My friend Peter McIntyre, now comfortably retired in Ireland, periodically sends me articles to which I am very grateful. He gave me a fascinating one recently.
From the GenZ feature www.thetimes.co.uk dated Sept. 5, 2023, by Hannah Rogers, the article is “Gen Alpha’s singing toilet makes even Gen Z feel old.” I want to share this with you and add some commentary at the end.
Ha! That’s a strong start for a Monday. I’m sorry, but I am pleased about this. Finally, their time has come.
Whose? Gen Z’s. You’ve really got it in for them, haven’t you?
Absolutely, I’m a millennial. They – the Gen Zers - have been making me feel dreadfully out of date for some time now. I’m ready to see the same thing happen to them.
Surely it can’t be. They’re practically fetuses. Very digitally versed fetuses.
Not compared with Generation Alpha – those born after 2010. They have started to make memes. Weird ones.
Heavens. Can they even talk yet?
Not as fast as they can TikTok. Gen Alpha are tweens now – internet debutantes. They are entering the social media sphere and bringing with them their own brand of communication and expression, and it’s making Gen Z feel... old.
How do we know?
The Zers. They keep finding memes they don’t understand and complaining on TikTok. There is reportedly one viral video series in particular that they can’t get their heads around. It is about – wait for it – a singing toilet.
Sorry, a singing toilet?
That’s right. “Skibidi Toilet” is an animated YouTube series about singing and dancing toilet creatures that dream of world domination.*
I see. Perhaps Gen Alpha took the pandemic harder than we all feared.
Looks that way. Skibidi Toilet’s creator has over 23 million subscribers on YouTube and 1.9 million followers on TikTok.
Suffice to say, I don’t get it.
Don’t worry. Pleasingly, neither do Gen Z.
End of article. It’s an interesting site, and you may want to subscribe.
We have yet to understand Generation Z fully, and here comes Generation Alpha doing stuff that perplexs all generations more so mine. And so I watched, and it boggled my mind even more.
Not many people are “fans” of classifying different generations for their traits. Still, as a communicator and one who conducts leadership training everywhere, it makes what I do more relatable and compelling. Classifying different generations with distinct traits can be a useful sociological and demographic tool for understanding and discussing trends and behaviors within specific age groups.
Tamara J. Erickson is a renowned author and expert on generational differences and workforce issues. Erickson’s work often emphasizes the importance of understanding generational differences in the workplace and how these differences can impact communication, collaboration, and overall organizational dynamics. Erickson typically acknowledges that generational traits and characteristics can provide valuable insights into how people from different age groups may approach work, technology, and social interactions. However, she also highlights the importance of recognizing that individuals are unique and that generational traits are generalizations. Only some people within a generation will fit neatly into these categories, and other factors, such as life experiences and individual personalities, play a significant role.
Change happens so fast that these young people do not even have time to grow up anymore, while another younger generation enters the scene and grabs the limelight away from them.
As one who has gone through the library encyclopedia experience in my student days, to the Encarta (online encyclopedia) of my young career days, to being surprised with a phone that does not require a qwerty keyboard but one that you can “swipe” around to living in an “always on-always connected” world and trying to understand the Metaverse, blockchain, and so forth and so on... No wonder the biggest fear among professionals in the workplace is FOLO. (not FOMO). FOMO, of course, is Fear Of Missing Out, popular with the millennials; FOLO means Fear Of Looming Obsolescence.
Again, explains why people who have attended my leadership training and will attend again will always tell me there are so many new things they have not learned before. Because things change so fast, new developments must be taught and included in the program long before the ink on the published manuals is dry.
As I constantly reiterate in my training programs, you and I today are “forever rookies” and should seek to be perpetual students. I know this; I teach it, but for the life of me, I still cannot get and understand the philosophy of Skibidi Toilet. But I will learn more about it.
(Francis Kong’s “Inspiring Excellence” podcast is now available on Spotify, Apple, Google, or other podcast streaming platforms).