My Millennial Babies Are Not Myths

Posted by: LeeAnn Taylor

I just barely understand my own! My 3 kids couldn’t be more different in personality, politics and professionally. Just ask them, they’re more than happy to tell you about it (but only if you have a few extra hours on your hands to spare). They’re a group of highly intelligent and complex individuals, these Millennials. So no, they are not all the same but as a generation they have more commonality than other generations. They are being molded by their access to knowledge, good and bad, every day. They are more in touch socially to their communities far and near. So if they are a product, then they're a product of our own making. So let’s debunk some of these myths.

Myth #1. Millennials are lazy, inattentive and entitled. Lazy is the opposite of what they are. If anything they have way too many balls in the air at one time. They are typically accomplishing at least 3 things at once on those phones… things that previously you and I would “physically” go and do. And, they manage to do them all at the same time! Just because they don’t happen to be running around physically, do not make the mistake of misinterpreting that as lazy.

Myth #2 - Millennials are selfish. Quite the opposite in fact.  They are more in touch with their communities, and by communities I mean worldwide community than any other generation before them. They have great empathy and tolerance for others. If selfish means they want more from their lives than previous generations, than yes they might be. But as a proud #grandmillennial, I don’t see that as selfish…I see that as smart.

Myth #3 - Millennials are not loyal. Not true. They are loyal, extremely loyal…when you give them a good reason to be. Once you have earned that loyalty though they're yours. It then becomes your job to keep it…they just don’t go blindly down a path forever, they’re too smart for that. If you put something out there, you’d better darn sure follow through.

Myth #4 - Millennials have no goals and are irresponsible with money. One of my personal favorites to debunk. For this I will refer to the MillennialResearch Study, The Principle Financial Group 2015. Let’s face it, we all hate the word budget. Most of us have one. Most are more like guidelines for us, pretty abstract. Millennials are quite different. 66% of them have “formal budgets” that they adhere to and live by, very literally. 70% of Millennials ranked having Financial Security as their principle goal followed by a 62% ranking of Healthy Living. Continuous learning, Traveling the World, Meeting New People, Making a Difference in the World and Raising a Family all came in quick succession across the board.

This I found really interesting. “Top Passions”, Raising a Family (79%), Starting a Family (62%), Having Financial Security (61%) and Being Spiritual (60%). Maybe it’s just me, but doesn’t it seem there is a shift occurring. This doesn’t look like selfish to me. So I’m getting off my soapbox now….before I break my neck.