The hidden selves of Generation Z employees | The GenZ Shift

Description

Benoît Vancauwenberghe delves into the intricate identity architecture of Generation Z employees, who often feel pressured to conceal their true talents behind a professional facade. The analysis highlights four distinct layers of identity: Digital, Social, Real, and Work, which younger professionals compartmentalize to safeguard their personal brands and emotional well-being.

When workplace cultures emphasize rigid conformity or breed political environments, employees tend to withhold their ingenuity, offering only a "shadow" of their potential while reserving their true brilliance for pursuits outside the office. This intentional separation results in a significant performance gap—companies invest in top-tier talent but receive only surface-level engagement in return.

To address this, leaders must abandon authoritarian structures and instead create "tribal" cultures that reward authenticity and transparency. Without embracing these diverse identities, organizations risk becoming outdated relics of quiet compliance instead of thriving hubs of innovation. This essential audio series, led by Benoît Vancauwenberghe, founder of 20Something, and brought to life by NotebookKLM’s AI podcast, is a must-listen for HR leaders and managers across Europe. It cuts through the noise to provide actionable insights on how Generation Z is transforming leadership, workplace dynamics, and talent strategies. Backed by cutting-edge research and decades of consulting expertise, this series is your guide to navigating the future of work.

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Transcription

Speaker #0
Welcome to the Deep Dive. I want to start today with something you've probably seen, especially if you manage or, you know, work with younger people.
Speaker #1
Today, we've got a whole stack of sources. We're talking Gallup, McKinsey, Edelman, all zeroing in on, well, one of the biggest puzzles for leaders right now, Gen Z.
Speaker #0
Okay, so I want to introduce you to a guy. Let's call him Lucas.
Speaker #1
Okay.
Speaker #0
He's 24. He works as a junior analyst and, you know, a huge... legacy company.
Speaker #1
Right. One of those places. Carpeted walls, the works.
Speaker #0
Exactly. And it's so quiet. You can literally hear the fluorescent lights buzzing. And if you walked past his desk, you'd barely even notice him.
Speaker #1
He's just part of the furniture.
Speaker #0
Totally. The guy in the beige sweater, he keeps his head down. He crushes his spreadsheets. He answers emails with will do thanks. He is, I mean, completely invisible.
Speaker #1
Which for a lot of old school managers sounds like the perfect employee. Low maintenance gets the job done.
Speaker #0
You would think. But here's the twist. And this is the thing that really gets me. On the weekends, Lucas is a completely different person. And I don't mean he has a cool hobby. I mean, he's basically a mogul. He produces rap videos. They get thousands of views.
Speaker #1
Wow.
Speaker #0
He manages a Discord community of 15,000 people. I mean, think about that. Moderation teams, engagement, conflict resolution. He's mastering editing tools that his own company's marketing department hasn't even heard of.
Speaker #1
So you have this. This massive reservoir of talent, leadership, technical skill, crisis management. Yeah. And it all just evaporates the second he walks into the office.
Speaker #0
It just vanishes. And so the million dollar question is, why? You know, is he shy? Is it imposter syndrome? Is he quiet quitting?
Speaker #1
It's none of that. It's not about laziness. And it's definitely not modesty.
Speaker #0
Then what is it? Because today we are diving into some really. A provocative research by a European strategist named Benoit van Kouwenberg. He's interviewed hundreds of people just like Lucas. And he found this one recurring idea that is honestly a little disturbing.
Speaker #1
And what's that?
Speaker #0
The quote that keeps coming up is this. At work, I show only the part of me that is safe.
Speaker #1
That word safe. That's doing a lot of work right there.
Speaker #0
It is. And that's our whole mission for this deep dive. We're not just talking about generational stuff. We are talking about something he calls identity architecture under constraint.
Speaker #1
It sounds super technical, but really it's an urgent business problem. The core issue Van Kallenberg points out is that modern management sees employees as these monolithic blocks.
Speaker #0
Right. You hire a person. You think you get the whole person.
Speaker #1
But that's a fatal misreading of what's happening. You're not managing a single block. You're managing a complex, layered identity architecture that is under, like, extreme tension.
Speaker #0
So if you don't get these layers. You're paying a full salary for, what, a shadow?
Speaker #1
It's worse than that.
Speaker #0
Yeah.
Speaker #1
You're paying 100% of the salary for maybe 15% of the capability. And the tragedy is the employee is exhausted from hiding and the manager is frustrated, and neither of them really knows why.
Speaker #0
Okay, let's break that down. Van Kallenberg uses the word dissociation. Now, that sounds pretty serious.
Speaker #1
Well, in this context, it's a strategic defense mechanism. I mean, think about it. If you're in an environment that feels arbitrary, or political or just indifferent to your skills, what do you do?
Speaker #0
You don't fight it. That's too risky.
Speaker #1
You don't fight it. You dissociate. You split your identity. You keep the really good stuff safe, you know, for yourself. And you send a representative to work.
Speaker #0
So Lucas isn't unmotivated. He's just protecting his assets.
Speaker #1
He's partitioning his hard drive. And to really get what he's protecting, we have to walk through the four layers he talks about. There's the digital self, the social self, the real self. And then finally... the work self.
Speaker #0
Okay, layer one, the digital self. I can already hear some managers listening and rolling their eyes thinking, oh great, his TikTok addiction.
Speaker #1
And that dismissal, that's the first huge mistake. Managers see the phone and they think distraction. For this generation, the digital self is their number one strategic asset. It's not a toy.
Speaker #0
Strategic how?
Speaker #1
He calls it reputation insurance, which is just brilliant. Lucas's Discord, his videos, that's an optimized. performative, even monetizable version of who he is. He's been trained by algorithms since he was a kid to know what creates value.
Speaker #0
So it's not vanity. It's a portfolio.
Speaker #1
It's leverage. I mean, look at the power dynamic. In the old days, you needed a reference from your boss to get a new job, right? Your boss held all the keys.
Speaker #0
Yeah, you had to play the game.
Speaker #1
But now. Lucas has public, verifiable proof of his competence. He has 15,000 people on Discord who can vouch for him. He has analytics on his videos. He doesn't need his manager's validation because the market validates him 24-7. That is,
Speaker #0
yeah, that's terrifying for a traditional manager. The threat of being fired just doesn't hit the same way.
Speaker #1
It doesn't hit at all. The digital self is a built-in exit strategy. So if the company he works for is seen as, I don't know, outdated or a bit... Cringe.
Speaker #0
It actually hurts the brand he's building for himself.
Speaker #1
Precisely. If my identity is being a cutting edge creator and my day job is at some company that still uses fax machines, my association with you actually hurts my brand equity.
Speaker #0
Wow. So you're not just an employer. You could be a liability.
Speaker #1
And when your digital self, your lifeboat, is more credible than your work self, you're already halfway out the door. The company is basically just financing the talent your polishing to take somewhere else.
Speaker #0
Okay. So that's the digital self, the exit strategy. Let's move to layer two, the social self. This is about your work friends.
Speaker #1
It's deeper. It's about the tribe versus the hierarchy. In the old world, you were proud of the company badge. You wanted the title. You respected the ladder.
Speaker #0
You wanted the corner office, the pat on the back from the boss.
Speaker #1
Yeah. But in the new world, loyalty is horizontal. It's not given to the manager. It's given to your peers. The social self wants validation from the community. not from some authority figure.
Speaker #0
So that employee of the month plaque is useless.
Speaker #1
It might even be a little embarrassing. They don't care if the CEO knows their name. They care if their tribe respects them. Their loyalty is to the people who get the inside jokes, who share the struggles.
Speaker #0
This explains so much about the retention crisis. I've heard leaders say, we pay top dollar. Why do people keep leaving?
Speaker #1
Because the tribe wasn't there. If the workplace is just functional, come in, do tasks, go home. The social self just starves. It becomes purely transactional. Time for money.
Speaker #0
And without that glue, that horizontal bond?
Speaker #1
They're gone. People rarely leave a tribe that protects them. But they will leave a high-paying job and a heartbeat if they feel alone. The social self is the guardian of connection. Without it, you just have a bunch of freelancers in the same room.
Speaker #0
That is a lonely thought.
Speaker #1
It is. And that loneliness leads us right to the next layer. Layer three, the real self.
Speaker #0
Okay, and this is where the research gets a little... Pointed. We have to talk about the whole snowflake stereotype. You know, the idea that Gen Z is fragile. They can't take criticism. They need trigger warnings for everything.
Speaker #1
Ben Kauenberg says that's a complete misdiagnosis. The real self isn't fragile. It's hyper lucid and hyper vigilant.
Speaker #0
Hyper vigilant. That sounds exhausting. Almost like a trauma response.
Speaker #1
