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Gen Z is often branded a \u201clazy\u201d generation of workers with no ambition to climb the corporate ladder. But PwC U.K. says the real challenge isn\u2019t motivation\u2014it\u2019s resilience. These young professionals are eager to succeed in their own way, but the pandemic may have left them with gaps in essential skills. So the \u201cBig Four\u201d consulting firm is taking matters into its own hands with \u201cresilience\u201d training for fresh-faced hires.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cQuite often we are struck that the graduates [who] join us\u2014who are meeting all the cognitive tests we\u2019ve set\u2014they don\u2019t always have the resilience,\u201d Phillippa O\u2019Connor, chief people officer at PwC U.K., recently toldThe Sunday Times.<\/em> \u201cThey don\u2019t always have the human skills that we want to deploy onto the client work we pass them towards.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve really doubled down, particularly [with] this year\u2019s graduates,\u201d O\u2019Connor continued. \u201cWe\u2019re doing a whole load of separate training in their first six months with us, really about resilience, really about some of those communication skills.\u201d<\/p>\n The executive described resilience as the ability to handle day-to-day work dynamics\u2014especially pressure, criticism, or sticky situations. That skill, she said, is particularly crucial in a deal-making environment, where managing challenges is a \u201ccore\u201d part of the job.<\/p>\n According to O\u2019Connor, many younger workers simply didn\u2019t get the chance to build that muscle during the pandemic, when lockdowns disrupted education and early workplace experiences that would normally help develop it.<\/p>\n But by offering this special training, PwC is ensuring the talent that fills its 1,300 open U.K. graduate jobs this year\u2014which received around 47,000 applications\u2014are well-equipped to succeed.\u00a0<\/p>\n Fortune<\/em> reached out to PwC for comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n PwC\u2019s \u201cresilience\u201d training is just one example of how employers have been stepping up to ensure Gen Z is primed to succeed in the workforce.\u00a0<\/p>\n In 2023, fellow \u201cBig Four\u201d consulting giant KPMGsupplied extra instruction to its Gen Z hires. The business provided training for its graduate talent, out of concern they were struggling to adapt to professional life\u2014particualry when it came to \u201csoft skills,\u201d how to give presentations, work in a team, and manage projects.\u00a0<\/p>\n The chief people officer of $1.5 billion data protection start-up Cohesity, Rebecca Adams, has also pushed for inter-generational cohesiveness.\u00a0<\/p>\n Earlier this year the executive led the charge to skill bosses in managing the young professionals, citing that Gen Z responds to feedback differently: \u201cThey want to know why, how\u2014they want constant feedback.\u201d On the flipside, she described having to teach \u201cbasic things\u201d to young staffers that would mind-boggle their Gen X counterparts.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cHow do I manage my calendar? You actually have to accept the meeting request,\u201d Adams explained toFortune <\/em>in September. \u201cYou can\u2019t just walk out of the meeting that you\u2019re in because you have another one while it\u2019s still going on.\u201d<\/p>\n Charitable organizations are also stepping up to solve Gen Z\u2019s professional pitfalls. Radical Hope is a nonprofit helping equip college students with essential skills including communication, interpersonal dexterity, and emotional intelligence. It began as a pilot program at New York University back in 2020, after experts noted \u201celevated anxiety, stress, and depression\u201d among students within the previous years\u2014and has spread to 75 college campuses so far.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Liz Feld, the CEO of Radical Hope, hopes the Gen Z trainees will become adept in the skills \u201cwe all got growing up at the kitchen table.\u201d Even the little things, like small talk, can be a challenge for the young hopefuls striving to one day succeed in the workplace.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThey won\u2019t ask someone, \u2018Do you want to go to the dining hall and grab dinner, you want to go grab a beer, you want to go for a walk, you want to get a coffee?\u2019\u201d Feld told Fortune<\/em>, adding that if someone says \u201cno,\u201d their confidence is crushed. \u201cThey internalize the whole thing. The face-to-face rejection is what they\u2019re afraid of.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n #Gen #grads #resilience #training #PwC #U.K #toughen #job<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Gen Z is often branded a \u201clazy… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3861,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[1721,938,542,924,2438,1127,1083,304,927,300,3767,635,522,2887,155,3764,3765,3768,2282,2297,3766,3769,1624,2591,56,2299,2300],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3860"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3860"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3860\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Companies are offering Gen Z special training\u00a0<\/h2>\n