A Story of an MZ Generation Civil Servant Who Left a Company Dinner Due to Seating Issues
Debate Over Workplace Culture and Consideration for New Employees
A story has emerged about an MZ generation (born between the 1980s and 2000s) civil servant who went home after being unable to sit at a company dinner.
On the 25th, a user named A, who revealed that they work in the maintenance team of a central government ministry, posted a message titled "Is this how MZ civil servants are these days?" on an online community. They explained the situation, saying, "Last week, our operations team and the responsible civil servants had dinner together. Attendees ranged from a Grade 4 manager to a newly hired Grade 9 MZ civil servant." They added, "In the chaotic atmosphere where people were finding their seats and going to the restroom, the MZ civil servant arrived a little late."
They continued, "When the MZ civil servant tried to sit down, someone said, 'That's so-and-so's assistant manager seat,' and 'That's another person's junior staff seat,' and it seemed like they were bounced around about three times." They said, "Then the MZ civil servant just went home." A expressed surprise and confusion, saying, "I was really shocked. Am I being old-fashioned? In the past, even assistant managers were intimidating, and this was a seat with a senior secretary present."
However, netizens who read this story criticized A and others for their lack of consideration. They responded with comments such as, "If the seats are all assigned like that, can't someone guide the seating first?", "Be thankful it wasn't reported as workplace harassment," "Regardless of MZ or not, take care of people," "I feel sorry for everyone," "They don't even recognize this as harassment," and "I feel sorry for the newcomers in such an organization."
Meanwhile, the National Assembly Research Service revealed that the proportion of newly appointed employees among all retired civil servants surged from 17.1% in 2019 to 23.7% in 2023 over the past five years. The number of civil servants with less than five years of service who retired increased more than twofold, from about 6,500 in 2019 to 13,566 last year.
Because of this, local governments nationwide are working hard to improve working conditions to prevent the departure of MZ civil servants. They are planning to eradicate unnecessary customs and bad practices such as "Days to serve executives," and in response to the MZ generation civil servants' demands for systematic handovers, they are implementing policies like pairing senior civil servants with new hires for practical mentoring and expanding special leave. Additionally, the government plans to raise the starting salary for Grade 9 civil servants to 3 million KRW per month by 2027.
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