In a way, it is. I mean, look at the world they grew up in. Fake news, climate crises, digital surveillance. They've developed this ultra sensitive. inconsistency radar.
Speaker #0
Okay.
Speaker #1
They are constantly scanning the gap between what a company says on its website and what a manager actually does in a meeting.
Speaker #0
So when a company puts, we are a family on the lobby wall, and then lays off 10% of the staff over a group Zoom call.
Speaker #1
The real self sees that hypocrisy instantly. And it doesn't react with sadness. It reacts with a cold, rational thought. This place is unsafe.
Speaker #0
But isn't that just cynicism?
Speaker #1
I think it's realism. The real self doesn't fear hard work. Lucas works like crazy on his weekends. What it fears is the void. Gratuitous humiliation. Polite cowardice. You know, when a manager is too afraid to give you real feedback so they just let you fail.
Speaker #0
Ah, the dreaded compliment sandwich with no filling. I hate that.
Speaker #1
They hate it more. They crave safety but not being coddled. They want the safety of knowing the rules are real and consistent.
Speaker #0
And if they don't get that safety, if the radar keeps pinging danger...
Speaker #1
Then you get a total lockdown. The real self basically says, OK, this environment is hostile. Shut down creativity. Shut down loyalty. We're going into survival mode.
Speaker #0
Which brings us to layer four. The only thing the manager actually gets to see. The work self.
Speaker #1
Or as he calls it, the firewall.
Speaker #0
I love that metaphor, but it's also incredibly depressing. The work self isn't really a person. It's just an interface.
Speaker #1
It's a compression zone. It's a construct that you send to the front lines to handle meetings, processes, KPIs. It's designed to answer emails professionally and say things like, let's circle back on that.
Speaker #0
It's like a video game NPC, a non-player character.
Speaker #1
Exactly. It's preventive dissociation. Lucas is physically present. He's answering your questions. But he has deliberately removed his intelligence from the room.
Speaker #0
So I'm the manager. I'm sitting there thinking, Lucas is a bit quiet, but he's solid. But really, I'm talking to a shell.
Speaker #1
You're talking to a defensive algorithm. He gives you his time that's in the contract. But he keeps his genius for himself.
Speaker #0
OK, let me play devil's advocate for a second. Does that matter? If the work gets done, why should a company care if they're only getting the firewall Lucas?
Speaker #1
They should care because of what Van Kallenberger calls the identity fragmentation debt.
Speaker #0
OK, identity fragmentation debt. That sounds expensive.
Speaker #1
It is colossally expensive. Think about your phone when you have 50 apps open in the background. The battery just drains. Everything slows down.
Speaker #0
Yeah, that's my life.
Speaker #1
Well, that's what Lucas is doing in his brain, maintaining all these masks, keeping the real self hidden, managing the digital self on the side. It consumes a massive amount of cognitive energy, and that's energy that is not being used to solve your business problems.
Speaker #0
So he's running at, what, maybe 60% capacity?
Speaker #1
Probably less. And the economic hit is brutal. This fragmentation turns your A talent into a C executor. You're paying an A-level salary, but the environment you've created only allows for C-level output.
Speaker #0
You're paying for a Ferrari and you're only allowed to drive it in a school zone.
Speaker #1
And you're paying twice.
Speaker #0
Ugh.
Speaker #1
Once for the management hours you waste monitoring someone who's hiding because you had to micromanage a firewall. And again, the raw loss of competence. The guy who knows how to build a community of 15,000 people, you'll never even know he has that skill.
Speaker #0
The source material brings in Sherry Turkle here, right?
Speaker #1
Yes, her work is key. She talks about how digital life naturally fragments our identity. But von Kallenberg's point is that in the workplace, this isn't just a side effect of tech. It's a direct result of management systems that can't handle complexity.
Speaker #0
We want people to be simple, to fit in a neat little box.
Speaker #1
And if your system punishes individuality, people will flatten themselves to survive. They become the firewall.
Speaker #0
Okay, so the diagnosis is pretty grim. We have Lucas hiding, his real self is unsafe, his digital self is plotting an escape, his social self is starved. If I'm a manager listening right now, I'm probably starting to sweat. So how do we fix it?
Speaker #1
The good news is it is fixable, but it means reframing the manager's job entirely. Your job is no longer just assigning tasks. Your new job is to stop the split. You have to build a place where it's safe to bring more than just a fragment of yourself to work.
Speaker #0
The source gives three really practical steps. Let's walk through them. Step one. Recognize the digital self.
Speaker #1
This just means stop treating their life outside work like some cute little hobby. If Lucas is a master of Discord, you bring that skill into the room.
Speaker #0
What does that actually look like?
Speaker #1
It's saying, hey Lucas, I saw that video you posted. The editing was incredible. You know, we were struggling with our internal comms videos. Could you take a look? I'd love to get your take on it.
Speaker #0
You're validating his outside talent inside the company walls.
Speaker #1
You're connecting his digital self to the company's actual mission. Suddenly he's not hiding his genius. He's applying it. You're basically making the company a platform for his personal brand, not a prison for it.
Speaker #0
That is a huge mental shift. Okay, step two, strengthen the social self.
Speaker #1
This is all about killing that teacher's pet culture. You know, the top-down praise, great job, Lucas, here's a gift card, feels hollow.
Speaker #0
So what's the alternative?
Speaker #1
Peer-to-peer recognition. You create rituals where the team validates each other. Maybe a weekly shout-out session where the manager actually just shuts up and lets the team praise each other. Remember, people stay for tribes. If you build that web of horizontal respect, the social self locks in.
Speaker #0
It makes it harder to leave because you'd be leaving your friends, not just your boss.
Speaker #1
Exactly. It's a much more resilient kind of loyalty.
Speaker #0
And then step three, and this feels like it's the foundation for everything, protect the real self.
Speaker #1
This is the hardest part. It means replacing all the political theater with clear, predictable rules.
Speaker #0
We hear transparency all the time. But what does that actually mean in this context?
Speaker #1
It means radical predictability. The real self is hypervigilant. It's scanning for threats. If the rules are crystal clear, even if they're tough, that radar can finally turn off. Transparency isn't about being nice. It's about creating safety through predictability.
Speaker #0
So things like, here's the exact rubric for promotion, or here's exactly why that project's budget was cut. No mystery.
Speaker #1
No guessing games. No passive aggression. When the environment is predictable, the real self can finally relax. And when it relaxes, it unlocks the doors to all the other selves. The creativity comes back. The loyalty comes back.
Speaker #0
A firewall comes down.
Speaker #1
And you finally get to meet the brilliant person you actually hired.
Speaker #0
There's a line at the end of the source material that really, it just stopped me in my tracks. It says, organizations rarely fail because they lack smart people. They fail because they make intelligence too risky to express.
Speaker #1
That one hit me too. We always assume companies fail because of a talent gap. But no, they had the talent. It was sitting right there in the beige sweater, hiding, just waiting for five o'clock to go home and be brilliant somewhere else.
Speaker #0
We're forcing people to choose between quiet compliance or uncomfortable competence.
Speaker #1
And given the choice, most people will pick compliance. It's safer. But if a company always chooses preservation over intelligence, you don't evolve. Like Van Kallenberg says, you just become a museum.
Speaker #0
Museum of old processes.
Speaker #1
Exactly. Beautifully preserved and totally dead.
Speaker #0
It really just flips that whole lazy Gen Z narrative on its head. It says, no, the energy is there. The drive is there. You just haven't earned access to it.
Speaker #1
The reactor is running. The question is, is your company built to plug into it or is it built to just pour concrete over the whole thing?
Speaker #0
So as we wrap up, I want to leave our listeners with a little bit of homework. Whether you're a manager or you're a Lucas, look around your office tomorrow. Look at your team.
Speaker #1
And ask yourself. Am I interacting with a person or am I just talking to their firewall?
Speaker #0
And if you're the one who's hiding, keeping your genius for the weekend, just ask yourself what that prevention strategy is costing you. Because driving with the emergency brake on is a really, really exhausting way to live.
Speaker #1
It's a debt and it always comes due eventually.
Speaker #0
Huge thanks to the insights from Benoit van Kouwenberg for this one. It really makes you see the quiet person in the next cubicle differently.
Speaker #1
It certainly does.
Speaker #0
That's it for this deep dive. We'll catch you in the next one. stay curious

About The GenZ Shift

Is your organization ready for the Gen Z and Gen Alpha revolution sweeping across Europe's workplaces?

Introducing The Gen Z Shift, an essential audio series written by Benoît Vancauwenberghe, founder of 20Something, and a leading voice on youth generations, and realized by an AI podcast by NotebookKLM.

This series cuts through the noise to decode how young people are fundamentally reshaping work, culture, and leadership.

