A new report from The San Francisco Standard claims that Bay Area companies are investing in a service that can alleviate some of the stresses caused by hiring younger employees: etiquette experts. These experts are making good money explaining to new hires why it’s inappropriate to show up to work in sweatpants or put your feet on the table during a meeting.
The story quotes women employed in this apparently blossoming field, including Rosalinda Randall, a coach from Marin who claims that inquiries about her services have shot up 50 percent over the past two months. Companies hire Randall (for quite a hefty fee) to teach younger employees about how to behave in a workplace in a civilized manner. Many of the issues that companies encounter sound like just run-of-the-mill inconsiderate behavior:
One supervisor told Randall a new hire repeatedly left food wrappers scattered on the communal lunch table, assuming janitors would clean it up. “Their manager didn’t know how to handle it, as they didn’t want to sound like a parent,” said Randall.
Another reported instance involved stinky new hires:
One Bay Area tech firm asked her to address personal hygiene, because two new hires did not shower or change their shirts for weeks. “They didn’t want to deal with it, so they hired me,” said Randall.
Other potential concerns mentioned in the story include inappropriate female attire, insubordinate attitudes, and poor command of how to speak to co-workers on Slack.
It’s difficult to understand how “etiquette” services differ in any great capacity from what an HR department is supposed to provide but, according to the report, companies are paying a premium for such services. The Standard notes that Randall charges her clients as much as $2500 for a 90-minute workshop with employees to teach them stuff like “how to make eye contact,” “where to stick your name tag (always on the right),” and “how to ask for — not demand — things from your boss.”
I have a hard time believing that Gen-Z is any better or any worse than any other generation of American worker (weren’t previous generations known for sexual harassment and doing coke in the bathroom?). That said, I don’t really work with any Zoomers, so I have no strong reference point. There does seem to be a certain amount of inter-generational discontent out there. A story published by the Washington Post last year similarly reported that etiquette coach services were shooting upwards, partially because “younger workers are making up an increasing share of the workforce and bringing with them a preference for more-casual working environments, which is creating friction with older generations.”
