CURATED READS FOR GEN Z—AND THEIR Z-CURIOUS COLLEAGUES

first up

Welcome back—this week, we’re talking about Gen Z’s complicated relationship with privacy.

When Gen Z’s parents were kids, the most personal information someone could easily find out about them was a home telephone number. Now, your fingerprints, face, or voice are likely used for a log-in process that takes less than two seconds to verify your identity. In fact, these days, what you can’t find out about a person is almost more telling—you might be seen as an outlier for having no online presence.
  
McKinsey took a look at what the future will hold in 2030, when the youngest Gen Zers will be finishing up their primary education. Our lives will be plugged in in ways that still seem like science fiction: food and drink will come with personalized recipes, entertainment will be picked for you, and your fridge will have chats with your bed about whether you’re staying healthy.

It’s a marvel, but it doesn’t come without a cost: an empire of your personal data (and Gen Z, in particular, highly values data transparency).

Some of these futuristic strides are already happening, of course. Airlines can now scan your face instead of your boarding pass, and almost 40 percent of Gen Zers would knowingly swap personal info to use an online service for free, McKinsey’s Jim Boehm, Liz Grennan, Alex Singla, and Kate Smaje found. This kind of technology will be central to our adult lives.

Tech leaders know this, but Gen Z knows it too—and living in a world where the default is no privacy can have an impact.  

Anonymity is at an all-time low in the workplace, too, and Gen Zers and others are pushing back. In response to work cultures where you’re expected to respond to emails at 9:00 p.m., many workers are digging in their heels for hybrid work arrangements. Even as people yearn for connection, they want to be able to manage themselves a few days a week.

(Some Gen Zers are taking that to an extreme—a UK study found that 79 percent of Gen Z employees had spent a work-from-home Friday working abroad—and didn’t share with their bosses that they weren’t at home. But at least they were actually working.) 

McKinsey partner Bryan Hancock notes that, if you are in the office, young people in particular are on the hunt for privacy and the ability to work alone (something they might not find in crowded flatshares). 

Sure, not every Gen Zer wants to be anonymous. The drive to become an influencer is as strong as ever. But many people are calculating, on some level, just how much of themselves they want out in the world—and ultimately realizing that the answer is probably going to be “a bit more than you’d like.” 

Still—there are times I feel like I’d agree to be personally watched by the Eye of Sauron (it’s a Tolkien thing) to avoid resetting that forgotten password one more time.

VISUALIZE IT

Consumers aren’t too wary of AI-based services—most trust them as much as, if not more than, real people.

WAIT, DON’T SCROLL

Tell me more . . . This commentary from three McKinsey partners examines how ChatGPT could change your business, permanently.  
 
Connecting everyone. There are five steps that could help bring digital equity to every Black household in the United States—here’s how to do it.  

Up, up, and away. As the world shrinks, why not make it bigger? The space economy is no longer just for governments and defense companies; it’s time to get involved.

NOT US; STILL GREAT

Kind of us. At Davos, McKinsey’s Tracy Francis and Katy George shared that Gen Zers are more open to collaboration than other generations but still hold strong values. [Business Insider]

Grandma went viral. Meet the octogenarians experiencing successful—and lucrative—turns as TikTok stars, with the help of their grandkids. [WSJ]

Speak up? For Gen Zers, it’s not as simple as keeping your head down and paying your dues—many feel a moral obligation to speak up at work, even if they might struggle to know how. [BBC]

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— Edited by Sarah Skinner, editor, New York