The Growing Pressures of Hustle Culture
Many people have discussed how social media has impacted our beauty standards, but what about our workforce and the expectations put on the newer generation?
Being a college student in 2025 is vastly different from being a college student 10-15 years ago. With the rise of social media, there has been one major game-changer for college students in determining their success: LinkedIn. LinkedIn is an app designed for professional networking and is heavily used by companies and recruiters around the globe to seek out potential new hires and professional connections. As a business student, LinkedIn is regarded as a vital tool for networking and finding a job or career path after graduation..
I, like many other college students across the country, have felt paralyzed by the pressures of having a perfect resume and LinkedIn profile. To make matters worse, the job market has been impossible to navigate, with some recent graduates going to TikTok to post about having applied to 200+ jobs without any success. Companies are even posting “entry-level” jobs that require 5+ years of experience, putting pressure on college students to begin their internship searches earlier and earlier. This incredibly competitive market has led to a toxic culture of students having to fight for opportunities by trying to reach nearly impossible standards.
Every time I open LinkedIn, I am bombarded with posts from other students at my school posting about their amazing new internships and jobs spanning all across the country. It can be exhausting to see so many people reflecting on their amazing study abroad experiences, internships, and professional events, when I am someone who is struggling to find the right opportunities for myself. I am someone who has faced a lot of hardship in my personal life throughout my college career, and have struggled to keep up with the hustle of my peers. This is something I think a lot of other students can relate to, and are silently struggling to find what their version of success may look like.
Building off of that, we must also acknowledge who else may be getting left behind in this new culture. Many of the internships that look the best for recruiting and for future careers are summer-long and unpaid. Students who rely on their own income to support themselves are unable to partake in these opportunities and may have to work retail or service jobs to make ends meet. This greatly impacts other students' chances to secure a competitive resume and creates an uneven playing field for graduating college students.
These additional pressures seem to be furthered by the creation of social media and the need for every person, no matter how young, to have a “brand.” This has only recently become a problem due to the popularization of handheld technology and the ability to be recorded or photographed at any time. Our “brands” are in jeopardy every time we step out of our front doors, and this has become an incredible burden for the newer generation to bear. When young adults are now expected to have their career goals mapped out as early as 17 and 18 to secure the proper connections, experiences, and opportunities, it’s no wonder why our generation has such high rates of anxiety and burnout. The expectations have never been higher, and many are struggling to cope with these incredible standards.
Throughout my academic career, it seems like every time I have reached the ceiling for success, it gets raised another few feet. Once I was able to get over a 3.5 GPA to make Honor Roll in middle school, suddenly 4.0s are the standard. Now that everyone had a 4.0, it became all about having the perfect volunteer experiences and extracurriculars in high school. This seems to have continued into college with the creation of LinkedIn and having the perfect record, except now the stakes are far higher– they affect my future income. Getting the perfect job after college is definitely not a new idea, but having LinkedIn and seeing the success of so many other people amplifies the need to stand out and amplifies the consequences of not succeeding.
The fear of not having the perfect lifestyle that you see on social media is something the majority of people my age have faced at least once in their lives. We have the power to see so much more than we ever would have been able to if we were growing up in the 80s or 90s, like most of our parents. Even though we are facing enormous pressure from the internet to succeed at such a young age, it is important to remember that everyone is on their own timeline. The success of someone else does not define your own success, and it is important to adapt to your challenges and focus on yourself.
Your personal best will always be enough, and others' successes do not diminish your own.