We explore:

👉 Their search for meaningful work and a unique feedback culture

👉 The shift from 'boss to coach' mentality

👉 Why 'quiet quitting' is a signal, not a threat

👉 Strategies to attract, engage, and retain young talent in Europe

Packed with cutting-edge research, consulting insights, and real-world experience, this is an indispensable resource for leaders, HR teams, and educators. Gain an unfiltered perspective rarely heard in traditional circles.

Ready to confidently navigate an evolving workforce and lead a generation that refuses blind adherence?

Listen to The Gen Z Shift now! The bridges between your world and the world of Generation Z

#GenZ #GenAlpha #FutureOfWork #Leadership #HR #WorkplaceCulture #Europe

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

About The GenZ Shift

Is your organization ready for the Gen Z and Gen Alpha revolution sweeping across Europe's workplaces?

This series cuts through the noise to decode how young people are fundamentally reshaping work, culture, and leadership.

We explore:

👉 Their search for meaningful work and a unique feedback culture

👉 The shift from 'boss to coach' mentality

👉 Why 'quiet quitting' is a signal, not a threat

👉 Strategies to attract, engage, and retain young talent in Europe

Ready to confidently navigate an evolving workforce and lead a generation that refuses blind adherence?

Listen to The Gen Z Shift now! The bridges between your world and the world of Generation Z

