AGE DIVERSITY IN THE WORKPLACE

To a large extent, how companies manage the differing expectations, career needs, communication styles, and learning preferences of each generation will determine how well they attract, develop, engage and retain top talent. The importance of the shift in demographics that is occurring now is so significant that it is worth diving deeper to understand the implications for 2020. The quote above from Marchesini expresses the growing importance of the latest diversity issue facing organizations today: age diversity. Whereas organizations have historically dealt with diversity in terms of race, gender, sexual orientation, and physical disabilities, they will now also need to manage extreme age diversity as members of four, soon to be five, generations work together side by side.

While a record number of Millennials (those born between 1977 and 1997) are entering the workplace, many older workers are also returning for second careers. Because of the economic meltdown that began in 2008, many older workers simply cannot afford to retire. Interestingly, research from the Pew Research Center’s Social and Demographic Trends project found that the key factor in whether an individual decided to delay retirement was how much money he or she had lost in the economic meltdown. Pew reports that among a sample of 2,969 working adults between the ages of 50 and 64, those who had lost 40 percent or more of their investment nest eggs in the market meltdown were roughly twice as likely as those who had not lost any money to say they would delay retirement.¹

These older workers may either stay in their current jobs longer or enter second careers, fulfilling long-held dreams when possible. Increasingly, the federal government is one sector that appears to be hiring older, more experienced workers.

The Partnership for Public Service, a Washington, D.C.–based public service advocacy group, has launched an initiative to encourage federal agencies to recruit and hire older workers. Partnership data show that of the 68,000 employees hired in 2003 at General Service Levels 12 to 15 (the highest levels for government workers), 15 percent came from outside the federal government, and this number is increasing every year.² Take the example of John Emens, who retired from commercial banking in 2002 after thirty-two years with no idea of what to do next. At a board meeting in Washington, D.C., he mentioned his retirement to a colleague, who suggested he consider a career in the federal service.

Says Emens, “I was in a heavily regulated industry; and federal service and the opportunities it offered had never occurred to me.” He joined the federal Export-Import Bank, where he is now senior vice president for small business.³

To recruit more people like Emens, the Partnership has called on agencies to launch an elite fellowship program for older Americans, modeled after the White House Fellows program. This is the type of creative solution needed to deal with the pending shortage of talent facing federal government agencies.

While the federal government deals with how to attract older workers for second careers, other companies acknowledge a different challenge: how to integrate younger Millennial workers into the workplace. Consider the heightened expectations Millennials bring with them to work. As Ron Alsop, formerly of The Wall Street Journal and the author of The Trophy Kids Grow Up, says, “Millennials have been prepping for years to excel at everything they touch, and they bring this to the workplace.”⁴ In his book he quotes James Danko, the business school dean of Villanova University, who shares a story of how an applicant’s parents once gave him a copy of the Excel spreadsheet they had used to record their child’s every accomplishment. Danko continues:

What happens in the workplace when these credentials-driven Millennials are forced to work side by side with older coworkers, who may at times view them as out of touch with reality?

To successfully answer this question and the others raised by having an age-diverse workforce coexisting in the workplace, it’s important to develop an understanding of each generation as well as the challenges the different generations bring to the workplace in terms of communication styles, career aspirations, and knowledge transfer. Understanding each generation is critical because employers who adapt the fastest to a multigenerational workforce will be able to attract the highest-quality employees when the war for talent is in full swing.

INTRODUCING FIVE GENERATIONS

Today employers are dealing with four generations in the workplace, but by 2020 there will be five generations, and each will bring its own values and beliefs and a different lens to the workplace.

As we can see from figure 2-1, the Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that by the year 2020 there will be five generations in the workplace, with Millennials comprising more than 50 percent of the workforce.

With these projected demographics, companies will need to create new strategies to deal with motivating, communicating with, developing, and engaging the members of each generation. Thus, understanding of the needs, expectations, and demands of each generation will be crucial to creating a workforce development plan for the coming years.

Figure 2-1: Five Generations in the Workplace

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics Employment Projections.

Traditionalists

Baby Boomers

Generation X

Millennials

Generation 2020

 

Let’s examine each generation and the implications their differences will have on human resources, learning, and communications strategies. First, developing an understanding of the demographics is key. Figure 2-2 shows U.S. population data according to the U.S Department of Census as of 2007.

Figure 2-2: U.S. Population by Generation

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2007 American Community Survey.

