Speaking to business event leaders of the 13 member cities in the global alliance, as well as 19 representatives of international associations, McCrindle said Gen Alpha would be the longest living and the largest generation in the history of the world, totalling almost two billion people by the end of this year.
Gen Alpha was living on the edge of an extraordinary age. They are children of Gen Y and grandchildren of Baby Boomers, but just as each generation reflects on generations that preceded them, Gen Alpha would have at least 17 different jobs after leaving school and their working life would entail six separate careers.
Beyond purely remuneration, a workplace would need to provide them social interaction, purpose, stimulation and lifelong learning.
As they require different parenting styles, Gen Alpha would also present different challenges for employers and, in turn, for professional associations.
“As we live longer, retire later, change jobs a lot more frequently and retrain across multiple careers, lifelong learning will move from an aspiration to essential…affecting professional development and training offered by associations,” McCrindle said.
The risk in ignoring these unprecedented generational changes of Gen Z and the upcoming Gen Alpha in the workforce was summed up in a bold-text quote he showed the audience. It read: “Many people leave jobs not because there is a compelling reason to leave, but because there is no compelling reason to stay”.
McCrindle said the future was not just “out there”, but it was “coming towards us at an unprecedented velocity and often from an unknown direction”.
