1 in 4 Gen Z job applicants bring their mom or dad to their job interview in 2024

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Dear All,

I am OP. I love how virtually every response expresses complete and utter disbelief this phenomenon exists.

Google it for yourself. This phenomenon is not represented by one single person, one time. It is a trend (but do your due diligence and find out). It exists.

In any event: answer the question:

- will this increase or decrease in the future?

If Covid is to blame, the trend (if there is one) will decrease.

Parents barging in on their kids' college education has been happening since pre-covid so I assume that will continue on.

[Anonymous]

Look at the crazy MoCo parents upset they are shutting down the Covid Virtual school.

Helicopter parents

[Anonymous]

They have to mean take them to the interview, not sit in. I can't see how the interview would even start with a parent there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, I do not believe it will grow larger. I have never seen this and interviewed hundreds of Gen Z applicants in the past few years.

Maybe their parents gave them a ride to the interview?

There are lots of phony trend stories and that is nothing new.

Why would the parents even give them a ride to the interview. Will they also give them a ride to work? And pack their lunch?
Grow up!

Why do you care? MYOB and STFU.

[Anonymous]

This is not true, it's about 8% if you accurately look at the numbers provided by the study.

Also, people should always be skeptical of accepting the results of one study, particularly a poorly-done one like this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This does not remotely pass the sniff test. No way.

+1. There's basically zero chance this is true, but it does give people a chance to be upset about Kids Today, so they lap it up.

Different survey; similar results:

https://www.businessinsider.com/gen-z-jobseekers-unprofessional-entitled-employers-say-survey-2024-1?amp

That study said that 20% of managers saw a parent show up to an interview, not that 20% of interviewees came with a parent.

[Anonymous]

I said this in the other thread about Gen Z but: Gen Z is currently age 12 to 26. Are we sure this "statistic" is not referring to teenagers. I was accompanied by parents to "job interviews" when I was 13-16 because I couldn't legally drive and also they often needed to sign paperwork to allow e to work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I said this in the other thread about Gen Z but: Gen Z is currently age 12 to 26. Are we sure this "statistic" is not referring to teenagers. I was accompanied by parents to "job interviews" when I was 13-16 because I couldn't legally drive and also they often needed to sign paperwork to allow e to work.

They said the youngest surveyed were 18. But it looks like the 1 in 4 number that OP is using includes people who are just being driven to the place, or their parent is waiting around in the office. It's so misleading and click-baity.

[Anonymous]

As someone who does recruiting & hiring, I don't find it surprising.

I'm Gen X. I started seeing it happen for the first time when interviewing Millennial candidates. I work for a company with 200+ employees. If I did 30 interviews in a month, maybe 1 would bring mom into the office and leave her in the lobby. I can only think of 2 instances where the candidate wanted to bring their parent into the interview or the parent wanted to come in.

However, in the last 3 years, Gen Z has gotten bad about bringing one or both parents into the interviewing & hiring mix. Not just toting them along to the interview, but also them adding them to the cc on emails or even a few candidates asking us to negotiate their salary with their parents. We've had parents call in sick for their adult kids, and not for emergency situations like where they were rushed into emergency surgery, but for simple colds/flus. Another odd thing is that these Gen Z workers want to bring their parents to work to show off their work. For example, a new hire brought her dad to work to sit in on the first big meeting and presentation she was heading.

[Anonymous]

You should be very very embarrassed that you don't understand connections and networking (yes, even through parents - no ESPECIALLY through parents) is how the real world works. Not taking every advantage and opportunity you have at your disposal, especially huge ones like having parents who know decision-makers, is just plain stupid.

You think George W. Bush would have gotten anywhere near as far as he did if it weren't for who his parents were? Is becoming President (regardless of what a terrible job he did) "failure to launch?"

If you're holding back on offering your connections to your kids out of some misguided attempt to make them independent, I feel very sorry for them.

Totally agree with this...it's not what you know but who you know sometimes and giving your kid a leg up through your connections is totally ok and done all the time. It's all about networking!

That being said I have NEVER - not even when my kids were interviewing for teenage year/college summer jobs - been present at any of their job interviews! And I have one kid with ADHD and General Anxiety Disorder. Sure, I may introduce them and make the initial "connection", but never ever will I be present (whether in person or virtually) during a job interview.

As an aside - driving them to an interview is fine...no different than them taking an Uber if for some reason they are without wheels at the time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As someone who does recruiting & hiring, I don't find it surprising.

I'm Gen X. I started seeing it happen for the first time when interviewing Millennial candidates. I work for a company with 200+ employees. If I did 30 interviews in a month, maybe 1 would bring mom into the office and leave her in the lobby. I can only think of 2 instances where the candidate wanted to bring their parent into the interview or the parent wanted to come in.

However, in the last 3 years, Gen Z has gotten bad about bringing one or both parents into the interviewing & hiring mix. Not just toting them along to the interview, but also them adding them to the cc on emails or even a few candidates asking us to negotiate their salary with their parents. We've had parents call in sick for their adult kids, and not for emergency situations like where they were rushed into emergency surgery, but for simple colds/flus. Another odd thing is that these Gen Z workers want to bring their parents to work to show off their work. For example, a new hire brought her dad to work to sit in on the first big meeting and presentation she was heading.

I think this study is ridiculous and it's wild that people aren't being more skeptical of the headlines, but I can believe that this sort of thing happens. What is up with these parents? I get being very involved since getting a job these days is much harder than it was when I graduated from college, but I'd think that involvement meant working with your kid to build a strong resume, editing that resume, researching job opportunities, etc. If my kid asked me to do anything more I would think that they aren't ready to join the workforce.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As someone who does recruiting & hiring, I don't find it surprising.

I'm Gen X. I started seeing it happen for the first time when interviewing Millennial candidates. I work for a company with 200+ employees. If I did 30 interviews in a month, maybe 1 would bring mom into the office and leave her in the lobby. I can only think of 2 instances where the candidate wanted to bring their parent into the interview or the parent wanted to come in.

However, in the last 3 years, Gen Z has gotten bad about bringing one or both parents into the interviewing & hiring mix. Not just toting them along to the interview, but also them adding them to the cc on emails or even a few candidates asking us to negotiate their salary with their parents. We've had parents call in sick for their adult kids, and not for emergency situations like where they were rushed into emergency surgery, but for simple colds/flus. Another odd thing is that these Gen Z workers want to bring their parents to work to show off their work. For example, a new hire brought her dad to work to sit in on the first big meeting and presentation she was heading.

Oh yeah I can't remember ever thinking for a minute that my parents might call in sick for me. That's part of having a job. Calls like that have always been awkward for me and still are. Never got good at it but I learned to do it.

My direct supervisor allows us to text her if we're staying home sick or something happens last minute. But the official policy is to call in. I can't imagine how hard that is for some people.