Why Career Confidence Is Everyone’s Concern

4 Generations, 1 Challenge: How Each Generation Can Find Their Path Forward

If you have been feeling uncertain about your career lately, you are not alone. Whether you are a Gen Z professional struggling to break into the job market, a Millennial caught between childcare and career demands, a Gen X worker wondering if your experience still matters, or a Baby Boomer navigating how to stay relevant, career confidence challenges are hitting everyone right now.

The good news? There’s growing agreement across all generations that business ownership offers a viable alternative to traditional employment. And there are proven ways to design a personalized path to long-term security, no matter which generation you belong to.

Different Battles, Shared Concerns

Every generation faces unique pressures in today’s labor market, but the underlying anxiety about job security cuts across age groups.

Gen Z is fighting the hardest battle just to get started. About 58% of recent graduates are still looking for full-time work— compared to just 25% of earlier graduates from previous generations (Fortune, 2025). Entry-level job postings have declined by 29 percentage points since January 2024 (Randstad, 2025). In Canada, job security is a must-have for 54% of Gen Z workers— higher than any other generation (Humi Survey, 2024). Nearly half of Gen Z (48%) do not feel financially secure in 2025, up dramatically from 30% just one year earlier (Deloitte, 2025).

Millennials are now the largest generation in the workforce (36%), yet they face the “sandwich generation” squeeze— caring for aging parents while raising young children and navigating peak career responsibility. About 77% of Millennials believe AI will impact their work within the next year (Interview Guys, 2025). In Canada, 32% of Gen Z workers and 20% of Millennials plan to quit or change jobs in 2025 (First Onsite Workplace Values Survey, 2025).

Gen X remains the most stable generation in terms of job loyalty—only 14% considered leaving during the Great Resignation —but they are increasingly overlooked. Meanwhile, nearly half of all North American employees (49%) say ageism keeps them in unsatisfying jobs because they fear looking for new work at their age (TES Generational Career Confidence Survey, 2025). 

Baby Boomers report the highest discrimination in hiring processes at 20.7% (iHire, 2025).

One Thing All Generations Agree On

Despite their different circumstances, there’s a remarkable consensus across generations about business ownership as a path forward.

According to the TES Generational Career Confidence Survey conducted by The Entrepreneur’s Source®, just over four in five North Americans (83%) think owning a business is a viable alternative to a traditional career. Millennials lead this belief at 87%, followed closely by Gen X (85%) and Baby Boomers (84%). Even Gen Z—the generation facing the toughest entry-level market —shows strong belief at 72%.

Seven in ten North Americans (70%) believe owning a business provides more opportunities—including career stability and financial growth—than traditional jobs in today’s economy. Millennials (79%) and Gen Z (73%) are most optimistic about these benefits. And four in five employees (80%) say that starting or owning a business would give them more control over their career than a traditional job, with Millennial employees (86%) most likely to hold this belief.

AI Risk and the Entrepreneurial Shield

Concerns about AI replacing jobs vary by generation. Gen Z leads with 39% fearing AI will affect wages, followed by Millennials at 36%. Gen X and Baby Boomers show more confidence, with 31–32% disagreeing that AI poses a threat to their income (Checkr, 2025).

But here’s what’s striking: just over three in five North Americans (61%) believe that owning a business is the best way to protect against AI making your career obsolete, with Millennials (68%) and Gen Z (65%) feeling this most strongly (TES Generational Career Confidence Survey, 2025). Business owners can adapt to technological change, choose which tools to adopt, and position themselves in roles that require human judgment, creativity, and relationship-building—the very skills AI cannot replicate.

Why Three-Quarters of Parents Want Entrepreneurial Kids

The generational shift in thinking is perhaps most visible when parents consider their children’s futures.

Nearly half of parents are worried about their children’s ability to achieve career stability (48%), financial independence (48%), and homeownership (47%). These concerns are driving a major shift in what skills parents want their children to develop.

For three-quarters of parents (75%), it’s important that their children develop an entrepreneurial mindset, with Millennial (82%) and Gen X (84%) parents most inclined to feel this way. More than four in five parents (83%) believe that supporting their child in starting a business would be a good investment in their long-term financial security (TES Generational Career Confidence Survey, 2025).

This represents a fundamental shift in how North Americans view career success. Parents who once pushed their children toward traditional corporate paths are now recognizing that entrepreneurial thinking—problem-solving, adaptability, financial literacy, and self-reliance—may be the most valuable skills they can pass on.

How I.L.W.E.™ Goals and Coaching Help Every Generation

One reason career confidence is so low across generations is that most people have never been taught to think strategically about what they actually want from their work. They chase job titles, salary increases, or promotions without connecting those pursuits to deeper goals around Income, Lifestyle, Wealth, and Equity—what Career Ownership Coaches® call I.L.W.E.™ goals. I.L.W.E.™ provides a framework for designing your ideal career:

• Income: How much do you need to earn, both now and in the future?
• Lifestyle: What kind of flexibility, schedule, and work-life balance matters to you?
• Wealth: Are you building assets that grow over time, or just trading hours for dollars?
• Equity: Are you creating ownership value that you can eventually sell or pass on?

Through Career Ownership Coaching™, a Career Ownership Coach® helps you clarify these goals and explore options that align with your specific situation. For Gen Z, this might mean finding a path that bypasses the broken entry-level job market entirely. For Millennials, it could mean building something that offers both income and flexibility to manage family responsibilities. For Gen X and Baby Boomers, it often means converting decades of experience into a business that values what you know rather than filtering you out because of your age.

The coaching process is not about pushing you toward any particular path. It is about helping you see possibilities you may have overlooked and designing a personalized path to long-term security that aligns with your unique goals, values, and circumstances.

Your Generation Does Not Define Your Future

The data from the TES Generational Career Confidence Survey tells a powerful story. About a third of North Americans (34%) have owned a business, and two in five business owners (41%) say starting their own business improved their confidence— especially Gen X owners (54%). Nearly a third of business owners (32%) say a toxic work environment motivated them to start their own business, with Gen Z business owners (44%) reporting this most often.

Every generation faces different challenges. But the solution—taking control of your career through ownership—works across all of them. You don’t have to wait for the job market to improve, for employers to value your experience, or for AI to stop changing the landscape. You can start designing your path today.

Whatever generation you belong to, the question is the same: What do you want from your career? And are you willing to take control to get it?

 

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About Your Career Revolution

Our mission is to help individuals explore self-sufficiency as an alternative career.

We help them define their Income, Lifestyle, Wealth, and Equity goals and provide education on the best ways to achieve them. We don’t sell franchises – we help people achieve their dreams of self-sufficiency through business ownership. The approach is different, the experience is different. And it works.

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