Millennial Tyrant and Gen Z Minion – How an Uncanny Partnership Works

Clement: No one has PTSD here. Allegedly.

Hsiao Ying: Master has given Dobby a sock. Dobby is free.

Hi, my name is Clement, and I am an Assistant Director with Affinite Solutions. If you’re reading this, you might have realised that I also double up as the co-editor of this uber amazing online publication.

Don’t say it.

Moving on.

If this is the first time you are seeing us, I would like to humbly invite you to read our story.

Let’s get into it then.

From the Castle of the Millennial Tyrant

At Affinite, I manage the marketing team. Which means I also oversee the development of all marketing collaterals. Funny how it is – sometimes, I know what marketing stuff is being developed, and sometimes I don’t. It is what it is, so (I) deal with it.

Most of the time, my attention is focused on implementing marketing initiatives for Affinite’s flagship technology product, Purple Rewards, which is an employee benefits mobile application that offers exclusive retail merchant discounts. Purple Rewards is also open to the public, so check it out if you are looking for food deals or an affordable massage session, among many other lifestyle deals.

As I manage the marketing team, this means I have my own dedicated minion to bully.

Yes, singular.

One is plenty enough, considering that said minion is repeatedly finding ways to raise a rebellion.

You might think that I’m kidding.

I am not.

But it’s all good. I always have it under control. It’s just annoying that I have to take the time to crush the rebellion. Over, and over, and over again. Not going to lie – it gets fun watching the light die out in my minion’s eyes after a beatdown. Crushed, exactly like I said.

If anyone thinks I’m being hard on my minion, here’s what I’m dealing with on a daily basis. You may also be thinking, “Wouldn’t it be easier to just get another minion who doesn’t cause trouble?”

Yes, I suppose it would.

But where am I supposed to find another minion who is so good at being a minion? Efficient, effective, smart, and understands what I need as soon as instructions leave my mouth. Also, attends to my every whim and unreasonable demands. Most importantly – loyal – a trait akin to a unicorn. Everyone has heard of it, but none has seen it before.

Recently, I found out that my minion doesn’t know how to make sushi from scratch. How is this relevant to work? I don’t know. All I know is that what I want, I want. And I always get it from my minion. No bonus two points for her, I guess. But it doesn’t matter because I already rate her 5000/10 for productivity, so those two points won’t affect her review.

Don’t worry, my minion. Master’s got your back.

Not too long ago, I took a personality test. Turns out, I’m a perfectionist. I may or may not have unfairly and unreasonably expected too much out of my minion. Not admitting anything though. I still get what I ask for on time. It pains me to say this, but on a few occasions, I was actually impressed.

But life isn’t perfect, so here’s the bad part.

My minion can be frustratingly annoying. If you didn’t click on the link a few paragraphs earlier, please do, and then you’ll understand what I have to go through. That’s what I have to deal with every single day at work.

Sardonic, negative, and shamelessly claims that her writing has lots of soul. Last one is debatable. I’m not disagreeing with it, though.

The Outcome was the Only Thing that Mattered to Me

Because at the end of the day, I don’t care how it happens, as long as it happens. I don’t care about the race, because all I care about is what happens at the finish line.

To give a perspective of how effective our partnership is:

We have never been late for deadlines.
We reached an audience of 1.2 million through our marketing initiatives with a modest budget.
We tested our digital ads and figured out the most suited audience set with the best suited types of marketing materials.
We achieved an increase of 1000% in user downloads for Purple Rewards.
We achieved top 3 SEO-ranked positions on Google for our targeted keywords for Megazine.

Not too shabby, if I do say so myself.

Ten months ago, I nicknamed my minion Flying Donkey (trust me, she deserves it). Today, she is now my trusted partner at work. What she says is also what I say, and I make sure that people know of it.

This is as good as you’ll ever get from me.

Time to fly, minion.

From the Dungeon of the Gen Z Minion

Hello. It’s me. The minion.

Let me just start off my portion of this article by saying that getting a compliment from Clement is like trying not to diarrhea after eating a McSpicy and drinking a milo together. Near impossible. When I read the list of our achievements together and what Clement wrote thereafter, I burst into tears.

I’m not ashamed of that – I think I deserve it.

By the way – that personality test thing? I scored high as a perfectionist too. By high, I mean nineties out of a scale of hundred. When Clement first joined the company, a year after I did, he said that our personalities were too different and that he didn’t expect for us to get along. Joke’s on him. We get along like a straw house on fire. Big Bad Wolf blowing down straw houses who?

It’s all about arson and pyromania here.

Seriously though – I think that our (in my case, limited) experience as consultants has streamlined the way that we both think. We’re often in agreement rather than disagreement over how we should tackle our marketing initiatives. Even when we disagree, we talk through it like mature adults and rationalise our thought process before drawing a conclusion that we’re both satisfied with.

