Did Gen Z redefine the traditional 9-to-5 workday and popularise flexible work culture? Zoho CEO Mani Vembu doesn't think so. According to him, Zoho has been following flexible work schedules for nearly three decades, long before Gen Z entered the workforce and flexible working became a widely discussed trend.
Responding to a post on X claiming that the conventional 9-to-5 workday is "on its way out" because Gen Z employees prefer flexible schedules, Vembu said Zoho had embraced such a work culture years ago. He argued that flexible working is not a "new Gen Z culture" as it is often portrayed.
"We've been working this way at Zoho for nearly 30 years. Interesting that it's been framed as new Gen Z culture," Vembu wrote on X.
He added that the shift has less to do with generational differences and more with a universal preference for flexibility.
"I think this is more about human beings. We always preferred flexibility, as long as work gets done," he said.
Vembu was responding to a startup founder's post stating that 90 per cent of his workforce belongs to Gen Z and suggesting that fixed office hours such as 9-to-5 or 10-to-6 could soon become outdated. The post argued that younger employees are comfortable overlapping during certain hours for meetings and collaboration but increasingly want the freedom to choose when they begin and end their workday.
However, Vembu maintained that flexible working should not be seen as a demand unique to one generation, but rather as a long-established workplace practice based on trust and accountability. In his view, the focus should remain on outcomes rather than the number of hours employees spend at work.
In a separate discussion on X, Zoho co-founder and chief scientist Sridhar Vembu also questioned the tendency to classify people based on generational labels.
"I come across a large number of people of various age groups, and I don't find categorising generations based on age all that meaningful," he wrote.
To illustrate his point, Sridhar Vembu shared the story of a 19-year-old employee whose top priority is helping her parents repay loans and supporting her younger siblings.
"That is her foremost priority in life. She buys only low-cost clothes, she mends her broken footwear and so on because she wants to save every rupee," he wrote.
He also spoke about two employees in their mid-20s who recently got married and decided to keep their weddings simple after he advised them against excessive spending.
Using these examples, Sridhar Vembu argued that values such as responsibility, financial discipline and commitment to family are not confined to any particular generation.
"These attitudes are timeless. I find them equally in Gen-Z," he added.
