5 toxic thoughts and behaviors, I am letting go as a millennial manager

“I am a millennial manager, of course you don’t have to tell me why you’re taking time off.”

I am sure you have watched the incessant TikTok videos that celebrate millennial managers who value work life balance and flexibility. These videos have brought a breath of fresh air into the American economy, and a change to antiquated workplaces cultures that see employees as mere machines who should be exploited for their labor. The impact that millennials have in changing how we conceptualize the relationship between employees and work is undeniable. Millennials now represent over 60% of all managers, which means we play a significant role in shaping company culture.

Consequently, we also are a generation that has been plagued with significant life altering societal events — from the expansion of social media, and the rise of the internet, 9/11, the Great Recession, the invasion of Iraq, and the COVID-19, global health pandemic. Even through world chaos, we have managed to still be supportive, present and empathetic managers, and provide care and concern for our employee’s mental and personal health.

In celebrating all of the notable aspects of the millennial manager, I also realize that we have been forced to be the sacrificial generation. What do I mean by this? We’re a generation that has sacrificed our own mental health and personal well being for the lives of others. A generation that has sacrificed the reality of owning a home, starting and raising families and building wealth to increased corporate greed, and skyrocketing inflation. Millennials have never truly had the time to recover from all of the world chaos over the past decade — and many of us are shouldering the burden of work burnout, caring for aging parents, student loan debt — -while also still managing to be decent managers and showing up consistently for our employees. We have had to be high achievers even in the midst of world chaos — many of us felt the boomer generation pressure to make it in a much tougher economy; we felt propelled to prove to people that we weren’t lazy or not hardworking. Cue Whoopi Goldberg’s rant about millennials and Gen Z not wanting to work hard enough.

And now, we’re paying for it. It is estimated that the number of millennials born between 1981 and 1996 experiencing mental health issues is at 40 percent, and we’re more likely to suffer from depression when compared to our elders.