What Does Gen Z Really Want?

Every generation has its labels. Gen Zers are often described as job-hoppers who are purpose-driven, as tech-dependent individuals who are too online, as highly sensitive employees who are impossible to manage—but what is Gen Z actually like to work with? What do they want from their careers, and are leaders really listening?

In this episode of Eventualists, co-hosts Taylor Smith and Hannah Elston speak with guest Preston Krzyzak, customer engagement and growth manager at Soundings, to unpack the reality behind the labels, headlines and stereotypes. From flexibility and feedback to financial security and work-life balance, the Eventualists explore what matters most to the next generation entering the events industry.

This episode is for senior leaders trying to retain emerging talent, and for young professionals navigating constantly evolving, sometimes outdated workplaces.

If we want the industry to evolve, we need to understand the generation shaping its future.

Listen now: 

Meet Our Guest: 

Preston Krzyzak, is a customer engagement and growth manager at Soundings. Krzyzak is dedicated to ensuring client success and strategic alignment are always at the forefront. With a background in leadership, sales and startups, he brings a unique blend of creativity and strategic thinking to the meetings and events industry. Preston excels at matching the right talent to the right teams, driving high-impact outcomes for every project. His passion for people, consulting and philanthropy fuels his consultative approach.

Transcript: 

Editors note: The following transcription was exported from Microsoft Teams and proofed by our editors. Although it is very accurate, there inevitably will be some mistakes, so please consider that when reading. Thank you.

Hannah Elston 
Welcome to eventualists, real stories, eventual experiences, a new Meetings Today podcast for tomorrow's talent and today's leaders, co-hosted by me, Hannah Elston.

Taylor Smith 
And me, Taylor Smith, the eventualists sheds light on the unexpected realities of life as a business events industry professional and today we are excited to welcome our next guest. But before we do, Hannah, why don't you share one of your favorite moments from our last episode, which featured our first ever guest on eventualists, Tyler Sturdivant, in case our listeners missed it and need a little recap.

Hannah Elston 
Yeah, of course. I mean, firstly, snaps for Tyler because she was absolutely incredible and definitely want to hear more of her voice in the industry moving forward. She talks a lot about standing up for yourself and your own career progression, making things happen for you and being an advocate for yourself and also reaching out for help when you need it. I just think she had so many insightful bits of information there to help you navigate your expectations when you're starting a career. Taylor, was there something that you took away from that podcast you wanted to share?

Taylor Smith  
I loved hearing Tyler's story because I was in Calgary last week with Tourism Calgary on a fam trip and we were at lunch one day. I was speaking to another attendee and we were talking about how the average amount of time that today's employees stay at a company, mostly Gen Z, but in general is 2.2 years.  

For me, approaching my fourth year at Meetings Today and then hearing from Tyler how she started as an intern and now she's assistant manager of events there. It was inspiring for me to hear that because I think a lot of Gen Z feels like they have to jump around to find opportunities right now, and they have to jump around and go to the next company to get that next paycheck and that next pay bump and seeing that there are opportunities out there for people where companies offer those opportunities for growth, I think was very heartwarming to know that someone feels so happy and comfortable in their job and they're given those opportunities and that's ultimately what we want to create more of for Gen Z. I think her story was very relatable for me. Now just for fun question for you, Hannah. What's a small win you're celebrating lately?

Hannah Elston  
I mentioned on the last podcast that I was going skiing in the Alps, which I have now completed, and I learned how to parallel ski. Which was very exciting. A lot of falling over, a lot of bruises, but I have left with a new skill, which is fantastic. So, I'm celebrating that.  

Another thing that I am celebrating is my third cup of coffee of the day. It is 20 past five. It's been one of those days as an event professional where you think, how else am I going to survive than copious amounts of caffeine. Now here I am recording this podcast with you.  

Taylor, what is something that you want to celebrate today?

Taylor Smith 
I think a small win I want to celebrate is seeing the three sisters in Banff is something that as the oldest of three sisters, that was just a very cool, spiritual nature filled experience for me and I loved it.  

Taylor Smith
Now let's get into the latest with a new eventualist, Preston Krzyzak, customer engagement and growth manager at Soundings. In his role, Preston is dedicated to ensuring client success with a background in leadership, sales and start-ups. He brings a unique blend of creativity and strategic thinking to the meetings and events industry.

Hannah Elston 
Preston excels at matching the right talent to the right teams. His passion for people, consulting and philanthropy fuels his business approach.

Taylor Smith 
Today, Preston joins us to unpack the reality behind the labels, headlines and stereotypes. From flexibility and feedback to financial security and work life balance, the eventualists explore what matters most to the next generation entering the events industry. Preston, thanks for joining us today.

Preston Krzyzak   
Oh, it is such a joy to be joined by you two. Super excited about the opportunity and platform that we have and most importantly, just to hang out for a little bit and chat, right?

Taylor Smith  
Right. Before we get started, Preston, do you want to take a moment to introduce yourself a little bit beyond what I shared and maybe share a bit about your leadership experiences and what inspired us to have this conversation today?

Preston Krzyzak 
Yeah, of course. I am Preston. I grew up in the Chicago suburbs and then moved to the city afterwards. I went to Miami University. But funny enough, I did not graduate with any event background there. I actually graduated with a finance degree. So, you know, coming into the events industry, I think sometimes it's not a linear trajectory, and sometimes it just unfolds in different ways. And I think that's what happened for me.

