What Facebook Reveals About Gen Y and Work

Millennials are more likely to list their schools than their jobs on their Facebook profiles.

Image: Millennial Branding

Young adults are far more likely to list their school than their workplace on Facebook, and their profiles reveal a generation looking to startups for employment. Those are some of the results of a study by Millennial Branding of Generation Y Facebook profiles from Identified.com.

According to the study released this morning, 80 percent of young adults list their schools on their Facebook profiles, while just 34 percent list their workplaces. Nonetheless, they're likely to include plenty of coworkers—16 on average—among their “friends.”

“Gen-Y needs to be aware that what they publish online can come back to haunt them in the workplace,” said Dan Schawbel, founder of Millennial Branding. “Gen-Y managers and co-workers have insight into their social lives, which could create an awkward workplace setting or even result in a termination.”

A look at Facebook reflects the abysmal job market into which today’s young adults are entering. Among the findings:

• Seven percent of the Millennials whose Facebook profiles were studied worked for Fortune 500 companies.
• The military is the largest employer of these young adults.
• The largest cohort work in service industries like hotels and restaurants, traditionally low-paying jobs.
• Companies like Walmart and Starbucks—neither one exactly a high-tech, high-pay, high-skill entry level job—ranked high among employers.

While the overall unemployment rate for December was 8.5 percent, the rate for those aged 16-19 was 23.1 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

One possible reaction to that grim job market is a generation with entrepreneurial flair. "Owner" is the fifth-most popular title young people list on their Facebook profiles.

And whether they like it or not, the job market could well force more young people to create their own jobs instead of relying on someone else to create jobs for them.