Gen Z employees are presumed to be highly tech-savvy. As a result, they find themselves being treated like the resident IT person, even if IT work isn’t in their job description. As a result, non-tech-savvy colleagues are quick to ask a young person for help. They see it as a way to fix their problem in 5 minutes, whereas calling IT or figuring it out themselves could take an hour. So, it’s best for everyone to just ask you, right? Well, if you are a young person or recent graduate who is just starting to build their career, the answer is NO.
To advance through promotions, you need to do two things:
- Excel at your own role. This means meeting or exceeding all of your job expectations and any KPIs you might have.
- Take on “stretch projects.” These are projects or working groups that will help you gain the skills and experience required for the higher-level position you are aiming for.
That means that in any given week, you need to complete all your own work with enough time leftover to take on side projects. This is partly why it’s so hard to move up — you need to be so efficient in your work that you can excel at your job in only 75% of the allotted time, allowing you to spend 25% doing more work. On top of this, you need to build a reputation as a great team player.
Now, imagine you are the de facto tech expert in your area. Every time you’re pulled away from your work to solve someone’s “quick problem,” there’s a mental and physical setup time that turns any 10-minute task into a 30-minute task. So if you have 7 hours of work time in a day, each instance of support kills nearly 10% of your workday. Now imagine you get a reputation for being “good at fixing things,” and that number will multiply.
Let’s be clear — you are not obliged to fix people’s tech stuff. You can say, “I’m sorry, I’m swamped and I’m not able to help.” However, this article is for people who want to move up in their careers, in which case it’s better to try and turn this into a development opportunity. So how can Gen Z and early career employees protect their productive work time while being a team-player and developing leadership skills? Read on and find out!
#GenZ is known for being tech-savvy. As a result, they are disproportionately being asked to support their colleagues with IT issues. This is taking time away from their own work and holding back their development.
— Chris (@ChrisjBergen) May 18, 2023
Has this happened to you? How would you solve this problem?
Key point 1: Set boundaries
In every job, employees find themselves serving unofficial roles that aren’t necessarily in their job description. These unofficial roles are usually thankless – they don’t show up on your annual review or any performance metrics, they aren’t evident to senior leadership, and they don’t contribute to your development. Regardless, you just have to do it. The key is to make sure these small roles don’t prevent you from the high-impact work. So, you need to set boundaries.
If that unofficial role is “helping co-workers with IT problems,” then the trick is to delay the help to a set time in the future. Tell the co-worker something like, “I’m swamped right now, but I can help you at (insert day/time).” Whatever time you choose to make yourself available, you want to give enough time so that the person will be incentivized to try and sort out the issue on their own; usually, they do.
By delaying the support until a fixed window of time late in the day, you create the following benefits for yourself:
- Protect your time: Establishing a designated window of time allows you to budget your schedule and ensure most of your time is spent on your own initiatives. Plus, if two people have asked for help, and you’ve established a 20-minute window of time at the end of your shift, then it becomes easy for you to tell that third person that you’re full up and won’t be able to help.
- Preserve your mental energy: Knowing that you won’t be interrupted allows your mind to stay focused on high-impact work, especially during the critical morning times when most people’s brains work best. You want to use your best “brain time” on your own work, not on silly little issues.
With consistency, you’ll train your colleagues to solve their own problems, and eventually, they won’t need to interrupt you at all.
Key point 2: Teach them – don’t do it for them
If a colleague asks you to help them solve an IT problem, your first instinct may be to sit at their computer and take over. However, it’s important not to touch their keyboard or mouse. Instead, guide them and make them do it themselves. Teach them along the way by asking questions like, “Did you understand how that worked?” or “Do you feel confident that you can do that next time?” or “Is there anything you didn’t understand that I can walk you through?” You may spend more time with them in that initial session, but it will reduce or eliminate the time spent helping them in the future.