Now I am currently at Soundings Connect. We are a talent community that primarily places freelance talent with the industry for different corporations, agencies and associations in the world. So, for my role in that company, I work with clients and ultimately look to place talent, drive growth within those current accounts, but then also bring in new opportunities in. So that's kind of been my current background with employment.

Taylor Smith 
Being in your position where you not only match clients but talent in with companies, right, I think that really sets you up for this conversation. You know on both sides what companies are looking for, but also what Gen Z wants. So, I'm excited to talk to you today about it.

Hannah Elston  
Preston, thank you for sharing more about your story and how you know you came to be in this role. I think something we like to ask all of our guests when we have them on is how do you think your experience makes you an eventualist?

Preston Krzyzak  
Yeah. So when I think of eventualists, I don't necessarily think age determines that factor because my definition and my feeling towards it is wanting to grow, it's wanting to learn and ultimately become better within the industry. I think for us, no matter where you are in your career, no matter where you are in life. The want to grow and the want to learn and become better—I think there's beauty in that. I think that mentality is always ingrained into me as the idea of being an eventualist and to continuously want to grow and continuously want to develop and ultimately dream and change make and lead a generation of what's to come and how we can ultimately grow and shape this industry for the better and together.

Taylor Smith   
I think your mentality there and how you approach these growth opportunities not just for yourself. Your story just completely flips so many labels and stereotypes that Gen Z experiences on its head. If you put yourself next to all those labels, it's just like Preston doesn't fit into any of these. He is on the outside of all these lazy, entitled, words that get thrown at us put on Gen Z all the time.  

There's often a gap, right? Because of these stereotypes and labels between how Gen Z is understood and perceived by older generations versus how they perceive themselves and what they're experiencing. From your perspective, why do you think this gap exists between how Gen Z employees see themselves and how some leaders or hiring managers perceive them in their roles?

Preston Krzyzak 
Yeah, I think that's a great question. I think when we look at Gen Z, there's the narrative of this idea of work life balance. I think that's a big push when we compare...Gen Z wants more days off and we want flexibility in our schedule and we want to have this work life balance, right. Because the way the industry is moving and the way we do our job has changed dramatically with the increase in digital work. I think it's kind of changed from work-life balance to just quality of life, right? You cannot blame a generation for just wanting to enjoy their life and have more power within that, right?

And when we look at what has shaped Gen Z, I think we have to take it back from how we grew up in our community. We've gone through pre-K to 12 having community, having structure all our lives. For the ones who went to university, you have even more community. It's hard not to have community in college. There's so many opportunities to be involved with different organizations, community involvement. And then we have all this structure, right? You have class, you have your schedule. Obviously, there's less structure because it points you in the way where you have to control your own schedule. You live on your own now, but that sense is still there. 

We leave college, you're back into the real world and there's just all this new opportunity and it could be daunting at times, but at the same way, traditionally we've had the idea of work being your second place, right? Outside of home, work was your second place. In high school, school was your second place. And then traditionally we have work as our second place, but with the increasement in hybrid work or even fully remote virtual work that has changed where your second place is no longer that structured work environment, your second place is kind of set up for you.

And I think that drives into the idea of isolation, that our industry, our generation is as isolated as possible. We are as lonely as possible. We called it the lonely generation because we have the rise of technology and social media, but we also have this rise of the way that structure around us has changed.

And I think that has led to all this depression—we're the most depressed generation. Anxiety is at an all-time high because we're lonely. We don't have that human interaction. And I think what drives those different facts when we talk about mental health, when we talk about depression, when we talk about anxiety, things that are not talked about enough in our generation are the root causes for that.  

And then we throw on top of social media and the facade that we see people are living these lives, and it's a fake reality, but we compare ourselves to what is being seen. And sometimes they say comparison is a thief of joy. And I think that's why we are so sad and lonely and depressed and what does that lead to in the workplace. I think we have to start there and have the conversation about what the actual impacts are and where that came from.

Taylor Smith 
Are we creating an environment where Gen Z can really thrive, where we're meeting their needs?  

Hannah Elston
I feel like what you touched on there as well, Preston. It's such a sad irony that this generation is more connected than any other generation has ever been. And at the same time, we've never been so lonely. You know you have your entire contact book at your fingertips at all times. But because we've removed that physical aspect and that need to physically be there for each other, it's so much easier to feel more lonely. I mean, even when you have loads of connections that you might never even see, it's such a crazy concept.  

If we were to go back and tell someone 100 years in the past that this is how we would all be working and communicating with each other and that people are falling in love with people they've never even seen before or don't know if they are who they say they are, it's just absolutely ridiculous how connection has changed as time has gone on and it's definitely had an effect on us as a generation as a whole. And  

I think it's interesting that some people wouldn't necessarily see it that way or, don't understand why we are a little bit more dissociated when actually everything that's happened to us since we've been born has been so different. The way that technology has advanced since the year 2000. That advancement in just 25 years is at a rate that no other generation has ever seen before.  

If you talk to someone who was born in 2000 and also someone like my brother who was born in 2007, in just seven years, our experiences are so incredibly different. He's 18 right now, but his reality with technology is so different than mine. I still had cassette tapes video players, but he doesn't even know what that is or never owned one. It's so interesting how it has changed so quickly and I feel like it's incomparable to what other people have experienced. Touching on that, what do you think Gen Z are hoping to find from the workforce today that maybe previous generations didn't prioritize as much?