historically, this split ... sometimes you call it aa dislocation. Would come back together because the oldest generation would leave the workforce, create all this upward opportunity. Well, that hasn't happened. Net new employment would pull people in. And even though we were fully employed, I mean, so many millennials felt like they still were not in a good place in terms of their self-reliance, career, and so forth. So all these things flow together, and we're unclear how it's going to play out. Particularly when you look at the effects of COVID-19 and what that's going to look like for the workforce for the next many years.

Jeff Harrell: Let's turn our attention to the study that we did focusing on local government. As a millennial, what do you think was the biggest surprise to you in the research that we did together?

Jason Dorsey: I think the biggest stat overall, many millennials do want to engage more with local government. I think there's this myth out there that millennials aren't interested in engaging in local government, that they're tuned out. And people point and blame and say all these things about our generation. The reality is millennials generally do want to engage more with local government and it just needs to be easier in order for them to do more of that. In fact, in many ways, they want to engage more often when it comes to other generations engaging with local government.

Jason Dorsey: So I think millennials are this massive opportunity for local governments to drive much deeper engagement, collaboration. I would even argue, innovation. And I'd like to point out again, millennials are roughly 25 to 40, 41-ish. So this is a key constituency that if we can better engage, really does solve a lot of community problems.

Jeff Harrell: Jason, I agree with you. I feel like millennials get a bad rap. One of my kids is a millennial, a hardworking kid. A lot of people say millennials don't feel positively about anything except maybe avocado toast, but it turns out about 50% of them feel positively about government. Why is that?

Jason Dorsey: There's this perception out there that millennials are very negative and don't want to engage, don't want to be productive. And I just think that's not true. And when half the millennials have a positive feeling towards government, it just shows you the potential. Many millennials have started to have positive relationships with their local government. They've had positive experiences. Whether that's because they own a house now, whether that's because they're working in some other situation where they need local government assistance, they've had some experience. And oftentimes, those have been positive.

Jason Dorsey: And so I think we got to look at this and say, there's a huge opportunity. There's 83 million millennials in the U.S. So half of millennials feel positive towards government. What an opportunity, not only to better engage and deeper engage that 50%, but also the other half that is not feeling positive right now. We really need to reach out to them, make it easier for them to reach out to us, and drive that positivity forward. Because there's never been a time when we more need every single generation involved in local government than we do right now.

Jeff Harrell: One of the stats I thought was very interesting is 41% of millennials said they found working in local government very appealing. That's got to be good news for local government, isn't it?

Jason Dorsey: It is good news. I think hidden underneath that is local governments have to figure out how to recruit millennials. I see that's where things tend to fall down. I speak at lots and lots and lots of government conferences all around the world and there's this desire to work and engage in government, which we've seen repeatedly. The challenge is how local government adapts to recruit a generation that looks for a job differently.

Jason Dorsey: That's that leap. That when we can cross that and get the message out, and frankly, tell the story of local government and careers in local government in a really compelling way, which I just think means a more accurate way. Then millennials get even more excited and you'll get more applicants. You can't hire people who don't apply. And the local government standpoint means, how do we get more people to apply? More qualified and better fit people to apply? And I think this is a massive opportunity with millennials.

News From Social Media

Jeff Harrell: In a lot of the studies, we saw millennials were very similar to Gen X. Here's an area where they had really aligned more with Gen Z, in that 50% of them prefer to get their information from local government through social media. Is that a surprise to you?

Jason Dorsey: I don't know if it's a surprise, but it's certainly something that jumps out. And what I see here is that, millennials, for quick reference, are roughly 25 to 40, 41-ish. And Gen Z, who for the purposes of the study were roughly 18 to 24, have more similarities when it comes to where they go to get information. The reason that jumps out at us is that these two generations have come of age with social media, Gen X and baby boomers did not. So this is the natural place where millennials and Gen Z would go for information.

Jason Dorsey: Now, what I find really interesting is that they're also deeming this information to be accurate. So that means if you're a local government and you're posting updates on Twitter, then this is where they're going to get those updates. And they're assuming that those are accurate, which also creates the opportunity for other people to comment on those updates. And that's where the conversation can get really muddled.

Jason Dorsey: So I think the key here is that local governments need to be very thoughtful about what they put on social media and really lean on it to reach not just the very youngest, but also millennials. So if you want to reach that 18 to 40 group, which is the older members of Gen Z and millennials, you have to be using social media. That is where they're going. You can't just put up ... do a press release or a press conference or appear on the evening news. You could miss these generations entirely. You're really got to use social media. And I actually think that's really empowering for local governments, because it's much easier for them to control at least what they put out on that, than when they have to go to other news sources where it could become a different type of story.

Jeff Harrell: And millennials seem to be pretty hungry for content. 14% of them said they want daily information, 36% said weekly. Is that because of this social media usage that they have?

Jason Dorsey: It's because of their relationship with social media. And what I mean by that is they have very, very short news cycles, right? It used to be that a news cycle was 24 hours. And even before that it might be a week. And all of a sudden, now, it's 15 minutes on Twitter. It's 30 minutes, it's an hour. So the idea that they're constantly going to be getting news updates and being able to engage with those updates, maybe even reach out and get questions answered, just shows the frequency that this generation is accustomed to. This isn't that millennials have higher expectations, which is what people often say. That's not true at all.

