So what did 15 years of research actually tell you about people and how they find their purpose?

Yeah.

What the research shows is that nobody knows what their values are.

I mean, the thing is that there's no real definition, no agreed upon definition of values, and people mix values up with virtues and identity and personality.

So as a scholar of values, I was pretty sure that nobody knew what values were.

The word itself has been hijacked by politics.

And it's, you know, you can go through high school, you can learn like the kings of Mesopotamia but you'll not learn what really values are versus virtues or whatever.

you have to

Okay.

So the top values for Gen Z, the number one top value for Gen Z, we use a Greek word because we don't like people's heads to explode when we say it, but it's... we call it eudaimonia.

That's the Greek word for flourishing.

It's work-life balance, okay? It's, it is happiness, okay? It...

The number one value is they wanna feel good.

They want wellbeing, they want balance, they want harmony.

They want to have everything all at once.

What is a 10/10/10 framework?

Okay.

So the top values for Gen Z, the number one top value for Gen Z, we use a Greek word because we don't like people's heads to explode when we say it, but it's, we call it eudaimonia.

That's the Greek word for flourishing.

It's work/life balance, okay? It's, it is happiness, okay? It, the number one value is they wanna feel good.

They want wellbeing, they want balance, they want harmony.

They want to have everything all at once.

Okay, that's the number one value for Gen Z, okay? The number two value is voice.

What is a 10/10/10 framework?

[clears throat]

...

I, I love Gen Z. I think that they were changed.

Or I don't, I mean, maybe they were changed even before Gen Z, but what Gen, what the pandemic reinforced for them is that they did not wanna postpone joy.

They did not want to earn their happiness, which is actually, um, a very ancient concept if you go all the way back to the stoics, the idea is that you work very hard and then you earn your, um, gold watch and your relaxation and your retirement, basically.

That you play, you work very hard then you get to play hard.

And I think what happened, and what the research would show, is that they came out of the pandemic and they said, "We don't really like that arrangement.

... get wrong? Well, what do we get wrong about the skills that you need and how to build a career today for this cohort of Gen Z-ers who don't wanna delay joy, who, you know, wanna live life?

... get wrong? Well, what do we get wrong about the skills that you need and how to build a career today for this cohort of Gen Z-ers who don't wanna delay joy, who, you know, wanna live life?

I think that, uh, people from older generations have the, uh, former kind of array of values, which is they, um, they value achievement more, and they have also this, uh, equation in their heads that you have to work to get your, um, your period of pleasure.

You know, I wanna say, maybe they're right, okay? I mean, I, I, I don't subscribe to it.

I'm, I work all the time and I love working, and I've always said.

But, um, I would say that what...

If you are managing Gen Z and you cannot put your finger on why they are driving you crazy-

Mm.

You know, like, I, you know, I would be up there, like with Beyonce if I was just following my passions.

universities and professors don't appear to be equipping these young people with the right skill set.

Their values are formed by the time they get to school.

I mean, I don't think the professors all feel the same way about this.

I don't think this is happening in school.

Schools have learned to cater to it because they're getting in students who have a certain set of values.

But those students didn't arrive with totally different values and then have them change.

I think it's happening a little earlier now.

Hold it

Is Gen Z

unemployable? I want you to know, for the record, I did not come up with that headline.

And as soon as I thought, I'm dead.

Look, that piece was about my data.

The top three values of Gen Z, the number one is self-care.

We call it eudaimonia because the word self-care is very politicized.

And that's the Greek word for flourishing.

Okay.

Yeah, that's a problem at the keynos.

I mean, I think that it's, it, it, that, [laughs] that it's, um, people have a lot of trouble wrapping their hearts and souls around this concept of organizing their life around work because they've learned the hard way that work does not love you back, okay? You can work and work and work, and then you can get fired, or your job can evaporate.

And so people are like, "Yeah, here's the conundrum.

I want achievement." Gen Z wants achievement more than ever com- uh, uh, in recent years, show, the data shows, but they want to work probably less than ever.

Mm.

And so I say something that they don't wanna hear, okay? They wanna be told, "Go learn this skill, that skill, ma- major in this, and go get that job." That's what they wanna hear.

And I say, "I'm sorry, I'm gonna say something much harder.

Um, sit down." And what I say is, "The world is changing so much, we don't know what's gonna happen in six months.

Mm-hmm.

And it was during the pandemic, and so everybody would stop working, but I just was paralyzed.

And thanks be to God, my job at that time was to be on the Today Show.

And in that period, Hoda Kotb asked me to come back onto the show.

