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Over the past two decades, popular press and academic literature have asserted that generational differences abound in the workplace. Of particular interest is the current generation of workers, referred to variously as the "Millennials" (Strauss and Howe, 2000), "Generation Y" (Johnson and Johnson, 2010), "Nexters" (Zemke et al. , 2000) and "Generation Me" (Twenge, 2006). This generation, born between 1980 and 1994 (Foot, 1998; Lancaster and Stillman, 2002; Zemke et al. , 2000), is thought to be significantly different in terms of outlooks and preferences when compared to previous generations (Lyons et al. , 2012). Relative to preceding generations of workers, such as "Baby Boomers" (born between 1945 and 1964) and "Generation Xers" (born between 1965 and 1979), Millennials have been shown to hold different work values (e.g. Lyons et al. , 2007), personalities (Twenge and Campbell, 2008), and have different expectations related to work preferences (Ng et al. , 2010; Twenge et al. , 2010). This research evidence might convince employers to revamp their human resource systems in order to effectively attract, engage and retain the next generation of workers (Crumpacker and Crumpacker, 2007).
Much of the research on Millennials has focussed on their work values, which play a pivotal role in shaping individuals' decisions and subsequent behavior (Dawis, 1991) including career choice (e.g. Judge and Bretz, 1992; Super, 1970). Many of these studies were conducted with respondents who were in their late-teens and early 20s, often students in post-secondary education (PSE) who had not yet gained full-time, meaningful employment (e.g. Broadbridge et al. , 2007; Lyons et al. , 2005, 2007; Ng et al. , 2010; Terjesen et al. , 2007; Twenge et al. , 2010). Although work values are typically seen as a stable individual difference (Schwartz, 1992), new evidence suggests they can and do change over time such that the relative stability of work values is lowest during one's PSE (e.g. emerging adulthood) and becomes more stable as one enters the workforce (e.g. post-PSE - young adulthood) (Jin and Rounds, 2012; Krahn and Galambos, 2014). PSE in particular allows individuals to explore and refine their identities, often resulting in a number of intra-individual changes as students develop themselves and their careers (Ng and Burke, 2006; Perry, 1970/1999). Indeed, some researchers...