Millennials are feeling insecure about their jobs, and they’re piling on alternatives to traditional careers to build their own safety nets.
They’re the largest generation in the workforce and are taking on multiple income streams, skills training, and other jobs outside their primary work to feel more secure — what Glassdoor terms “stability stacking.” This comes as multiple job-holders are increasingly well-educated, middle-class earners, indicating that labor market instability is plaguing the generation that should be in their prime working years.
Over three-quarters of millennials report actively questioning their career paths, according to a new Glassdoor poll of 1,805 US professionals in August. A separate Glassdoor poll found the majority are delaying milestones because of that uncertainty.
For millennials, working one job — or cultivating the skills for one career — isn’t enough to feel secure these days. Despite low layoffs, major employers have made cuts, with many attributing them to AI. Some companies have flattened their management levels just as millennials started to move up the ladder, and it’s tough to find a new job in today’s low-hire, low-fire market.
“We’re at a point in our careers where we have been in the workforce for long enough that it feels like we should have experienced some sort of payoff by now. But for a lot of us, that hasn’t come to fruition,” said Janel Abrahami, the creator of career platform Going Places and a millennial stability stacker. That dynamic can lead to burnout or a sense that all career eggs are in one basket.
“I think stability stacking offers a more empowering way for us to break out of this very murky cycle that we find ourselves in 10 to 15 years out of college,” Abrahami said.
What stability stacking means
Millennials are in their earnings prime. Typically, workers in their 30s leave behind the rapid wage growth of their early career and settle into their peak earnings era.
But that doesn’t mean they’re feeling secure on that plateau.
“Stability stacking is a way to make sure that you have alternatives lined up should things go sideways at your current role,” said Chris Martin, senior economist at Glassdoor. “The reason we see more of this with millennials is because they experienced a couple really big rug-pull moments in their career.”
That includes overcoming two recessions as they searched for jobs and progressed in the workplace. Martin said that with stability stacking, millennials are creating insurance against potential layoffs, job displacement by AI, or other major job changes. Martin said it could also mean building up the skills that AI is less likely to replace within your role.
Stability stacking is also a way to combat job fatigue. Among the generations surveyed, millennials were by far the most likely to mention burnout, and they were also the most likely to mention job security and layoffs.
One way to create this insurance is to develop the skills employers need now and in the future. That may include developing AI knowledge or sharpening soft skills.
Beyond working on what you can bring to the table, you can build out your connections so that if something goes sideways, you have people to reach out to immediately. Martin said stability stacking may involve “building a network that’s adjacent to your career or in a different field altogether so that you have a network you can draw on should your job go away and job prospects in your industry or your occupation start drying up.”
And recently, when millennial Abrahami was at a new coaching certification course, she encountered Gen Xers and boomers picking up new skills post-retirement; they were very interested in the idea of stability stacking and portfolio careers. She sees the trend as part of the future of work.
“Thinking about, OK, well work means I do a job, I get promoted, I wait for a raise, and then maybe I make this big pivot to another company — that’s a very linear way of thinking,” Abrahami said. “And I don’t think the future of our careers is going to reward linear thinking anymore. I think it’s going to reward non-linear and stacked thinking.”