#GenZ #GenAlpha #FutureOfWork #Leadership #HR #WorkplaceCulture #Europe

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Description

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Transcription

Speaker #0
Welcome to the Deep Dive. I want to start today with something you've probably seen, especially if you manage or, you know, work with younger people.
Speaker #1
Today, we've got a whole stack of sources. We're talking Gallup, McKinsey, Edelman, all zeroing in on, well, one of the biggest puzzles for leaders right now, Gen Z.
Speaker #0
Okay, so I want to introduce you to a guy. Let's call him Lucas.
Speaker #1
Okay.
Speaker #0
He's 24. He works as a junior analyst and, you know, a huge... legacy company.
Speaker #1
Right. One of those places. Carpeted walls, the works.
Speaker #0
Exactly. And it's so quiet. You can literally hear the fluorescent lights buzzing. And if you walked past his desk, you'd barely even notice him.
Speaker #1
He's just part of the furniture.
Speaker #0
Totally. The guy in the beige sweater, he keeps his head down. He crushes his spreadsheets. He answers emails with will do thanks. He is, I mean, completely invisible.
Speaker #1
Which for a lot of old school managers sounds like the perfect employee. Low maintenance gets the job done.
Speaker #0
You would think. But here's the twist. And this is the thing that really gets me. On the weekends, Lucas is a completely different person. And I don't mean he has a cool hobby. I mean, he's basically a mogul. He produces rap videos. They get thousands of views.
Speaker #1
Wow.
Speaker #0
He manages a Discord community of 15,000 people. I mean, think about that. Moderation teams, engagement, conflict resolution. He's mastering editing tools that his own company's marketing department hasn't even heard of.
Speaker #1
So you have this. This massive reservoir of talent, leadership, technical skill, crisis management. Yeah. And it all just evaporates the second he walks into the office.
Speaker #0
It just vanishes. And so the million dollar question is, why? You know, is he shy? Is it imposter syndrome? Is he quiet quitting?
Speaker #1
It's none of that. It's not about laziness. And it's definitely not modesty.
Speaker #0
Then what is it? Because today we are diving into some really. A provocative research by a European strategist named Benoit van Kouwenberg. He's interviewed hundreds of people just like Lucas. And he found this one recurring idea that is honestly a little disturbing.
Speaker #1
And what's that?
Speaker #0
The quote that keeps coming up is this. At work, I show only the part of me that is safe.
Speaker #1
That word safe. That's doing a lot of work right there.
Speaker #0
It is. And that's our whole mission for this deep dive. We're not just talking about generational stuff. We are talking about something he calls identity architecture under constraint.
Speaker #1
It sounds super technical, but really it's an urgent business problem. The core issue Van Kallenberg points out is that modern management sees employees as these monolithic blocks.
Speaker #0
Right. You hire a person. You think you get the whole person.
Speaker #1
But that's a fatal misreading of what's happening. You're not managing a single block. You're managing a complex, layered identity architecture that is under, like, extreme tension.
Speaker #0
So if you don't get these layers. You're paying a full salary for, what, a shadow?
Speaker #1
It's worse than that.
Speaker #0
Yeah.
Speaker #1
You're paying 100% of the salary for maybe 15% of the capability. And the tragedy is the employee is exhausted from hiding and the manager is frustrated, and neither of them really knows why.
Speaker #0
Okay, let's break that down. Van Kallenberg uses the word dissociation. Now, that sounds pretty serious.
Speaker #1
Well, in this context, it's a strategic defense mechanism. I mean, think about it. If you're in an environment that feels arbitrary, or political or just indifferent to your skills, what do you do?
Speaker #0
You don't fight it. That's too risky.
Speaker #1
You don't fight it. You dissociate. You split your identity. You keep the really good stuff safe, you know, for yourself. And you send a representative to work.
Speaker #0
So Lucas isn't unmotivated. He's just protecting his assets.
Speaker #1
He's partitioning his hard drive. And to really get what he's protecting, we have to walk through the four layers he talks about. There's the digital self, the social self, the real self. And then finally... the work self.
Speaker #0
Okay, layer one, the digital self. I can already hear some managers listening and rolling their eyes thinking, oh great, his TikTok addiction.
Speaker #1
And that dismissal, that's the first huge mistake. Managers see the phone and they think distraction. For this generation, the digital self is their number one strategic asset. It's not a toy.
Speaker #0
Strategic how?
Speaker #1
He calls it reputation insurance, which is just brilliant. Lucas's Discord, his videos, that's an optimized. performative, even monetizable version of who he is. He's been trained by algorithms since he was a kid to know what creates value.
Speaker #0
So it's not vanity. It's a portfolio.
Speaker #1
It's leverage. I mean, look at the power dynamic. In the old days, you needed a reference from your boss to get a new job, right? Your boss held all the keys.
Speaker #0
Yeah, you had to play the game.
Speaker #1
But now. Lucas has public, verifiable proof of his competence. He has 15,000 people on Discord who can vouch for him. He has analytics on his videos. He doesn't need his manager's validation because the market validates him 24-7. That is,
Speaker #0
yeah, that's terrifying for a traditional manager. The threat of being fired just doesn't hit the same way.
Speaker #1
It doesn't hit at all. The digital self is a built-in exit strategy. So if the company he works for is seen as, I don't know, outdated or a bit... Cringe.
Speaker #0
It actually hurts the brand he's building for himself.
Speaker #1
Precisely. If my identity is being a cutting edge creator and my day job is at some company that still uses fax machines, my association with you actually hurts my brand equity.
Speaker #0
Wow. So you're not just an employer. You could be a liability.
Speaker #1
And when your digital self, your lifeboat, is more credible than your work self, you're already halfway out the door. The company is basically just financing the talent your polishing to take somewhere else.
Speaker #0
Okay. So that's the digital self, the exit strategy. Let's move to layer two, the social self. This is about your work friends.
Speaker #1
It's deeper. It's about the tribe versus the hierarchy. In the old world, you were proud of the company badge. You wanted the title. You respected the ladder.
Speaker #0
You wanted the corner office, the pat on the back from the boss.
Speaker #1
Yeah. But in the new world, loyalty is horizontal. It's not given to the manager. It's given to your peers. The social self wants validation from the community. not from some authority figure.
Speaker #0
So that employee of the month plaque is useless.
Speaker #1
It might even be a little embarrassing. They don't care if the CEO knows their name. They care if their tribe respects them. Their loyalty is to the people who get the inside jokes, who share the struggles.
Speaker #0
This explains so much about the retention crisis. I've heard leaders say, we pay top dollar. Why do people keep leaving?
Speaker #1
Because the tribe wasn't there. If the workplace is just functional, come in, do tasks, go home. The social self just starves. It becomes purely transactional. Time for money.
Speaker #0
And without that glue, that horizontal bond?
Speaker #1
They're gone. People rarely leave a tribe that protects them. But they will leave a high-paying job and a heartbeat if they feel alone. The social self is the guardian of connection. Without it, you just have a bunch of freelancers in the same room.
Speaker #0
That is a lonely thought.
Speaker #1
It is. And that loneliness leads us right to the next layer. Layer three, the real self.
Speaker #0
Okay, and this is where the research gets a little... Pointed. We have to talk about the whole snowflake stereotype. You know, the idea that Gen Z is fragile. They can't take criticism. They need trigger warnings for everything.
Speaker #1
Ben Kauenberg says that's a complete misdiagnosis. The real self isn't fragile. It's hyper lucid and hyper vigilant.
Speaker #0
Hyper vigilant. That sounds exhausting. Almost like a trauma response.
Speaker #1
In a way, it is. I mean, look at the world they grew up in. Fake news, climate crises, digital surveillance. They've developed this ultra sensitive. inconsistency radar.
Speaker #0
Okay.
Speaker #1
They are constantly scanning the gap between what a company says on its website and what a manager actually does in a meeting.
Speaker #0
So when a company puts, we are a family on the lobby wall, and then lays off 10% of the staff over a group Zoom call.
Speaker #1
The real self sees that hypocrisy instantly. And it doesn't react with sadness. It reacts with a cold, rational thought. This place is unsafe.
Speaker #0
But isn't that just cynicism?
Speaker #1
I think it's realism. The real self doesn't fear hard work. Lucas works like crazy on his weekends. What it fears is the void. Gratuitous humiliation. Polite cowardice. You know, when a manager is too afraid to give you real feedback so they just let you fail.
Speaker #0
Ah, the dreaded compliment sandwich with no filling. I hate that.
Speaker #1
They hate it more. They crave safety but not being coddled. They want the safety of knowing the rules are real and consistent.
Speaker #0
And if they don't get that safety, if the radar keeps pinging danger...
Speaker #1
Then you get a total lockdown. The real self basically says, OK, this environment is hostile. Shut down creativity. Shut down loyalty. We're going into survival mode.
Speaker #0
Which brings us to layer four. The only thing the manager actually gets to see. The work self.
Speaker #1
Or as he calls it, the firewall.
Speaker #0
I love that metaphor, but it's also incredibly depressing. The work self isn't really a person. It's just an interface.
Speaker #1
It's a compression zone. It's a construct that you send to the front lines to handle meetings, processes, KPIs. It's designed to answer emails professionally and say things like, let's circle back on that.
Speaker #0
It's like a video game NPC, a non-player character.
Speaker #1
Exactly. It's preventive dissociation. Lucas is physically present. He's answering your questions. But he has deliberately removed his intelligence from the room.
Speaker #0
So I'm the manager. I'm sitting there thinking, Lucas is a bit quiet, but he's solid. But really, I'm talking to a shell.
Speaker #1
You're talking to a defensive algorithm. He gives you his time that's in the contract. But he keeps his genius for himself.
Speaker #0
OK, let me play devil's advocate for a second. Does that matter? If the work gets done, why should a company care if they're only getting the firewall Lucas?
Speaker #1
They should care because of what Van Kallenberger calls the identity fragmentation debt.
Speaker #0
OK, identity fragmentation debt. That sounds expensive.
Speaker #1
It is colossally expensive. Think about your phone when you have 50 apps open in the background. The battery just drains. Everything slows down.
Speaker #0
Yeah, that's my life.
Speaker #1
Well, that's what Lucas is doing in his brain, maintaining all these masks, keeping the real self hidden, managing the digital self on the side. It consumes a massive amount of cognitive energy, and that's energy that is not being used to solve your business problems.
Speaker #0
So he's running at, what, maybe 60% capacity?
Speaker #1
Probably less. And the economic hit is brutal. This fragmentation turns your A talent into a C executor. You're paying an A-level salary, but the environment you've created only allows for C-level output.
Speaker #0
You're paying for a Ferrari and you're only allowed to drive it in a school zone.
Speaker #1
And you're paying twice.
Speaker #0
Ugh.
Speaker #1
Once for the management hours you waste monitoring someone who's hiding because you had to micromanage a firewall. And again, the raw loss of competence. The guy who knows how to build a community of 15,000 people, you'll never even know he has that skill.
Speaker #0
The source material brings in Sherry Turkle here, right?
Speaker #1
Yes, her work is key. She talks about how digital life naturally fragments our identity. But von Kallenberg's point is that in the workplace, this isn't just a side effect of tech. It's a direct result of management systems that can't handle complexity.
Speaker #0
We want people to be simple, to fit in a neat little box.
Speaker #1
And if your system punishes individuality, people will flatten themselves to survive. They become the firewall.
Speaker #0
Okay, so the diagnosis is pretty grim. We have Lucas hiding, his real self is unsafe, his digital self is plotting an escape, his social self is starved. If I'm a manager listening right now, I'm probably starting to sweat. So how do we fix it?
Speaker #1
The good news is it is fixable, but it means reframing the manager's job entirely. Your job is no longer just assigning tasks. Your new job is to stop the split. You have to build a place where it's safe to bring more than just a fragment of yourself to work.
Speaker #0
The source gives three really practical steps. Let's walk through them. Step one. Recognize the digital self.
Speaker #1
This just means stop treating their life outside work like some cute little hobby. If Lucas is a master of Discord, you bring that skill into the room.
Speaker #0
What does that actually look like?
Speaker #1
It's saying, hey Lucas, I saw that video you posted. The editing was incredible. You know, we were struggling with our internal comms videos. Could you take a look? I'd love to get your take on it.
Speaker #0
You're validating his outside talent inside the company walls.
Speaker #1
You're connecting his digital self to the company's actual mission. Suddenly he's not hiding his genius. He's applying it. You're basically making the company a platform for his personal brand, not a prison for it.
Speaker #0
That is a huge mental shift. Okay, step two, strengthen the social self.
Speaker #1
This is all about killing that teacher's pet culture. You know, the top-down praise, great job, Lucas, here's a gift card, feels hollow.
Speaker #0
So what's the alternative?
Speaker #1
Peer-to-peer recognition. You create rituals where the team validates each other. Maybe a weekly shout-out session where the manager actually just shuts up and lets the team praise each other. Remember, people stay for tribes. If you build that web of horizontal respect, the social self locks in.
Speaker #0
It makes it harder to leave because you'd be leaving your friends, not just your boss.
Speaker #1
Exactly. It's a much more resilient kind of loyalty.
Speaker #0
And then step three, and this feels like it's the foundation for everything, protect the real self.
Speaker #1
This is the hardest part. It means replacing all the political theater with clear, predictable rules.
Speaker #0
We hear transparency all the time. But what does that actually mean in this context?
Speaker #1
It means radical predictability. The real self is hypervigilant. It's scanning for threats. If the rules are crystal clear, even if they're tough, that radar can finally turn off. Transparency isn't about being nice. It's about creating safety through predictability.
Speaker #0
So things like, here's the exact rubric for promotion, or here's exactly why that project's budget was cut. No mystery.
Speaker #1
No guessing games. No passive aggression. When the environment is predictable, the real self can finally relax. And when it relaxes, it unlocks the doors to all the other selves. The creativity comes back. The loyalty comes back.
Speaker #0
A firewall comes down.
Speaker #1
And you finally get to meet the brilliant person you actually hired.
Speaker #0
There's a line at the end of the source material that really, it just stopped me in my tracks. It says, organizations rarely fail because they lack smart people. They fail because they make intelligence too risky to express.
Speaker #1
That one hit me too. We always assume companies fail because of a talent gap. But no, they had the talent. It was sitting right there in the beige sweater, hiding, just waiting for five o'clock to go home and be brilliant somewhere else.
Speaker #0
We're forcing people to choose between quiet compliance or uncomfortable competence.
Speaker #1
And given the choice, most people will pick compliance. It's safer. But if a company always chooses preservation over intelligence, you don't evolve. Like Van Kallenberg says, you just become a museum.
Speaker #0
Museum of old processes.
Speaker #1
Exactly. Beautifully preserved and totally dead.
Speaker #0
It really just flips that whole lazy Gen Z narrative on its head. It says, no, the energy is there. The drive is there. You just haven't earned access to it.
Speaker #1
The reactor is running. The question is, is your company built to plug into it or is it built to just pour concrete over the whole thing?
Speaker #0
So as we wrap up, I want to leave our listeners with a little bit of homework. Whether you're a manager or you're a Lucas, look around your office tomorrow. Look at your team.
Speaker #1
And ask yourself. Am I interacting with a person or am I just talking to their firewall?
Speaker #0
And if you're the one who's hiding, keeping your genius for the weekend, just ask yourself what that prevention strategy is costing you. Because driving with the emergency brake on is a really, really exhausting way to live.
Speaker #1
It's a debt and it always comes due eventually.
Speaker #0
Huge thanks to the insights from Benoit van Kouwenberg for this one. It really makes you see the quiet person in the next cubicle differently.
Speaker #1
It certainly does.
Speaker #0
That's it for this deep dive. We'll catch you in the next one. stay curious

About The GenZ Shift

Is your organization ready for the Gen Z and Gen Alpha revolution sweeping across Europe's workplaces?

This series cuts through the noise to decode how young people are fundamentally reshaping work, culture, and leadership.

We explore:

👉 Their search for meaningful work and a unique feedback culture

👉 The shift from 'boss to coach' mentality

👉 Why 'quiet quitting' is a signal, not a threat

👉 Strategies to attract, engage, and retain young talent in Europe

Ready to confidently navigate an evolving workforce and lead a generation that refuses blind adherence?

