At the time of publication, the fresh-faced Harvard MBA had just been promoted to vice president—moving up the ranks from Weill’s assistant for two years—when he shared the career tip.

Prior to that, he helped analyze multi-million-dollar deals and negotiated major acquisitions. But his instinct was still to claim the right to speak.

And it paid off: A year later, he followed his former boss Weill to the Commercial Credit Company, where he became CFO at just 30-years-old.

Jamie Dimon’s mantra for Gen Z: “Learn, learn, learn, learn, learn, learn, learn.”

Now, Dimon has led JPMorgan as its CEO for 20 years—and even though during that time, the world of work has become more dynamic, frequent and increasingly online, he still tells young people to listen more.

Billionaire banking boss tells Gen Z that if they want to get ahead, they need to shut down their TikTok and Instagram apps and learning by osmosis.

“You can only learn by reading and talking to other people. There is no other way,” Dimon told the crowd of students at the Financial Markets Quality (FMQ) Conference at Georgetown University in 2024. “People are wasting a huge amount of time … turn off TikTok, Facebook.”

Simple advice may seem counterintuitive in an age when young workers are trained to build personal brands from day one and contribute regularly.

But in fact, some experts sound less talkative — especially by practicing actively hearing, stop before speaking, and avoidance unnecessary details—can make a person appear older.

And Dimon’s rule—listen first; noisy then—is what other leaders also recommend.

Even after finding success, Apple’s Steve Jobs still prioritized listening

The CHRO of L’Oréal US advises Gen Z new hires to be those people who raise their hands and volunteer to get coffee from their manager or taking notes in meetings.

Instead of making you look young, he noted that it gives you access to rooms with senior leaders where you can watch and learn how it operates.

“If you take the actions from the meeting and the next steps, and you listen and you observe it’s not negative,” explains L’Oréal exec Stephanie Kramer. “You’re in the room and you know how to get to those points. You develop inference skills.”

Even after building the trillion-dollar tech giant, Apple’s Steve Jobs never pretends to have all the answers. He remained, as his former design chief said, open to learning from other people until the end.

Jony Ive, worked with the late cofounder for nearly 15 years to design iconic products such as the iMac, iPod, iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch.

Reflecting on their relationship in a newly released letter, he wrote that they would spend most days eating together and then brainstorming ideas in the afternoon.

“For Steve, wanting to learn was more important than wanting to be right.”