You want to condition your colleagues to see you as a teacher, not just a fixer. Many employees are not interested in learning things they don’t think they need to. If they know they have a colleague who can fix their problems for them, they won’t bother to learn how to fix it themselves. However, if they know that asking you for help means they will have to spend 10 minutes learning how to do it, they might hesitate.
In addition, by acting as a teacher, you’ll be improving the culture of the workplace. Your supervisors want to see you supporting your colleagues to perform better, not doing their work and falling behind in your own. From a management perspective, they don’t want the staff to solely rely on each other to solve their problems; they want the team to work together to improve.
If you are genuinely good at IT stuff and want to be proactive, you could set a regular time and promote it to your coworkers. For instance, you could send out an email to your team saying something like this:
“Dear colleagues,
I’d like to contribute what I can to ensure our team is as efficient as possible. One area where I think I can help is with matters concerning the MS Office suite and other simple IT issues. Every Friday, from 3 – 4 pm, you can feel free to book 15 minutes with me, and I will come by your desk or call you over Zoom to help you find solutions. Since timeslots are limited, please book in advance to secure your spot. Due to my own workload, I unfortunately cannot provide this support outside of this timeslot.
Thanks all, and I look forward to helping the team!
Regards,
Chris”
This may seem a bit over the top, but think about what will be asked of you in a job interview for a leadership position. They will want to hear examples of how you supported your peers. What they will want to hear is how you empowered your peers to achieve greater success in their roles. Which of these following examples sounds better?:
- “I regularly fixed people’s Word documents.”
- “I implemented and led a weekly coaching program to help my colleagues improve their tech skills and self-efficiency.”
Obviously, you want to be able to claim the latter. Even if no one takes you up on the offer, your supervisors will see the initiative you are taking. You can speak to it in an interview, and if anyone asks for help, you can happily suggest they book a spot (and save yourself from interruptions). It’s a win-win-win.
Key point 3: If it becomes an issue, make your manager aware
Despite your best efforts, people may continue to bother you to fix their tech problems. If this is the case, you need to let your manager know. They will see your productivity lacking, so they need to be aware and involved in the solution early on. Your supervisor will need to know:
- The frequency of requests: How many times per day/week you are being asked to provide support on average, and how much time it costs you.
- Types of requests: What type of support is being asked for – that way, if it’s a common issue, your manager can look for long-term solutions such as branch-wide training.
- Proposed short- and long-term solutions: This is an opportunity as well as a risk. You want to come off as a problem solver rather than a complainer. You might offer to organize a workshop or draft an email to be sent to the staff with information and links to YouTube videos, for example.
- Explain how the issue is affecting your work: You want your manager to understand how this issue is affecting you, the team, and the business overall. This will help them evaluate the issue and your proposed solutions.
Be sure to document the conversation. If the problem isn’t solved and your work continues to be impacted, you can refer to it in your performance reviews. If you feel that this side-duty has affected your overall performance in the role, you should proactively address it with your supervisor well in advance of your performance evaluation. Send your supervisor an email with something like this:
“Dear (supervisor),
On (x date), we spoke about the high volume of tech support requests to me from the team and how I felt it was impacting the timely completion of my duties. Since then, in the absence of an alternative solution, I have continued to provide this support, costing me roughly 4 hours per week and making this role a key responsibility of my position. I believe this should be taken into consideration when evaluating my overall performance. In executing this role, I have received excellent feedback from my colleagues and have improved operational efficiency for the branch overall. If it suits you, I would be happy to explore how we might formally include this responsibility into my position or support the development of alternative solutions.
Regards,
Chris.”
Final Thoughts
While this article focuses on helping Gen Z employees manage the risk of becoming the de-facto “tech support” for their unit, the advice can be applied to any side duty that frequently falls on you. Examples include graphic design, customer assistance, and committee work.
And one last point – don’t do this to your boss. Managing up is almost never a good idea, especially when you’re new! If your boss frequently asks for tech support, unfortunately, you just need to do it, but try to provide some teaching if they are open to it.
Have you been tasked with a “side-role” that impacted your ability to do your job? If so, please share your experience in the comments below!