Listen to The Gen Z Shift now! The bridges between your world and the world of Generation Z

#GenZ #GenAlpha #FutureOfWork #Leadership #HR #WorkplaceCulture #Europe

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

About The GenZ Shift

Is your organization ready for the Gen Z and Gen Alpha revolution sweeping across Europe's workplaces?

This series cuts through the noise to decode how young people are fundamentally reshaping work, culture, and leadership.

We explore:

👉 Their search for meaningful work and a unique feedback culture

👉 The shift from 'boss to coach' mentality

👉 Why 'quiet quitting' is a signal, not a threat

👉 Strategies to attract, engage, and retain young talent in Europe

Ready to confidently navigate an evolving workforce and lead a generation that refuses blind adherence?

Listen to The Gen Z Shift now! The bridges between your world and the world of Generation Z

#GenZ #GenAlpha #FutureOfWork #Leadership #HR #WorkplaceCulture #Europe

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

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Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

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Speaker #0
Welcome to the Deep Dive. I want to start today with something you've probably seen, especially if you manage or, you know, work with younger people.
Speaker #1
Today, we've got a whole stack of sources. We're talking Gallup, McKinsey, Edelman, all zeroing in on, well, one of the biggest puzzles for leaders right now, Gen Z.
Speaker #0
Okay, so I want to introduce you to a guy. Let's call him Lucas.
Speaker #1
Okay.
Speaker #0
He's 24. He works as a junior analyst and, you know, a huge... legacy company.
Speaker #1
Right. One of those places. Carpeted walls, the works.
Speaker #0
Exactly. And it's so quiet. You can literally hear the fluorescent lights buzzing. And if you walked past his desk, you'd barely even notice him.
Speaker #1
He's just part of the furniture.
Speaker #0
Totally. The guy in the beige sweater, he keeps his head down. He crushes his spreadsheets. He answers emails with will do thanks. He is, I mean, completely invisible.
Speaker #1
Which for a lot of old school managers sounds like the perfect employee. Low maintenance gets the job done.
Speaker #0
You would think. But here's the twist. And this is the thing that really gets me. On the weekends, Lucas is a completely different person. And I don't mean he has a cool hobby. I mean, he's basically a mogul. He produces rap videos. They get thousands of views.
Speaker #1
Wow.
Speaker #0
He manages a Discord community of 15,000 people. I mean, think about that. Moderation teams, engagement, conflict resolution. He's mastering editing tools that his own company's marketing department hasn't even heard of.
Speaker #1
So you have this. This massive reservoir of talent, leadership, technical skill, crisis management. Yeah. And it all just evaporates the second he walks into the office.
Speaker #0
It just vanishes. And so the million dollar question is, why? You know, is he shy? Is it imposter syndrome? Is he quiet quitting?
Speaker #1
It's none of that. It's not about laziness. And it's definitely not modesty.
Speaker #0
Then what is it? Because today we are diving into some really. A provocative research by a European strategist named Benoit van Kouwenberg. He's interviewed hundreds of people just like Lucas. And he found this one recurring idea that is honestly a little disturbing.
Speaker #1
And what's that?
Speaker #0
The quote that keeps coming up is this. At work, I show only the part of me that is safe.
Speaker #1
That word safe. That's doing a lot of work right there.
Speaker #0
It is. And that's our whole mission for this deep dive. We're not just talking about generational stuff. We are talking about something he calls identity architecture under constraint.
Speaker #1
It sounds super technical, but really it's an urgent business problem. The core issue Van Kallenberg points out is that modern management sees employees as these monolithic blocks.
Speaker #0
Right. You hire a person. You think you get the whole person.
Speaker #1
But that's a fatal misreading of what's happening. You're not managing a single block. You're managing a complex, layered identity architecture that is under, like, extreme tension.
Speaker #0
So if you don't get these layers. You're paying a full salary for, what, a shadow?
Speaker #1
It's worse than that.
Speaker #0
Yeah.
Speaker #1
You're paying 100% of the salary for maybe 15% of the capability. And the tragedy is the employee is exhausted from hiding and the manager is frustrated, and neither of them really knows why.
Speaker #0
Okay, let's break that down. Van Kallenberg uses the word dissociation. Now, that sounds pretty serious.
Speaker #1
Well, in this context, it's a strategic defense mechanism. I mean, think about it. If you're in an environment that feels arbitrary, or political or just indifferent to your skills, what do you do?
Speaker #0
You don't fight it. That's too risky.
Speaker #1
You don't fight it. You dissociate. You split your identity. You keep the really good stuff safe, you know, for yourself. And you send a representative to work.
Speaker #0
So Lucas isn't unmotivated. He's just protecting his assets.
Speaker #1
He's partitioning his hard drive. And to really get what he's protecting, we have to walk through the four layers he talks about. There's the digital self, the social self, the real self. And then finally... the work self.
Speaker #0
Okay, layer one, the digital self. I can already hear some managers listening and rolling their eyes thinking, oh great, his TikTok addiction.
Speaker #1
And that dismissal, that's the first huge mistake. Managers see the phone and they think distraction. For this generation, the digital self is their number one strategic asset. It's not a toy.
Speaker #0
Strategic how?
Speaker #1
He calls it reputation insurance, which is just brilliant. Lucas's Discord, his videos, that's an optimized. performative, even monetizable version of who he is. He's been trained by algorithms since he was a kid to know what creates value.
Speaker #0
So it's not vanity. It's a portfolio.
Speaker #1
It's leverage. I mean, look at the power dynamic. In the old days, you needed a reference from your boss to get a new job, right? Your boss held all the keys.
Speaker #0
Yeah, you had to play the game.
Speaker #1
But now. Lucas has public, verifiable proof of his competence. He has 15,000 people on Discord who can vouch for him. He has analytics on his videos. He doesn't need his manager's validation because the market validates him 24-7. That is,
Speaker #0
yeah, that's terrifying for a traditional manager. The threat of being fired just doesn't hit the same way.
Speaker #1
It doesn't hit at all. The digital self is a built-in exit strategy. So if the company he works for is seen as, I don't know, outdated or a bit... Cringe.
Speaker #0
It actually hurts the brand he's building for himself.
Speaker #1
Precisely. If my identity is being a cutting edge creator and my day job is at some company that still uses fax machines, my association with you actually hurts my brand equity.
Speaker #0
Wow. So you're not just an employer. You could be a liability.
Speaker #1
And when your digital self, your lifeboat, is more credible than your work self, you're already halfway out the door. The company is basically just financing the talent your polishing to take somewhere else.
Speaker #0
Okay. So that's the digital self, the exit strategy. Let's move to layer two, the social self. This is about your work friends.
Speaker #1
It's deeper. It's about the tribe versus the hierarchy. In the old world, you were proud of the company badge. You wanted the title. You respected the ladder.
Speaker #0
You wanted the corner office, the pat on the back from the boss.
Speaker #1
Yeah. But in the new world, loyalty is horizontal. It's not given to the manager. It's given to your peers. The social self wants validation from the community. not from some authority figure.
Speaker #0
So that employee of the month plaque is useless.
Speaker #1
It might even be a little embarrassing. They don't care if the CEO knows their name. They care if their tribe respects them. Their loyalty is to the people who get the inside jokes, who share the struggles.
Speaker #0
This explains so much about the retention crisis. I've heard leaders say, we pay top dollar. Why do people keep leaving?
Speaker #1
Because the tribe wasn't there. If the workplace is just functional, come in, do tasks, go home. The social self just starves. It becomes purely transactional. Time for money.
Speaker #0
And without that glue, that horizontal bond?
Speaker #1
They're gone. People rarely leave a tribe that protects them. But they will leave a high-paying job and a heartbeat if they feel alone. The social self is the guardian of connection. Without it, you just have a bunch of freelancers in the same room.
Speaker #0
That is a lonely thought.
Speaker #1
It is. And that loneliness leads us right to the next layer. Layer three, the real self.
Speaker #0
Okay, and this is where the research gets a little... Pointed. We have to talk about the whole snowflake stereotype. You know, the idea that Gen Z is fragile. They can't take criticism. They need trigger warnings for everything.
Speaker #1
Ben Kauenberg says that's a complete misdiagnosis. The real self isn't fragile. It's hyper lucid and hyper vigilant.
Speaker #0
Hyper vigilant. That sounds exhausting. Almost like a trauma response.
Speaker #1
In a way, it is. I mean, look at the world they grew up in. Fake news, climate crises, digital surveillance. They've developed this ultra sensitive. inconsistency radar.
Speaker #0
Okay.
Speaker #1
They are constantly scanning the gap between what a company says on its website and what a manager actually does in a meeting.
Speaker #0
So when a company puts, we are a family on the lobby wall, and then lays off 10% of the staff over a group Zoom call.
Speaker #1
The real self sees that hypocrisy instantly. And it doesn't react with sadness. It reacts with a cold, rational thought. This place is unsafe.
Speaker #0
But isn't that just cynicism?
Speaker #1
I think it's realism. The real self doesn't fear hard work. Lucas works like crazy on his weekends. What it fears is the void. Gratuitous humiliation. Polite cowardice. You know, when a manager is too afraid to give you real feedback so they just let you fail.
Speaker #0
Ah, the dreaded compliment sandwich with no filling. I hate that.
Speaker #1
They hate it more. They crave safety but not being coddled. They want the safety of knowing the rules are real and consistent.
Speaker #0
And if they don't get that safety, if the radar keeps pinging danger...
Speaker #1
Then you get a total lockdown. The real self basically says, OK, this environment is hostile. Shut down creativity. Shut down loyalty. We're going into survival mode.
Speaker #0
Which brings us to layer four. The only thing the manager actually gets to see. The work self.
Speaker #1
Or as he calls it, the firewall.
Speaker #0
I love that metaphor, but it's also incredibly depressing. The work self isn't really a person. It's just an interface.
Speaker #1
It's a compression zone. It's a construct that you send to the front lines to handle meetings, processes, KPIs. It's designed to answer emails professionally and say things like, let's circle back on that.
Speaker #0
It's like a video game NPC, a non-player character.
Speaker #1
Exactly. It's preventive dissociation. Lucas is physically present. He's answering your questions. But he has deliberately removed his intelligence from the room.
Speaker #0
So I'm the manager. I'm sitting there thinking, Lucas is a bit quiet, but he's solid. But really, I'm talking to a shell.
Speaker #1
You're talking to a defensive algorithm. He gives you his time that's in the contract. But he keeps his genius for himself.
Speaker #0
OK, let me play devil's advocate for a second. Does that matter? If the work gets done, why should a company care if they're only getting the firewall Lucas?
Speaker #1
They should care because of what Van Kallenberger calls the identity fragmentation debt.
Speaker #0
OK, identity fragmentation debt. That sounds expensive.
Speaker #1
It is colossally expensive. Think about your phone when you have 50 apps open in the background. The battery just drains. Everything slows down.
Speaker #0
Yeah, that's my life.
Speaker #1
Well, that's what Lucas is doing in his brain, maintaining all these masks, keeping the real self hidden, managing the digital self on the side. It consumes a massive amount of cognitive energy, and that's energy that is not being used to solve your business problems.
Speaker #0
So he's running at, what, maybe 60% capacity?
Speaker #1
Probably less. And the economic hit is brutal. This fragmentation turns your A talent into a C executor. You're paying an A-level salary, but the environment you've created only allows for C-level output.
Speaker #0
You're paying for a Ferrari and you're only allowed to drive it in a school zone.
Speaker #1
And you're paying twice.
Speaker #0
Ugh.
Speaker #1
Once for the management hours you waste monitoring someone who's hiding because you had to micromanage a firewall. And again, the raw loss of competence. The guy who knows how to build a community of 15,000 people, you'll never even know he has that skill.
Speaker #0
The source material brings in Sherry Turkle here, right?
Speaker #1
Yes, her work is key. She talks about how digital life naturally fragments our identity. But von Kallenberg's point is that in the workplace, this isn't just a side effect of tech. It's a direct result of management systems that can't handle complexity.
Speaker #0
We want people to be simple, to fit in a neat little box.
Speaker #1
And if your system punishes individuality, people will flatten themselves to survive. They become the firewall.
Speaker #0
Okay, so the diagnosis is pretty grim. We have Lucas hiding, his real self is unsafe, his digital self is plotting an escape, his social self is starved. If I'm a manager listening right now, I'm probably starting to sweat. So how do we fix it?
Speaker #1
The good news is it is fixable, but it means reframing the manager's job entirely. Your job is no longer just assigning tasks. Your new job is to stop the split. You have to build a place where it's safe to bring more than just a fragment of yourself to work.
Speaker #0
The source gives three really practical steps. Let's walk through them. Step one. Recognize the digital self.
Speaker #1
This just means stop treating their life outside work like some cute little hobby. If Lucas is a master of Discord, you bring that skill into the room.
Speaker #0
What does that actually look like?
Speaker #1
It's saying, hey Lucas, I saw that video you posted. The editing was incredible. You know, we were struggling with our internal comms videos. Could you take a look? I'd love to get your take on it.
Speaker #0
You're validating his outside talent inside the company walls.
Speaker #1
You're connecting his digital self to the company's actual mission. Suddenly he's not hiding his genius. He's applying it. You're basically making the company a platform for his personal brand, not a prison for it.
Speaker #0
That is a huge mental shift. Okay, step two, strengthen the social self.
Speaker #1
This is all about killing that teacher's pet culture. You know, the top-down praise, great job, Lucas, here's a gift card, feels hollow.
Speaker #0
So what's the alternative?
Speaker #1
Peer-to-peer recognition. You create rituals where the team validates each other. Maybe a weekly shout-out session where the manager actually just shuts up and lets the team praise each other. Remember, people stay for tribes. If you build that web of horizontal respect, the social self locks in.
Speaker #0
It makes it harder to leave because you'd be leaving your friends, not just your boss.
Speaker #1
Exactly. It's a much more resilient kind of loyalty.
Speaker #0
And then step three, and this feels like it's the foundation for everything, protect the real self.
Speaker #1
This is the hardest part. It means replacing all the political theater with clear, predictable rules.
Speaker #0
We hear transparency all the time. But what does that actually mean in this context?
Speaker #1
It means radical predictability. The real self is hypervigilant. It's scanning for threats. If the rules are crystal clear, even if they're tough, that radar can finally turn off. Transparency isn't about being nice. It's about creating safety through predictability.
Speaker #0
So things like, here's the exact rubric for promotion, or here's exactly why that project's budget was cut. No mystery.
Speaker #1
No guessing games. No passive aggression. When the environment is predictable, the real self can finally relax. And when it relaxes, it unlocks the doors to all the other selves. The creativity comes back. The loyalty comes back.
Speaker #0
A firewall comes down.
Speaker #1
And you finally get to meet the brilliant person you actually hired.
Speaker #0
There's a line at the end of the source material that really, it just stopped me in my tracks. It says, organizations rarely fail because they lack smart people. They fail because they make intelligence too risky to express.
Speaker #1
That one hit me too. We always assume companies fail because of a talent gap. But no, they had the talent. It was sitting right there in the beige sweater, hiding, just waiting for five o'clock to go home and be brilliant somewhere else.
Speaker #0
We're forcing people to choose between quiet compliance or uncomfortable competence.
Speaker #1
And given the choice, most people will pick compliance. It's safer. But if a company always chooses preservation over intelligence, you don't evolve. Like Van Kallenberg says, you just become a museum.
Speaker #0
Museum of old processes.
Speaker #1
Exactly. Beautifully preserved and totally dead.
Speaker #0
It really just flips that whole lazy Gen Z narrative on its head. It says, no, the energy is there. The drive is there. You just haven't earned access to it.
Speaker #1
The reactor is running. The question is, is your company built to plug into it or is it built to just pour concrete over the whole thing?
Speaker #0
So as we wrap up, I want to leave our listeners with a little bit of homework. Whether you're a manager or you're a Lucas, look around your office tomorrow. Look at your team.
Speaker #1
And ask yourself. Am I interacting with a person or am I just talking to their firewall?
Speaker #0
And if you're the one who's hiding, keeping your genius for the weekend, just ask yourself what that prevention strategy is costing you. Because driving with the emergency brake on is a really, really exhausting way to live.
Speaker #1
It's a debt and it always comes due eventually.
Speaker #0
Huge thanks to the insights from Benoit van Kouwenberg for this one. It really makes you see the quiet person in the next cubicle differently.
Speaker #1
It certainly does.
Speaker #0
That's it for this deep dive. We'll catch you in the next one. stay curious

