Unwired: Prepare for the next generation

Young people use technology like no previous generation. Unwired's Richard Leyland explains what to expect from them in the workplace and how to adapt your business to take advantage of their strengths.

You've seen them hunched over a PC, performing bewildering tasks at breakneck speed. You've watched with suspicion as they created an online community of friends, blurring the boundaries between 'real' friends and those they may never meet.

You took note when MySpace, their chief playground, was sold to Rupert Murdoch for about half a billion dollars.

Now the killer - today's tech-savvy young people are the office and boardroom faces of tomorrow. We need to understand them and change, if we're to create an environment where they can thrive.

So here's what I know about them...

How do they use technology?

Like most of us, today's teens are heavy internet users and are also driving the growth of web 2.0. The well-documented emergence of blogs and wikis, and the growth of collaborative sites such as Flickr, MySpace and Technorati prove they have some influence.

Instant Messaging (IM) is the backbone of a teen's digital communications, for both chat and file swapping. Djanogly City Academy, the UKs first ICT specialist academy, found their pupils use IM more than any other tool except email and that these tools sit alongside VoIP apps, SMS, mobile phones and the plain old telephone system to create a hugely varied array of communications tools. Indeed for many teens digital communications underpin their social lives.

Almost all teens connect in shared places, be that schools, libraries, coffee shops or simply on the street. They have the tools too - almost all own a mobile phone and almost half own two or more web connected toys (laptop, PDA, wireless games console etc).

Sanjesh Sharma, assistant principal at Djanogly Academy, is excited by the phenomenon. As he explained to me recently: "I see nothing less than a new breed of human being! They're surfing a wave of information and connections, and their skill is in absorbing the most relevant snippets."

What skills will they bring to the workplace?

Today's connected teens are highly skilled at multitasking and making complex, immediate connections. They can quickly access, create, swap and manipulate information on many levels.

At the one-to-one level, they use email, IM and phones. At the one-to-many level, they use blogs and web pages. At the collaborative level, they use message boards and wikis.

They also make smart, a la carte use of technology. Neither afraid of nor infatuated by the tools, they simply select those which are useful to the task in hand. It's clear that today's teens will be highly suited to work in the knowledge economy, where applying knowledge, learning and access to information are key to success.

What won't work?

First, traditional notions of hierarchy and senior/subordinate relationships. This is a generation that won't know its place. Instead of being managed, they expect to contribute and influence. Digital communications have removed information barriers and our youngsters either know everything, or know how to find out everything. This view will need to be channelled more than challenged.

Second, formal communications styles. The hierarchy that underpins formal communications is eroding, and the next generation is immersed in immediate informal communications such as IM, email and blogs. Effective organisations will need to deploy status and presence indicators to regulate these immediate connections (such as those 'available', 'in a meeting' and 'do not disturb' signs already found on most IM apps). A balance must be struck.

Third, requiring them to report to the office every day. Technology increasingly allows workers to be nomadic, particularly for knowledge work. A group used to connecting 'on the pause' wherever they happen to be is unlikely to endure a daily log-jam commute and 10 hours chained to a desk. As the hazy notion of 'work/life balance' creeps further into our thoughts, the far-sighted business will provide the flexibility demanded by the next generation of workers.

Dull, repetitive, linear jobs won't go over well with today's young people. They will expect technology to take the strain, while they concentrate on applying their knowledge and access to information. This trend is well established - a modern sales person sells, while a CRM package shoulders much of the admin burden; most research today is powered by Google, rather than hours in a library; scientists and mathematicians use PC computing power for their calculations.

These trends are the very essence of the emerging knowledge economy and the next generation are already well on board.

Should you be worried?

In a word: no. A skilful multitasker - in control of his or her technology, knowledge and access to information - is perfectly tuned to thrive in the emerging knowledge economy. Organisations that understand the skills which our young people will bring to the workplace and can adjust in order to play to their strengths will reap huge rewards in the future.