Traditionalists: Born Before 1946; 46 Million

Traditionalists are also called the Silent Generation and Veterans. As of the year 2010 they were all over the age of 64. The defining events of World War II and the Korean War changed millions of lives and shaped the hardworking, loyal, and patriotic character of the Traditionalist generation. Perhaps Tom Brokaw best captured the Traditionalists in his book entitled The Greatest Generation when he wrote, “They won the war; they saved the world. They came home to joyous and short-lived celebrations and immediately began the task of rebuilding their lives and the world they wanted.”⁶ If there are two words that describe this generation, they are “dependability” and “sacrifice.” They learned at an early age to put aside their needs and wants to work toward a common goal—be it the church, the military, or the workplace.

Today, some Traditionalists have retired, but a growing number are still actively employed in the workplace with no thoughts of retirement. Consider Les Resnick, a Traditionalist IT senior database administrator who retired from Merrill Lynch in 2005. Resnick now commutes down the hall to his home office, where he works in IT for an Indian outsourcing firm. This is his second career and one he is enjoying—not only because of the flexibility it offers him but because it gives him a chance to continue to build his technical skills as well as his savings. As he puts it, “The real reason for my change in work life was to reduce stress levels and take a similar job with fewer headaches, even if it was less money. As a side benefit, I’m keeping my skills current.”

Traditionalists are also known as the Greatest Generation for their service during World War II, but they have also faced the greatest amount of technological change in their home and work lives. Just think about the technological inventions that have occurred in the sixty-plus-year time span since the end of the war, from the first credit card issued in 1946 to color television in 1950, the personal computer in 1981, the first mobile phone in 1987, the emergence of the World Wide Web in 1991 and the introduction of Google in 1998, followed by a host of social media inventions ranging from MySpace to Facebook, YouTube, Second Life, and Twitter.

By 2020, the tail end of the Traditionalists will be 75 years old, and, as we have learned from the Pew Research Center, some of them will still be in the workforce. In researching this book, we encountered one 82-year-old sales representative at PPG Industries, an industrial manufacturing firm, who so thoroughly knows his products and how his clients use them that the CEO of PPG takes him along to key customer visits. Think about it: 82 years old and still working side by side with multiple generations at the company.

Baby Boomers: Born Between 1946 and 1964; 78 Million

As of 2010, Baby Boomers are between their midforties and sixties and make up a large segment of the workforce. Boomers have been called the Cold War Generation and the Growth Economy Generation.⁷ But regardless of their moniker, two of the largest impacts on this generation were the television and the personal computer. In 1950 only 12 percent of U.S. households had a television, but by 1958 that number had soared to 83 percent. The rise of television shaped this generation perhaps more than anything else, and it became the most powerful communication medium available at the time.⁸ As Boomers sat in front of their television sets, their generational personalities were being shaped for years to come. Events such as the Vietnam War, Watergate, the first man on the moon, and the assassinations of the Kennedy brothers were revealed through the visual medium of television, and as Boomers watched TV, their respect for and suspicion of authority was formed.

Though it was the television that had the most impact on the home lives of Boomers, it was the personal computer that directly impacted their jobs in the workplace. Consider this post from “Boomer Chronicles,” a blog written by Rhea, a fifty-something journalist examining the changes in her career as a journalist:

Many Boomers can still remember when they had to “walk to the computer,” because it filled an entire room. The room had card punchers, paper-tape readers, and magnetic tape drives. Employees had limited access to “the computer.” Everything changed in January 1975, when Popular Electronics ran a cover story called “Project Breakthrough: The World’s First Minicomputer Kit to Rival Commercial Models.” This article referred to the Altair, a do-it-yourself computer you could assemble at home, and led to the launch of the first commercial personal computer in 1981. The world changed dramatically after this, and Bill Gates and Paul Allen, the cofounders of Microsoft, born in 1955 and 1953, respectively, were old enough to see the potential of having one’s very own computer when it first became feasible for them in their early twenties. It is not surprising that the Boomer generation points to the personal computer as the invention that most changed their work lives.