And as soon as I walked back into the studio, I didn't know if I could do it.

I was like, can I work again? And then when I went back into the studio, I was like, oh my God, work is the answer.

What was I thinking to walk away from the joy that I derive from my work? And my work in those days was to be the careers reporter.

I do think this might create an intense, you know, purpose.

ask questions.

All right.

But I'm here to answer all my guests.

All right.

So listen, Becoming You is a class that I started teaching five years ago to help people answer the question, what the heck should I do with my life? Okay, this is coming out of the pandemic.

Like my timing was kind of immaculate because the whole world was simultaneously asking, what the heck should I do with my life? And I thought I had a method.

I knew I had a methodology to help people answer that.

How much of the top

So you could use that and tell us how that encounter unfolded.

If I'm recalling the student you're thinking of, I-- he was, uh, very, very on the fence about going into consulting, but he had that offer in his hand, and it felt like, okay, that's a win when you're in business school.

Um, but then his test results kept on coming out in ways that were very antithetical to the consulting life.

So for instance, one of his very high cognitive, um, um, uh, one of the cognitive aptitudes is how spatially oriented we are.

They just see everything in three dimensions.

They draw a lot.

They can manipulate objects in space, um, and these are people who are often very, very good with products, or they become architects, or they become designers.

What are those signs to watch for?

I just saw the term job hugging.

I'd never heard that term before.

Job hugging is a new phenomenon.

It used to be that young people in particular went from job to job to job to job because the world was their oyster.

Job hopping.

Job hopping.

But now what we're finding because of the uncertainty is that young people are getting into a job and they're hunkering down and they're hugging their jobs.

speaking their truth either.

To like, you know, explore something about yourself outside

of work.

People who have very high achievement, very high affluence go into investment banking and they have voice very low and they don't care.

If you have very high voice, you know, Goldman Sachs is going to be a different kind of fit for you.

True.

Yeah.

And so there's many, many good reasons to know your values.

And it was like more aligned with I think what's right for

Can you tell us about the 10/10/10 technique?

Yeah, I'd love to talk about it.

Look, 10/10/10 is a decision-making technique that I came to because I was at rock bottom.

I was trying to do it all, all at the same time.

I had four little children.

This is like 1995.

I had four little children.

How do we begin to use that information to point us into the direction of the most satisfying, fulfilling career for us?

What's the main premise and really who is it for? Yeah.

Well, we have found it's for everyone, which has been much to my joy and surprise.

Look, I started becoming you this methodology as a class for MBAs.

And the methodology, which is 13 parts, basically says, okay, everybody tells you to go live your purpose.

How the heck do you do it? How do you figure out what your purpose is? Forget how you do it.

Well, how do you even figure out your purpose? Well, some people are born knowing, okay, I've got to sing opera.

I've got to be a surgeon.

Can you elaborate a little bit on why this is such a big theme and also just for women sort of lifting each other up in motherhood and all of the things.

NYU Stern School of Business professor and author of Becoming You and host of Becoming You podcast, Suzy Welch.

It suddenly appeared that you could drop out of Stanford after one year, and it would be very, very good for you if you wanted to be a billionaire.

And so this sort of conversation started then, um, and there became this romance about it, okay? You don't have to go to college.

And it was kind of relevant to, like, .001% of the population.

That is what's shifted, is now people are saying, "Wait.

It's not just for these kids who want to be billionaire entrepreneurs.

What is college good for? What are you learning there that you're actually going to be able to apply?" And so of course, this is what professors, uh, and, and, and academic institutions are grappling with, which is how do we make our education relevant in a world where it, it appears that skills may not be relevant? And by that, I mean there's fascinating research.

So there's-

NYU Stern School of Business professor and author of Becoming You and host of Becoming You podcast, Suzy Welch.

It suddenly appeared that you could drop out of Stanford after one year, and it would be very, very good for you if you wanted to be a billionaire, and so this sort of conversation started then, um, and there became this romance about it, okay? You don't have to go to college.

And it was kind of relevant to, like, .0001% of the population.

That is what's shifted, is now people are saying, wait, it's not just for these kids who want to be billionaire entrepreneurs.

What is college good for? What are you learning there that you're actually going to be able to apply? And so of course, this is what professors, uh, and, and, and academic institutions are grappling with, which is how do we make our education relevant in a world where it, it appears that skills may not be relevant? And by that I mean there's fascinating research.

Uh, there's a term in economic terms, uh, which I'm sure you're familiar with, which is skill churn, which is how many of your skills you turn over every year.

Um, and in the old days, you would sort of throw out two of your 10 skills and learn two more skills, and that was kind of the numbers were bumping between two and three.