About The GenZ Shift

Is your organization ready for the Gen Z and Gen Alpha revolution sweeping across Europe's workplaces?

This series cuts through the noise to decode how young people are fundamentally reshaping work, culture, and leadership.

We explore:

👉 Their search for meaningful work and a unique feedback culture

👉 The shift from 'boss to coach' mentality

👉 Why 'quiet quitting' is a signal, not a threat

👉 Strategies to attract, engage, and retain young talent in Europe

Ready to confidently navigate an evolving workforce and lead a generation that refuses blind adherence?

Listen to The Gen Z Shift now! The bridges between your world and the world of Generation Z

#GenZ #GenAlpha #FutureOfWork #Leadership #HR #WorkplaceCulture #Europe

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

About The GenZ Shift

Is your organization ready for the Gen Z and Gen Alpha revolution sweeping across Europe's workplaces?

This series cuts through the noise to decode how young people are fundamentally reshaping work, culture, and leadership.

We explore:

👉 Their search for meaningful work and a unique feedback culture

👉 The shift from 'boss to coach' mentality

👉 Why 'quiet quitting' is a signal, not a threat

👉 Strategies to attract, engage, and retain young talent in Europe

Ready to confidently navigate an evolving workforce and lead a generation that refuses blind adherence?

Listen to The Gen Z Shift now! The bridges between your world and the world of Generation Z

#GenZ #GenAlpha #FutureOfWork #Leadership #HR #WorkplaceCulture #Europe

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Description

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Transcription

Speaker #0
Welcome to the Deep Dive. I want to start today with something you've probably seen, especially if you manage or, you know, work with younger people.
Speaker #1
Today, we've got a whole stack of sources. We're talking Gallup, McKinsey, Edelman, all zeroing in on, well, one of the biggest puzzles for leaders right now, Gen Z.
Speaker #0
Okay, so I want to introduce you to a guy. Let's call him Lucas.
Speaker #1
Okay.
Speaker #0
He's 24. He works as a junior analyst and, you know, a huge... legacy company.
Speaker #1
Right. One of those places. Carpeted walls, the works.
Speaker #0
Exactly. And it's so quiet. You can literally hear the fluorescent lights buzzing. And if you walked past his desk, you'd barely even notice him.
Speaker #1
He's just part of the furniture.
Speaker #0
Totally. The guy in the beige sweater, he keeps his head down. He crushes his spreadsheets. He answers emails with will do thanks. He is, I mean, completely invisible.
Speaker #1
Which for a lot of old school managers sounds like the perfect employee. Low maintenance gets the job done.
Speaker #0
You would think. But here's the twist. And this is the thing that really gets me. On the weekends, Lucas is a completely different person. And I don't mean he has a cool hobby. I mean, he's basically a mogul. He produces rap videos. They get thousands of views.
Speaker #1
Wow.
Speaker #0
He manages a Discord community of 15,000 people. I mean, think about that. Moderation teams, engagement, conflict resolution. He's mastering editing tools that his own company's marketing department hasn't even heard of.
Speaker #1
So you have this. This massive reservoir of talent, leadership, technical skill, crisis management. Yeah. And it all just evaporates the second he walks into the office.
Speaker #0
It just vanishes. And so the million dollar question is, why? You know, is he shy? Is it imposter syndrome? Is he quiet quitting?
Speaker #1
It's none of that. It's not about laziness. And it's definitely not modesty.
Speaker #0
Then what is it? Because today we are diving into some really. A provocative research by a European strategist named Benoit van Kouwenberg. He's interviewed hundreds of people just like Lucas. And he found this one recurring idea that is honestly a little disturbing.
Speaker #1
And what's that?
Speaker #0
The quote that keeps coming up is this. At work, I show only the part of me that is safe.
Speaker #1
That word safe. That's doing a lot of work right there.
Speaker #0
It is. And that's our whole mission for this deep dive. We're not just talking about generational stuff. We are talking about something he calls identity architecture under constraint.
Speaker #1
It sounds super technical, but really it's an urgent business problem. The core issue Van Kallenberg points out is that modern management sees employees as these monolithic blocks.
Speaker #0
Right. You hire a person. You think you get the whole person.
Speaker #1
But that's a fatal misreading of what's happening. You're not managing a single block. You're managing a complex, layered identity architecture that is under, like, extreme tension.
Speaker #0
So if you don't get these layers. You're paying a full salary for, what, a shadow?
Speaker #1
It's worse than that.
Speaker #0
Yeah.
Speaker #1
You're paying 100% of the salary for maybe 15% of the capability. And the tragedy is the employee is exhausted from hiding and the manager is frustrated, and neither of them really knows why.
Speaker #0
Okay, let's break that down. Van Kallenberg uses the word dissociation. Now, that sounds pretty serious.
Speaker #1
Well, in this context, it's a strategic defense mechanism. I mean, think about it. If you're in an environment that feels arbitrary, or political or just indifferent to your skills, what do you do?
Speaker #0
You don't fight it. That's too risky.
Speaker #1
You don't fight it. You dissociate. You split your identity. You keep the really good stuff safe, you know, for yourself. And you send a representative to work.
Speaker #0
So Lucas isn't unmotivated. He's just protecting his assets.
Speaker #1
He's partitioning his hard drive. And to really get what he's protecting, we have to walk through the four layers he talks about. There's the digital self, the social self, the real self. And then finally... the work self.
Speaker #0
Okay, layer one, the digital self. I can already hear some managers listening and rolling their eyes thinking, oh great, his TikTok addiction.
Speaker #1
And that dismissal, that's the first huge mistake. Managers see the phone and they think distraction. For this generation, the digital self is their number one strategic asset. It's not a toy.
Speaker #0
Strategic how?
Speaker #1
He calls it reputation insurance, which is just brilliant. Lucas's Discord, his videos, that's an optimized. performative, even monetizable version of who he is. He's been trained by algorithms since he was a kid to know what creates value.
Speaker #0
So it's not vanity. It's a portfolio.
Speaker #1
It's leverage. I mean, look at the power dynamic. In the old days, you needed a reference from your boss to get a new job, right? Your boss held all the keys.
Speaker #0
Yeah, you had to play the game.
Speaker #1
But now. Lucas has public, verifiable proof of his competence. He has 15,000 people on Discord who can vouch for him. He has analytics on his videos. He doesn't need his manager's validation because the market validates him 24-7. That is,
Speaker #0
yeah, that's terrifying for a traditional manager. The threat of being fired just doesn't hit the same way.
Speaker #1
It doesn't hit at all. The digital self is a built-in exit strategy. So if the company he works for is seen as, I don't know, outdated or a bit... Cringe.
Speaker #0
It actually hurts the brand he's building for himself.
Speaker #1
Precisely. If my identity is being a cutting edge creator and my day job is at some company that still uses fax machines, my association with you actually hurts my brand equity.
Speaker #0
Wow. So you're not just an employer. You could be a liability.
Speaker #1
And when your digital self, your lifeboat, is more credible than your work self, you're already halfway out the door. The company is basically just financing the talent your polishing to take somewhere else.
Speaker #0
Okay. So that's the digital self, the exit strategy. Let's move to layer two, the social self. This is about your work friends.
Speaker #1
It's deeper. It's about the tribe versus the hierarchy. In the old world, you were proud of the company badge. You wanted the title. You respected the ladder.
Speaker #0
You wanted the corner office, the pat on the back from the boss.
Speaker #1
Yeah. But in the new world, loyalty is horizontal. It's not given to the manager. It's given to your peers. The social self wants validation from the community. not from some authority figure.
Speaker #0
So that employee of the month plaque is useless.
Speaker #1
It might even be a little embarrassing. They don't care if the CEO knows their name. They care if their tribe respects them. Their loyalty is to the people who get the inside jokes, who share the struggles.
Speaker #0
This explains so much about the retention crisis. I've heard leaders say, we pay top dollar. Why do people keep leaving?
Speaker #1
Because the tribe wasn't there. If the workplace is just functional, come in, do tasks, go home. The social self just starves. It becomes purely transactional. Time for money.
Speaker #0
And without that glue, that horizontal bond?
Speaker #1
They're gone. People rarely leave a tribe that protects them. But they will leave a high-paying job and a heartbeat if they feel alone. The social self is the guardian of connection. Without it, you just have a bunch of freelancers in the same room.
Speaker #0
That is a lonely thought.
Speaker #1
It is. And that loneliness leads us right to the next layer. Layer three, the real self.
Speaker #0
Okay, and this is where the research gets a little... Pointed. We have to talk about the whole snowflake stereotype. You know, the idea that Gen Z is fragile. They can't take criticism. They need trigger warnings for everything.
