A new poll has found that the up-and-coming workforce may already be at their limit, with bad bosses potentially pushing Gen Z and millennial workers too far.
The latest Workforce Confidence survey from LinkedIn is examining the waters in the workplace, seeking to find what employees are going through.
The poll found that of all workers, not just the nation’s youngest, 69% said they would leave their job if they had a bad manager.
When breaking it down based on generations, 61% of baby boomers and 68% of Gen Xers shared with surveyors that they would leave a job because their boss was bad, but that number shot up amongst younger workers.
For millennials, 77% said that a bad boss would cause them to seek a career change, along with 75% of Gen Zers, the survey found.
Bad bosses are nothing new in the workforce, as studies have often examined how a poor manager could affect the workplace. Almost a decade ago, a Gallup poll found that 50% of adults who had recently left a job did so “to get away from their manager.”
Another study from researchers at the Stevens Institute of Technology and the University of Illinois, Chicago, has found that the most ambitious and youngest employees looking to advance in their careers are often “strongly affected” by managers who are considered toxic.
The study added that this often results in the employees cutting back on their “taking-charge behavior” at work.
As for the LinkedIn survey, it also found that workers leaving because of bad managers aren’t necessarily doing so because they think they could do the job better.
Only a third of workers say they aspire to become the boss themselves, with the survey reporting that millennials are the most likely to say they are working to become a manager.
“Some workers may just not see the value in pursuing a career in management,” the survey shared.
Another LinkedIn survey cited in the study shared that the workload isn’t any easier for those making all the decisions, as almost half of US managers have reported feeling burned out.
Some potential reasons for burnout include stress over the threat of possible layoffs or increasing productivity demands from higher-ups.
The survey was conducted from June to July and included responses from more than 6,400 US-based employees.