Investment Risk and Opportunity

Two managers were discussing the lack of training in their new and inexperienced hires. “The problem is, what if we invest the time and money in their development and they leave after a year?”  The older seasoned manager replied, “No, the greater problem is what if we don’t develop them and they stay for several years?”

As we discussed in our last blog, it is projected that Gen Z will be the workforce majority by 2035. That gives organizations approximately nine years to train and develop a generation that is currently struggling with basic workplace skills into the managers and leaders who will run their businesses.

More than 8 in 10 Gen Z believe soft skills like communication, leadership, empathy, and networking are somewhat or highly required for career advancement - more than AI or technical skills*. They even cite learning and development among the top three reasons they chose their current employer. They want managers who provide guidance, inspiration, and mentorship, not just oversight.

They believe that developing soft skills is more important than ever — they just haven't been given the tools or structured opportunity to do so. Yet when it comes to leadership, only 6% of Gen Z employees say their primary career goal is to reach a senior leadership position. This is a huge departure from past generational workforce motivation and incentives and raises a key paradigm shift in their development. For Gen Z their leadership aspiration must be cultivated, not assumed.

A new development paradigm

Conventional leadership development programs — competency frameworks, training modules, performance reviews, and generic coaching — were designed for a workforce with a different baseline. Previous generations entered organizations with years of in-person professional socialization already embedded. They needed leadership theory layered onto interpersonal instincts they already had. Gen Z often lacks the foundational layer. Asking them to perform leadership behaviors without first helping them understand and leverage their own natural strengths and relationship styles is like asking someone to run before they can walk.

Over the last five years Inpowering People has developed and continues to improve a yearlong program that helps our clients accelerate their emerging young leaders with people skills to fill many of these gaps. Rather than mapping Gen Z employees onto a generic competency template, CoreClarity with the CliftonStrengths begins where they are — identifying the natural talent patterns that are already present, already energizing, and already driving behavior. It provides a language for self-awareness and for understanding others that is constructive, identity-affirming, and immediately applicable to the interpersonal challenges this generation faces.

Moreover, Gen Z responds poorly to deficit-focused development — being told what they lack, what they need to fix, what they are doing wrong. Research on Gen Z learning preferences consistently shows they engage more deeply with development that is positive, personalized, values-connected, and immediately applicable. This is precisely where our Inpowered Leaders framework offers a differentiated and research-supported intervention. CliftonStrengths with CoreClarity provides precisely this kind of developmental scaffold. It is not a deficit model — it begins with what is strong, not what is wrong. It provides a shared language for teams that makes interpersonal difference legible and navigable.

By helping Gen Z employees understand their own communication styles, relational patterns, and emotional triggers, and by showing them how those patterns land on others, it builds the self-aware interpersonal foundation from which collaboration, feedback reception, conflict resolution, and leadership can genuinely grow. Next blog we will look deeper at how playing to strengths fills gaps to accelerate development and can surface latent leadership potential.

* Deloitte Global. (2025). Gen Z and Millennial Survey. Deloitte Insights