Earning Respect in the Workplace

To me, it all boils down to mutual respect.

We’ve acknowledged the fact that we both bring different strengths to the table, and we respect those boundaries. Clement is more of a numbers person. I scored seven out of hundred for one of my A-Math examinations back when I was schooling. Clement can’t design for nuts. The first time I saw his design draft of a brochure, I vomited in my mouth a little bit.

You get the gist of where I’m going.

Almost all the time, when I make changes on the spot without consulting him first, he’ll listen to my explanation thereafter and accept it. We’ll then seal the changes in by shaking hands (after spitting in our palms ‘cause we’re cool like that).

The last part is a lie.

…Really, it is.

Let’s face it. We live in Singapore, a traditional Asian society. In a professional environment, age is often seen as a marker of experience and a reason to thumb other people down. Some older office workers will probably disagree with me, claiming that it’s the young ‘uns who have no respect for their elders.

My point of view is that respect must be earned, and Clement has definitely earned mine. In more ways than one.

This is a Man’s World (But it’d Be Nothing Without a Woman or a Girl)

This next portion is a bit iffy – I debated over including it because I terribly dislike playing the woman card, especially so in a professional working environment – but ah, I’ve got a limited time to do it, so I might as well.

There are tons of articles out there about misogyny in the workplace. The definition of misogyny – for those who might not know – is the dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women. I have had the experience of having my expertise and voice devalued.

Clement will say it’s not because I’m a woman and that it’s just because I’m dumb.

The first time I submitted a piece of work to Clement, I fully expected it to be rejected because that was my norm. He accepted the first draft, clean and whole. To put it in Gen Z terms, I was shooketeth. So shooketeth that I took back the draft and squinted at it for a while more before sending it his way again.

Shout out to my female ex-boss who taught me the lesson of ensuring that whatever work I submitted was as close to perfection as possible. She got too frustrated over how I’d message her five times in a row telling her to “wait a minute, ma’am, I need to tweak this portion”.

Fair enough.

The Birth of the Flying Donkey

The first time Clement brought up the idea of Megazine to me – I was hesitant to do it. Contributing three to four articles (sometimes in a week) on top of my heavy workload of doubling up as a Strategic Communications Manager and a Data Protection Consultant?

Pure insanity.

Looking back, I’m actually glad that Megazine came to fruition. It’s become my placid pool of calm amidst the chaos of work. Sometimes, when I’m stuck on something, I’ll go to my computer and bang out an article within a few hours, which often gets my creative juices running so that I can complete whatever it is that I was stuck on.

I’m also thankful that Clement is so supportive of the chaos that is my mind – it’s been a long time since I’ve last felt free enough to write in a voice that is truly mine, rather than one that is construed for polite company.

In fact, whenever Clement throws article ideas in my way, our conversation will go something like this.

Hsiao Ying: “How about an article on <insert random topic>, it’s been popping up quite often recently.”

Clement: “Ya ok, but can you use your Gen Z voice?”

Hsiao Ying: “So I was thinking the article will go in <insert random topic> direction - Wait you’re unlocking my cage again? You sure not.”

Clement: “…Okay. 80% of your Gen Z voice.”

Hsiao Ying: “No no no, let’s get this straight – you’re giving me full free reign over the tone of voice?”

Clement: “…80%.”

Hsiao Ying: “You say one ah. Don’t regret it.”

Clement: “I said 80%.”

It’s all true, I have video evidence.

Anyways, the first of it was “A Day in the Life of a Gen-Z Employee”, as linked above, and then it never stopped. Honestly, I’m grateful that Clement has let me throw colours and shades of my personality into Megazine. I’ll never admit it in real life, though. An article is all you get, Clement.

Ooh – we never really got around to explaining how Flying Donkey came about.

In the beginning, Clement asked me what title I wanted to put for myself on Megazine, and he said that I could put anything. I was pleasantly confuddled, and offered a title that cannot be typed out in polite company just so I could see his face twisting in frustration. We went back and forth debating over what my title would be – his suggestions fit for polite company, and mine not so – until he threw his hands up and said, “Your title can just be Flying Donkey then.”

So there it is. I am Donkey. But Flying.

It’s Been a Ride, Partner

It’s been ten whole months since we started working together. Admittedly – it hasn’t always been a smooth ride. After all, we’re two wholly different people. It was amazing how an ancient caveman from the Paleolithic era who drummed bones on rock for music could get along with a modern, chic, sexy, and kind modern-day woman like me.

This is as good as you’re going to get from me too, Clement. ‘Til the next green flash.

Psst.

Clement asked me how confident I was in writing an article within two hours. He gave me this article at 3:46pm. It’s currently 5:40pm.

One for the Gen-Z Minion, none for the Millennial Tyrant.