Let’s consider the past couple of presidents. Barack Obama is a Baby Boomer. Donald Trump is barely a Baby Boomer. And Biden? President Houseplant? He was born during the Silent Generation. And I wish he’d remember that every time he opens the lying, gaslighting hole in his face. At this rate, the presidency may do the natural thing and skip Generation X entirely. And why not? We’re the forgotten middle child, after all.
“But Kev, aren’t Gen-Xers supposed to be in charge now?”
It doesn’t seem like it, does it? Let’s do the math, shall we? Born between 1965 and 1980, Gen-Xers are now, as of 2023, between the ages of forty-three and fifty-eight, prime time for being the boss of a country, corporation, or small sales team.
And yet, after years of being outnumbered in the workforce by Boomers (born between 1946 and 1964), another larger cohort, Millennials (born between 1981 and 1996), have already overtaken Gen-Xers. According to a Pew analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data, Gen-Xers held a brief majority of the U.S. workforce for only a few years, whose dominance ended in 2016.
If Gen-Xers are the bosses now, they’re the bosses only in a very Gen-X way: ambivalently, transiently, and with doubtful authority.
Consider the inconsequence of Generation X. Our parents were typically members of the Silent Generation, that regiment born between 1928 and 1945. The Great Depression and World War II shaped those people. They didn’t get to choose what they were having for dinner and ensured their kids didn’t either. Parents of Gen-X believed in spanking and borderline benign neglect, in contrast to the boisterous boomers and their deluxe offspring, the Millennial Mass.
Society designated Grubby Gen-Xers the O.G. slackers. Such a reputation didn’t bode well for becoming the future bosses. It mostly wasn’t our fault! Mostly. Reality bit for Gen-X because when we joined the workforce around 1990, the economy was in a recession, and the recovery that followed was sluggish.
Obviously, these are broad strokes. Yet I believe there’s some truth in the truisms.
Once Gen-Xers landed jobs, we were lowly peons hanging by a thread. We were prepared to be fired because we’d worked less than eighty hours that week, failed to “perform,” or simply because our boss enjoyed yelling, “You’re fired!”
But we’re also a generation that specializes in sucking it up. The contemporary pop culture emblem for the Gen-X manager is potentially Mark S., the unintended and hapless leader of a tiny and irritable group of employees in the T.V. series “Severance.” His staff members simultaneously thwarted Mark, as embodied by the Gen-Xer Adam Scott, and lorded over by the manager one rank above him, always subject to the strict bylaws of an indifferent corporation.
Now that’s a Gen X boss.
Generational expert, speaker, and author Meagan Johnson told the New York Times, “We Gen-Xers don’t feel like we’re the boss. We’re just kind of forgotten about.”
Aptly, by the time Gen-Xers had a chance at the top job, being in charge was no longer as attractive as it used to be. Consider the two most culturally influential leadership styles for Gen-X women as they ascended the ranks: Sheryl Sandberg’s demonic “leaning in” (until you topple over) and Sophia Amoruso’s odious #Girlboss approach, which had the additional drawback of including a hashtag. Not at all an ironic hashtag.
Unsurprisingly, both titles are now defunct.
The Great Resignation or Great Reshuffle or whatever we’re calling it today may also be the worst time to be in charge. According to Microsoft’s work-trend index, fifty-four percent of managers say that leadership is out of touch with employee expectations, and seventy-four percent say that they don’t have the influence or resources to influence change for their team. Their employees are at home or wishing they were at home.
Or wishing they were gone.
According to an October 2021 survey, forty-six percent of Millennials planned to leave their jobs within the year. And who can blame them? Employees say they are working harder and for longer hours.
It doesn’t get better. More than half of hybrid workers from Generation Z (born from 1997 to 2012) say they’re moving to a new location because they’re able to work remotely — possibly somewhere from where their bosses may never reel them in. A recent report from the NYT clarifies that Gen-Z is calling the shots with recruitment and retention.
In short, Gen-X bosses work for their employees, not the other way around.
It would be very Gen-X to shrug at this seemingly inevitable outcome. We were probably never meant to be the boss. Baby Boomers and Millennials have always had a precise sense of their importance. Gen-Xers are under no such illusion. We’re temperamentally prepared to be criticized and undermined at all times. We never entirely trusted the people in charge anyway.
