Gen Z at work: key insights on career values and expectations

The dream of a 9-to-5 job and a long, sluggish climb up the corporate ladder is dead. 

Taking its place among the career aspirations of today’s youth: A nimble workplace with flexible hours, the freedom to frequently switch roles and a greater say in an employer’s mission.

That’s the big takeaway of a new survey of Gen Z in Europe.

The survey by the NewGen Talent Centre at France’s EDHEC Business School, the Gen Z Lab and JobTeaser, asked 9,332 adults aged 18 to 30 what they wanted in a job and their careers. The poll covered seven European countries: France, Germany, the UK, Belgium, Spain, Italy and Luxembourg.

The answers portray a generation of workers with a fundamentally different relationship with employers compared to older cohorts. Gone is the 20th-century model of strict processes, rigid schedules, top-down corporate hierarchies and a decades-long commitment to a single, large corporation.

Instead, today’s young adults are more mission-driven, eager for dialogue with managers and favour flexibility in the hours and months they work. Their priority is not high pay, though that ranks high. Instead, for six in 10, the top goal is a healthy balance between work and life.

Perhaps most notable is that they typically want to commit only a year to their first job, preferably at a small or medium-sized firm. This aspiration differs greatly from the old model of seeking stable, long-term employment after college.

A childhood marked by global upheaval and social media

To understand Gen Z, first consider the world they grew up in. The oldest came of age at a time of tremendous geopolitical, economic and technological upheaval. They lived through the wars of Iraq and Afghanistan, the global financial crisis, the European debt crisis, the pandemic, surging inflation and artificial intelligence. 

Their initial impression of the world was shaped by the iPhone and social media. A sharp increase in home values has put homeownership out of reach and that, coupled with a significant increase in childcare and college costs, has led them to delay marriage and having children.

These shifts have transformed how young people think about their employers and long-term career aspirations. It’s not that they are disloyal or flaky, as some observers have characterised them, but that they want a career that won’t tie them to a desk or even a job title. They want the freedom to try out different roles, to be in constant dialogue with their bosses and to feel as though they’re part of a broader mission, one with a direct impact on society or the environment.

Social media has left them feeling more empowered at a young age than earlier generations. Now, as they enter the workplace, they view their employers not just as the signers of their pay checks but as a vehicle for broader change to make the world a better place. Because they have lost trust in big institutions to create change, they want to make change themselves through the private sector.

One caveat: They are also sceptical of big corporations. They’d rather work for a small or medium-sized business. But despite the rise of remote work since 2020, they don’t necessarily want to work from home throughout the whole week. Instead, they’d like a combination of working in the office – collaboration with colleagues is essential for them – while having the option to take care of personal matters at different times during the day or week. 

Think, perhaps, of something less rigid and hierarchical than a big bank but not quite as freewheeling as a Silicon Valley startup.

A keen desire for career mobility and pivots

Gen Z adults see the start of their careers as a transitional experience and do not expect to stay long in their first position – one year, ideally. Half prefer fixed-term contracts or to be self-employed. 

It is a profound new approach to careers that’s taking shape, characterised by mobility rather than permanence. Even before they enter the workforce, future graduates are already anticipating shifts in role or industry. 

Two in three say that higher pay will lead them to stay longer at a company. A solid majority add that a good work-life balance and good relationships with colleagues will increase company loyalty. 

More radically, they even imagine a complete professional pivot, 56% of them by personal choice and 39% by constraint. They appear to be proactively integrating the volatility of a more uncertain world into their career planning. This uncertainty is closely linked to the rapid pace of technological change: 34% are worried about the impact of AI on their future jobs and 28% fear that it may quickly become obsolete.

An HR challenge but also a huge opportunity

Employers can reshape the workplace to accommodate this shift in young adults’ views. These include offering new roles and responsibilities, enabling greater autonomy in project management, facilitating internal mobility or supporting career breaks. Below are other recommendations and examples of companies taking action to retain Gen Z employees. 

• A transparent recruiting process is essential. Young people are most likely to respond to job ads that include a salary and state the company’s values. Speed is crucial: young people ideally want a hiring decision in one to two weeks.
• Flatten the corporate hierarchy by reducing the roles between the most junior and senior positions. In 2024 SCOR, a French reinsurance company, cut the number of such roles to seven from 10.
• Forvis Mazars, an auditing firm, allowed employees with five years of seniority to take three months of paid leave to pursue a personal project company and provided parental leave of 70 days for a second parent.
• Build an ongoing dialogue between managers and young workers. Providing feedback to the company is very important to them and builds trust.