Speaker #1
Ben Kauenberg says that's a complete misdiagnosis. The real self isn't fragile. It's hyper lucid and hyper vigilant.
Speaker #0
Hyper vigilant. That sounds exhausting. Almost like a trauma response.
Speaker #1
In a way, it is. I mean, look at the world they grew up in. Fake news, climate crises, digital surveillance. They've developed this ultra sensitive. inconsistency radar.
Speaker #0
Okay.
Speaker #1
They are constantly scanning the gap between what a company says on its website and what a manager actually does in a meeting.
Speaker #0
So when a company puts, we are a family on the lobby wall, and then lays off 10% of the staff over a group Zoom call.
Speaker #1
The real self sees that hypocrisy instantly. And it doesn't react with sadness. It reacts with a cold, rational thought. This place is unsafe.
Speaker #0
But isn't that just cynicism?
Speaker #1
I think it's realism. The real self doesn't fear hard work. Lucas works like crazy on his weekends. What it fears is the void. Gratuitous humiliation. Polite cowardice. You know, when a manager is too afraid to give you real feedback so they just let you fail.
Speaker #0
Ah, the dreaded compliment sandwich with no filling. I hate that.
Speaker #1
They hate it more. They crave safety but not being coddled. They want the safety of knowing the rules are real and consistent.
Speaker #0
And if they don't get that safety, if the radar keeps pinging danger...
Speaker #1
Then you get a total lockdown. The real self basically says, OK, this environment is hostile. Shut down creativity. Shut down loyalty. We're going into survival mode.
Speaker #0
Which brings us to layer four. The only thing the manager actually gets to see. The work self.
Speaker #1
Or as he calls it, the firewall.
Speaker #0
I love that metaphor, but it's also incredibly depressing. The work self isn't really a person. It's just an interface.
Speaker #1
It's a compression zone. It's a construct that you send to the front lines to handle meetings, processes, KPIs. It's designed to answer emails professionally and say things like, let's circle back on that.
Speaker #0
It's like a video game NPC, a non-player character.
Speaker #1
Exactly. It's preventive dissociation. Lucas is physically present. He's answering your questions. But he has deliberately removed his intelligence from the room.
Speaker #0
So I'm the manager. I'm sitting there thinking, Lucas is a bit quiet, but he's solid. But really, I'm talking to a shell.
Speaker #1
You're talking to a defensive algorithm. He gives you his time that's in the contract. But he keeps his genius for himself.
Speaker #0
OK, let me play devil's advocate for a second. Does that matter? If the work gets done, why should a company care if they're only getting the firewall Lucas?
Speaker #1
They should care because of what Van Kallenberger calls the identity fragmentation debt.
Speaker #0
OK, identity fragmentation debt. That sounds expensive.
Speaker #1
It is colossally expensive. Think about your phone when you have 50 apps open in the background. The battery just drains. Everything slows down.
Speaker #0
Yeah, that's my life.
Speaker #1
Well, that's what Lucas is doing in his brain, maintaining all these masks, keeping the real self hidden, managing the digital self on the side. It consumes a massive amount of cognitive energy, and that's energy that is not being used to solve your business problems.
Speaker #0
So he's running at, what, maybe 60% capacity?
Speaker #1
Probably less. And the economic hit is brutal. This fragmentation turns your A talent into a C executor. You're paying an A-level salary, but the environment you've created only allows for C-level output.
Speaker #0
You're paying for a Ferrari and you're only allowed to drive it in a school zone.
Speaker #1
And you're paying twice.
Speaker #0
Ugh.
Speaker #1
Once for the management hours you waste monitoring someone who's hiding because you had to micromanage a firewall. And again, the raw loss of competence. The guy who knows how to build a community of 15,000 people, you'll never even know he has that skill.
Speaker #0
The source material brings in Sherry Turkle here, right?
Speaker #1
Yes, her work is key. She talks about how digital life naturally fragments our identity. But von Kallenberg's point is that in the workplace, this isn't just a side effect of tech. It's a direct result of management systems that can't handle complexity.
Speaker #0
We want people to be simple, to fit in a neat little box.
Speaker #1
And if your system punishes individuality, people will flatten themselves to survive. They become the firewall.
Speaker #0
Okay, so the diagnosis is pretty grim. We have Lucas hiding, his real self is unsafe, his digital self is plotting an escape, his social self is starved. If I'm a manager listening right now, I'm probably starting to sweat. So how do we fix it?
Speaker #1
The good news is it is fixable, but it means reframing the manager's job entirely. Your job is no longer just assigning tasks. Your new job is to stop the split. You have to build a place where it's safe to bring more than just a fragment of yourself to work.
Speaker #0
The source gives three really practical steps. Let's walk through them. Step one. Recognize the digital self.
Speaker #1
This just means stop treating their life outside work like some cute little hobby. If Lucas is a master of Discord, you bring that skill into the room.
Speaker #0
What does that actually look like?
Speaker #1
It's saying, hey Lucas, I saw that video you posted. The editing was incredible. You know, we were struggling with our internal comms videos. Could you take a look? I'd love to get your take on it.
Speaker #0
You're validating his outside talent inside the company walls.
Speaker #1
You're connecting his digital self to the company's actual mission. Suddenly he's not hiding his genius. He's applying it. You're basically making the company a platform for his personal brand, not a prison for it.
Speaker #0
That is a huge mental shift. Okay, step two, strengthen the social self.
Speaker #1
This is all about killing that teacher's pet culture. You know, the top-down praise, great job, Lucas, here's a gift card, feels hollow.
Speaker #0
So what's the alternative?
Speaker #1
Peer-to-peer recognition. You create rituals where the team validates each other. Maybe a weekly shout-out session where the manager actually just shuts up and lets the team praise each other. Remember, people stay for tribes. If you build that web of horizontal respect, the social self locks in.
Speaker #0
It makes it harder to leave because you'd be leaving your friends, not just your boss.
Speaker #1
Exactly. It's a much more resilient kind of loyalty.
Speaker #0
And then step three, and this feels like it's the foundation for everything, protect the real self.
Speaker #1
This is the hardest part. It means replacing all the political theater with clear, predictable rules.
Speaker #0
We hear transparency all the time. But what does that actually mean in this context?
Speaker #1
It means radical predictability. The real self is hypervigilant. It's scanning for threats. If the rules are crystal clear, even if they're tough, that radar can finally turn off. Transparency isn't about being nice. It's about creating safety through predictability.
Speaker #0
So things like, here's the exact rubric for promotion, or here's exactly why that project's budget was cut. No mystery.
Speaker #1
No guessing games. No passive aggression. When the environment is predictable, the real self can finally relax. And when it relaxes, it unlocks the doors to all the other selves. The creativity comes back. The loyalty comes back.
Speaker #0
A firewall comes down.
Speaker #1
And you finally get to meet the brilliant person you actually hired.
Speaker #0
There's a line at the end of the source material that really, it just stopped me in my tracks. It says, organizations rarely fail because they lack smart people. They fail because they make intelligence too risky to express.
Speaker #1
That one hit me too. We always assume companies fail because of a talent gap. But no, they had the talent. It was sitting right there in the beige sweater, hiding, just waiting for five o'clock to go home and be brilliant somewhere else.
Speaker #0
We're forcing people to choose between quiet compliance or uncomfortable competence.
Speaker #1
And given the choice, most people will pick compliance. It's safer. But if a company always chooses preservation over intelligence, you don't evolve. Like Van Kallenberg says, you just become a museum.
Speaker #0
Museum of old processes.
Speaker #1
Exactly. Beautifully preserved and totally dead.
Speaker #0
It really just flips that whole lazy Gen Z narrative on its head. It says, no, the energy is there. The drive is there. You just haven't earned access to it.
Speaker #1
The reactor is running. The question is, is your company built to plug into it or is it built to just pour concrete over the whole thing?
Speaker #0
So as we wrap up, I want to leave our listeners with a little bit of homework. Whether you're a manager or you're a Lucas, look around your office tomorrow. Look at your team.
Speaker #1
And ask yourself. Am I interacting with a person or am I just talking to their firewall?
Speaker #0
And if you're the one who's hiding, keeping your genius for the weekend, just ask yourself what that prevention strategy is costing you. Because driving with the emergency brake on is a really, really exhausting way to live.
Speaker #1
It's a debt and it always comes due eventually.
Speaker #0
Huge thanks to the insights from Benoit van Kouwenberg for this one. It really makes you see the quiet person in the next cubicle differently.
Speaker #1
It certainly does.
Speaker #0
That's it for this deep dive. We'll catch you in the next one. stay curious

