The 16–18-year-olds in a fascinating Demos report published last week are about to enter the workplace. They are not the “Gen Z” that’s been written about for the last decade. They’re something else. They’re Gen Z 2.0: hyper-stimulated, algorithm-shaped, politically sceptical and raised on feeds that never stop.

They’re younger than the iPhone.

This matters because most organisations are still designing workplace learning for people who no longer exist.

These young people live inside fast, reactive, personalised information streams. They learn in fragments, cross-check constantly and treat everything as provisional until the comments confirm it. Authority doesn’t impress them; SOME people do. The algorithm decides who gets their attention, not hierarchy.

So when they join, they will not sit quietly through a workshop. They won’t read a 40-page PDF. They won’t accept vague messaging or corporate voice. They won’t tolerate slow platforms, legacy LMS structures or learning that assumes attention is unlimited.

What they will need is something we don’t currently build at scale. They’ll need learning that’s fast, relevant and human. They’ll need managers who talk clearly and directly. They’ll need structure, not slogans. They’ll need friction and containment in a world that gives them neither. And they’ll need practical help navigating conflict, boundaries, information overload and gender relationships shaped more by TikTok and OnlyFans than by schools or parents.

The thing that stands out most is this: they haven’t been allowed to practise disagreement. School shut it down. Social media turned it into performance. So workplaces will inherit a cohort that struggles to debate well, escalates fast and doesn’t know how to sit with uncertainty. That’s an L&D problem as much as a cultural one.

The simple ask is “Where is their critical thinking?”.

We need to shift our approach. The next generation won’t be helped by content-first programmes, generic leadership models or surface-level training. They need evidence, practice and performance. Clear expectations. Spaces to test views. Real feedback. Real consequence. And more publishing than training: short cycles, narrative, creator-led content and people-first delivery.

They don’t want more digital. They want more connection. They don’t want more noise. They want signal. They don’t want more learning events. They want work that fits how they actually think.

If we don’t prepare for this, organisations will feel the strain in culture, behaviour and performance. If we do, we get a cohort that’s fast, critical, creative and unafraid to call out nonsense. We just need to design for the world they actually grew up in, not the one we remember.

This is not a future problem. This is next year’s onboarding.