Jason Dorsey: This is all millennials have ever known. This is them just bringing what is normal to them, to an environment which happens to be engaging in local government. In the same way, by the way, that they're thinking about brands, that they're thinking about employers. This to me is a really important insight, because I think there's a huge opportunity for local government to better use social media to engage generations once they recognize not only that it's important, which we've seen, but the frequency of that engagement is important.

Jeff Harrell: We'll be back with my interview with Jason Dorsey in just a moment. If you're interested in getting great content sent directly to your inbox, please subscribe to our monthly content email. Just go to tylertech.com, click resources at the top of the page, and you could subscribe from any of the great content pieces that you'll find there. We've got weekly blog articles, customer success stories, on demand, webinars, you name it. I think you'll find the content there super helpful. Now, back to my conversation with Jason Dorsey.

Jeff Harrell: We know that voting has gone down with each generation. Millennials, I think less than half say that they voted in a local election. What are some ways that local government can engage millennials better?

Jason Dorsey: We've been very surprised in our work, how little millennials know about voting. And what I mean by that is, they understand how to engage on social media. They understand how to talk to their friends about a particular politician or government proposal or a piece of legislation. To some degree they can engage about the hot topics and the people that they know. But what we find is they really don't understand or feel very confident in physically showing up to vote. And I think that's really important. There's this expectation of, oh, well, millennials are 30 now. They should know how to vote. We are constantly shocked. I mean, I would argue, just stunned by how many 30 year olds we meet who have never voted. Don't know how to vote. Don't know what they need in order to vote. Don't know where to go to vote.

Jason Dorsey: And I think really making that clear and simple, and I would argue, highly visual ... videos. These long text documents, millennials don't read. Millennials take all their content in through video. So adapting how we teach people to vote, I think is really important. At the same time, making it much more mobile friendly to find that location, to figure out that line, I think is important. And then, letting millennials know that their vote does count. Because unfortunately, millennials have really been targeted in terms of misinformation that their vote doesn't count. And we have to really change that narrative.

Jason Dorsey: And so I think millennials are at this stage where if we engage them correctly, they will turn out to vote. I think social media is a really key way to do that, but I think there's just a lot of practical things that millennials don't know and understand when it comes to the process of voting. One thing that we think could be a better opportunity for many local governments is to have local community influencers talking about not just the importance of voting ... everybody says it's important to vote. But these are the steps involved to actually vote. And these are the type of preparations you would make in order to go there and be able to vote. I think if that happens, we will see voter turnout move up, particularly with strong local influencers.

Jeff Harrell: Well, 42% of millennials say clear, easy-to-use technology would make online interactions with government better. What do you think that stat means?

Jason Dorsey: I think it means that millennials are very used to engaging with enterprises, organizations, and technology in a very simple way. Gen X was amazing at making things more complicated, more customized, more options. You can change everything you want. Well, now when it's got all the way down to millennials, millennials are like, fewest number of buttons or clicks possible. It should just happen and we need to make it easy. Otherwise, it's work. And I think that's what we're seeing here. It's really a drive towards simplicity in being able to create more of these engagements. And millennials are not going to work or struggle to drive that engagement through technology because everything else in their life is so much easier, and they would expect the same thing in government.

Jason Dorsey: So to me, I think really the strides towards simplicity and clear, easy-to-use technology is absolutely critical for governments if they want to engage with millennials. And I would argue, with every other generation too. Because every other generation now expects things to be even simpler. We're seeing that through all kinds of things from Netflix to Amazon. And that's the expectation that they're bringing in.

The Biggest Takeaway

Jeff Harrell: We have a lot of leaders listening to this podcast, Jason, we've talked about a lot of different things. What would you say is your number one biggest takeaway for millennials?

Jason Dorsey: My biggest takeaway from the research study when it comes to millennials is that this generation really is ready to be engaged by local government. What we saw is that they have more frequency in terms of them wanting to have interactions, get updates than any other generation. They're generally positive towards government, which I think is a surprise to a lot of people. And that they see technology as the way to drive that deeper engagement.

Jason Dorsey: So to me, this really is a rally cry to local government to say, hey, millennials are here. They're at the right age, life stage. They bring exactly the energy we need. It's up to us to adapt to them. And when we do so, we can really unlock their potential, which I think is incredibly, incredibly exciting. And I am a millennial, so I want that to happen too.

Jeff Harrell: Well, Jason, as always, you have shed a lot of light on this topic. We are so thankful for you and for your expertise, and be well, my friend.

Jason Dorsey: Thanks so much. Look forward to the next one.

Jeff Harrell: Well, second only to my oldest daughter, Jason is now my favorite millennial. Well, I forgot about Adele and John Krasinski. Well, Jason may be my fourth favorite millennial. I certainly feel like I understand millennials a little bit better. The split of millennials into mean me-llennials and mega-llennials is very interesting. I hope you grabbed some nuggets as well. And we're going to release a lot more of this research over time. In fact, we've got a white paper covering all the research coming out soon. So please check out our resource center at tylertech.com. You'll find lots of great content on a variety of topics.

Jeff Harrell: Hey, thanks so much for joining us. We got some really good feedback and would love for you to keep that coming. There's a couple things you can do. First, please go give us a review. And then second, you can reach out to me by email at podcast@tylertech.com. I really treasure your feedback and your ideas. And of course, please go subscribe. And we have a very special episode coming up next. I think you're really going to love this episode. We've got clinical psychologist, Dr. Kevin Gilliland here to help us understand the impact of COVID-19 on our mental health. And then Jason's back to talk about the greatest of all generations, and of course, that's Gen X. So from Tyler Technologies, this is Jeff Harrell. We'll talk to you soon.