About The GenZ Shift

Is your organization ready for the Gen Z and Gen Alpha revolution sweeping across Europe's workplaces?

This series cuts through the noise to decode how young people are fundamentally reshaping work, culture, and leadership.

We explore:

👉 Their search for meaningful work and a unique feedback culture

👉 The shift from 'boss to coach' mentality

👉 Why 'quiet quitting' is a signal, not a threat

👉 Strategies to attract, engage, and retain young talent in Europe

Ready to confidently navigate an evolving workforce and lead a generation that refuses blind adherence?

Listen to The Gen Z Shift now! The bridges between your world and the world of Generation Z

#GenZ #GenAlpha #FutureOfWork #Leadership #HR #WorkplaceCulture #Europe

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

About The GenZ Shift

Is your organization ready for the Gen Z and Gen Alpha revolution sweeping across Europe's workplaces?

This series cuts through the noise to decode how young people are fundamentally reshaping work, culture, and leadership.

We explore:

👉 Their search for meaningful work and a unique feedback culture

👉 The shift from 'boss to coach' mentality

👉 Why 'quiet quitting' is a signal, not a threat

👉 Strategies to attract, engage, and retain young talent in Europe

Ready to confidently navigate an evolving workforce and lead a generation that refuses blind adherence?

Listen to The Gen Z Shift now! The bridges between your world and the world of Generation Z

#GenZ #GenAlpha #FutureOfWork #Leadership #HR #WorkplaceCulture #Europe

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

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