This morning, I was looking at different articles that caught my fancy, and settled in on one that was written five years ago by 2 authors, Jeanne Meister and Karie Willyerd. Interestingly, they asked the question in that article, "Are you ready to manage five generations of workers?" Basically what they were saying was that today, the work force that you and I are managing, comes across five generations. I began to look at it and realized that we could be falling into it even as we look at the different people who work with us.
What are those five generations? They are:
Traditionalists, born before 1946, aged 68 to 72 years
Baby Boomers, born between 1946 and 1964, aged 50 to 68 years
Gen X, born between 1965 and 1976, between 38 and 49 years
Millennials, born between 1977 and 1997, age group 17 to 37 years
Gen 2020, born after 1997, approximately 17 years or so. The reason that they are included is because they are so tech-savvy that they are contributing to the work force while sitting at home and doing a lot of the work.
This is an interesting divide. Typically, when you look at it, you think – stereotypes. We normally think of the baby boomers as ones who are mystified by Facebook, not sure what to do with Facebook, trying desperately to get on and yet not sure that they are in there or not. Then you have the millennials who walk into a workplace wearing flip-flops. The traditionals who seemingly never retire. The Gen Xers who are only out for themselves. The 2020ers, for who the Smartphones seem to be surgically attached to the ear. These are stereotypes that we have. But the key to dealing with a 4 or 5 generational workplace is to stay away from the stereotypes.
Rebecca Knight wrote an article a couple of months back entitled, "Managing People from 5 Generations" and she talks about some key things. But I realized that very often, we fall into the stereotypes, and we try and mold people into those stereotypes and feed the stereotypes.
I remember many years ago, my son coming into my room, sitting across from me with his legs crossed and saying 'Hey Dad!" When I was growing up, I would never dare to cross my legs and sit in front of my dad. It would have been considered disrespectful to even let him see the sole of my shoe. I realized how times had changed. But I also realized that there was no disrespect in the way that my son was sitting. What had changed were the forms of respect; the intention to be respectful was still there. It's just that this generation was dealing with new forms of respected. As one who was cast in an earlier generation, to be able to communicate and keep that communication going, I had to understand where he was coming from, allow him to be comfortable with his generation and yet, make sure that things like respect (which he had and still does) are not lost. I think that is the key for us as we work across generations, in our workplaces especially, not to typecast and stereotype people, but to be able to take the best out of every generation and see how it all fits together to meet the objectives that the company has.
In the article written by Jeanne Meister, she says, "How will this change the world of work? Consider these four questions:
1. Does your company's brand appeal not only externally (to your customers), but also internally to each of the generations in your workforce?
2. Are you sourcing the next generation of talent where they live? Rather than career fairs and job boards, does your company have a social networking strategy for recruiting using Facebook, LinkedIn, and micro blogging sites such as Twitter?
3. Are you leveraging innovative learning methodologies such as games, simulations, reverse mentoring, e-coaching, peer-to-peer learning, and informal learning, to accelerate learning across the enterprise?
4. Are you preparing your leaders for the next generation of employees? Do your leaders have the skills and tools needed to communicate with the hyper-connected, who are used to rating everything and everyone in their lives?
These were four points that she raised 5 years ago and I thought that it might be a good checklist for you as you look at your workplace today and see whether these points are in play, and if they are not, whether you need to do something about it.
Rebecca Knight goes on to say, "There are some do's and don'ts as you manage across generations.
Do:
· Experiment with mixed-age teams and reverse mentoring programs that enable older, experienced workers to interact with and learn from younger hires. Don't just have a mentoring program that has people who are older mentoring people who are younger. Mentor both ways. Let there be a learning curve that comes downward in terms of age and upward too, in terms of age.
· Develop incentive plans that reflect where your employees are in their lives. For example, the millennials will want incentive plans that have to do with brand and those kinds of images. While the Gen Xers will probably want good insurance plans that deal with children and things like that. Older people may want to have better work-life balance. Know that it's not a one-size-fits-all.
· Conduct regular human resources surveys to get a pulse on your employees' demographics and needs. Be able to add in questions that will help you to get an understanding of their mindset.
Don't:
· Bother with generation-based employee affinity groups – they generally reinforce stereotypes. So don't cast people and say, "This is for the millennials, this is for the baby boomers." Have things that go right across generations. Break the stereotypes.
· Act like a top-down manager – forge partnerships with employees of different ages and encourage them to share their opinions. Give them forums where they can talk back so that you hear their voices.
· Assume you already know how to motivate employees who are older or younger – ask them what they want out of their professional lives.
Good thoughts for us today as we manage and lead, as we deal with a very diverse workforce, that is not only diverse in terms of the skills that are brought, but diverse in terms of age differences as well. I think these are wise words for us as we look at our own lives, our own workforces and say, "How can I really manage people well and better?" we are always learning things and as we learn, we are able to better ourselves. My prayer for you and for me is that we be better leaders, better managers of people than we have been in the past, because we are aware of some of the changing dynamics in our workplaces.
May I pray with you today? Almighty God, we know that we need your wisdom to understand, to see beyond stereotypes, to understand people clearly, know where they are coming from. Give us the wisdom to be able to do that. Give us the inclination to ask for that wisdom. Then help us to apply what we learn from You , what we hear from You into the things that happen in our day-to-day work lives. We ask this in Your name, Lord Jesus. Amen.
• Jeanne C Meister & Karie Willyerd, "Are You Ready to Manage Five Generations of Workers?" https://hbr.org/2009/10/are-you-ready-to-manage-five-g/
• Rebecca Knight, "Managing People from 5 Generations."https://hbr.org/2014/09/managing-people-from-5-generations
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