So there's-

What does that stat actually tell us, and what's missing from it?

I think that stat tells us the truth, what's going on, and I have an interesting perspective on it, perhaps, um, which is that I have interesting research that might shed some light on it.

So I, um, I teach two classes at NYU.

One is management, the, the classic management class that you would have at any business school, and then I also teach a class called Becoming You, which is a class that helps students figure out what they should do with their life, which my timing on teaching that class [chuckles] was quite prescient coming out of the pandemic.

For this class, the premise is that your purpose in life lies at the intersection of your values, your aptitudes, and your interests.

So with that as a setup, I'll say that I end up creating a tool called the Values Bridge, which discerns and rank orders individuals' values from one to 16.

It's a fully scientifically validated test, and in the past year, about two hundred thousand people have taken it.

So when we look at employers, what they're saying Gen Z workers aren't doing, aren't meeting expectations, what are they specificallyPointing to what's the gap that Gen Z needs to, or maybe this is on employers as well, but what's the gap, the common gap that you're hearing about?

Was there anything about covering crime that taught you about human nature that has carried over into the work throughout your career?

It was my education.

So, you know, I had a very fine undergraduate education.

I mean, it, it was very, very good.

I had all the greatest professors.

I studied literature.

I studied art.

So much of what you talk today, whether that's Becoming You or your multiple frameworks, Values Bridge, when did the, the inception of those ideas start? Was it during that time period?

Mm-hmm.

It's all the time.

I mean, I f- I have students that are fantastic, like, big extroverts, and they've got, you know, all sorts of like, you know, they have high values of scope, and then they, like, go to accounting.

You know? And they're like, "What?" They're miserable at 29.

What a s- what a shocker.

It has nothing to do with your values or your aptitudes, and the work is kind of boring too.

But somebody told them this was a job that was gonna give them a lot of security, probably their parents, and they took it.

I was gonna say, is it, like, mostly career-based that people find is, like... 'Cause that's so much of your life.

So how do you get to know yourself better to become stronger then?

Yeah, well, I think that the hard truth is, the answer is not in you.

I mean, I think we all love it.

Like I remember one time going to take a yoga class and like some 18 year old yoga teacher looking out at these 45 year old women saying the answer is all in you and all of us groaning because you come to understand as you get older that the answers, some of the answers are not in us because the the dirty little secret of personality is that we are not the words we use to describe ourselves.

We are not, our personality is not necessarily the words we use to describe ourselves.

I'm kind, I'm compassionate.

I'm a good listener.

I was going to say, how do you become more open to it and then start to translate that into actual changes to build that self-awareness?

Stay right here for a little more from Susie herself.

Are you the author of your life or the editor? It is the human condition for so many of us to end up in a life that we are not the authors of, that our parents or our teachers or our bosses or our culture have written the story for us, and we are fitting ourselves into it.

It does not have to be that way.

Everyone said, "You're gonna be an entrepreneur." I was like, "I don't have to be an entrepreneur."

I'm Susie Welch, host of the podcast Becoming You, where each week we come up with ways, actionable ways, where you are writing the narrative of your life.

Can you tell us about the 10-10-10 technique? Yeah.

I'd love to talk about it.

Look, 10-10-10 is a decision-making technique that I came to because I was at rock bottom.

I was trying to do it all, all at the same time.

I had four little children.

This is like 1995.

I had four little children.

If we identify a job that we want that we aren't necessarily qualified for, what should be our next step?

So why are you combining grit with forgiveness in order to optimize?

Okay, the book, I'm just gonna step back for a second and just say this.

The book is about a methodology that I teach that helps you determine your purpose, which I, there's a point to where I'm going with this, which I posit lies at the intersection of your values, your deeply held beliefs, which no one knows, your aptitudes, which no one actually knows either, and your economically viable interests, which most people have a fraction of understanding.

And so the book is about excavating those three data sets, if you will.

As part of knowing who you are, I have a tool called the Career Traits Compass, which helps you determine where you fall in the continuum from individual contributor to leader.

And one of the traits that I think you should have if you want to go into a leadership position which not everybody wants to do.

Some people are perfectly happy being individual contributors and power to them.

What stands in our way from getting to it?

She joined me on the Fox Business Rundown back on November 17th.

There's a contraction in jobs, and then there's also, like, a really big lack of visibility about what even is a job.

Uh, what will be a job in a few years.

It used to be...

I mean, I teach MBAs, and there, it used to be kind of a conveyor belt.

You, uh, got your degree, and you learned certain things.

You learn finance.

But, um-