Generation X: Born Between 1965 and 1976; 50 Million

As of 2010, Generation Xers are between their thirties and early forties. In the ten years following the boom years of the 1950s, birthrates declined dramatically, and there were 15 percent fewer babies born. Enter Generation X, so named after the title of a 1991 novel, Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture, by Douglas Coupland. In this novel, Coupland describes a generation who comes of age in the late 1980s with a burning desire to hop off the merry-go-round of status, money, and social climbing. In the workplace, they were energized by a Tom Peters manifesto titled “The Brand Called You,” which first appeared in the August 1997 issue of Fast Company magazine when the members of Generation X were in their twenties and thirties. Peters wrote:

Peters’s call to action ignited the aspirations of Generation Xers to become free agents. This is a generation that seeks self-reliance, independence, and balance in their lives. According to “What Business Thinks,” a survey of 408 Minnesota executives conducted by the authors Lynne Lancaster and David Stillman, Generation Xers are willing to pursue balance almost regardless of its impact on their finances. Free time is highly valued by this generation, and they are less likely to work for one employer, as they will go to the company that best fits their work/life needs.

Generation Xers are individualistic and idealistic. Often referred to as “latchkey kids” in their youth due to their early self-sufficiency, they are now known for thinking like entrepreneurs, thriving in situations where they can be independent thinkers, and expecting work/life balance. Starting their careers in a period of social and economic change, members of Generation X have witnessed AIDS, the Persian Gulf War, and the effect of the 1987 stock market crash on their families. Today, they are the generation that most resembles how Millennials use technology to run their personal and professional lives. Although many may be similar to Millennials in their usage of technology, they are aware that Millennials are waiting in the wings for their jobs.

The oldest of this generation are middle-aged in 2010. Expectations will be high for them to become the mentors and coaches of the next generation, the Millennials.

Millennials: Born Between 1977 and 1997; 88 Million

As of 2010, Millennials are in their twenties and early thirties. These young people have been referred to as Digital Natives, Generation Y, the Net Generation and the Google Generation. But whatever you call them, they have been living on the Web for as long as they could write their names. They are digitally confident and easily share photos, text friends, post messages on their Facebook wall, and watch YouTube videos—sometimes all at once.

When you look back over the last twenty years, one of the most significant changes affecting Millennials has been the rise of the World Wide Web and its associated host of digital technologies. Google, launched in 1998, is now so ubiquitous it is used as a verb, and it has become the go-to location to ask questions affecting one’s personal and professional life. In 1983 only 7 percent of households owned a personal computer, but by 2004 that number grew to 44 percent.¹¹

Today, three-quarters of U.S. teenagers between the ages of 15 and 17 have a mobile phone, and 73 percent of young people between the ages of 12 and 17 use the Internet.¹² As these young, tech-savvy people arrive in the workplace, employers will need to figure out how to manage, develop, and engage them.

To get a sense of just how hyperconnected Millennials are, consider the global survey of 862 Millennials commissioned by the Chartered Management Institute in the United Kingdom, entitled “Generation Y: Unlocking the Talent of Young Managers.” A profile of Millennials emerges as a generation that is ambitious, demanding, and hyperconnected and firmly believe they can change the world. According to this survey, Millennials want to:

• Work for an organization that does something they believe in.
• Be self-directed when it comes to their learning and personal development, with 68 percent saying they want to initiate most of their own learning and development.
• Work for organizations that are supportive, empowering, and inspiring.
• Blend their home life and their work life in a fashion that allows them to work when, how, and where they want.
• Develop new skills and good career prospects with their employer.¹³

In summary, this survey paints a picture of young professionals who are in a hurry for success. They have had access to mobile phones, laptops, Facebook, MySpace, and YouTube since their adolescent years. When they did their homework in grade school, they were using Google to find answers quickly. With the latest information constantly streaming into their bedrooms, Millennials have witnessed the Oklahoma City bombings, the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and the Columbine school massacre. Not surprisingly, they cite their personal safety as being of high importance to them on the job.

Though the image of Millennials is often that of an entitled generation, the reality, as demonstrated in our survey, “The Generations @ Work,” and other studies, is that they are the most socially conscious generation since the 1960s. They are committed to developing new skills and want to work for organizations where they have coaches and mentors to learn from on the job. Corporate training is often cited as one of the most attractive benefits to Millennials as they seek to differentiate themselves in their careers.

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) polled 4,271 new college graduates, asking them “What benefits would you value most over the next five years other than salary?” One-third chose training and development as their first-choice benefit other than salary. This was three times higher than those who chose cash bonuses as their first-choice benefit.¹⁴ When asked how they prefer to learn on the job, they listed formal classroom training, coaches, and rotational assignments as their top delivery modes, as seen in figure 2-3.

Figure 2-3: How Much Do You Value the Following Development Opportunities?

Source: PricewaterhouseCoopers, Managing Tomorrow’s People.

Formal, face-to-face learning

e-Learning

Strong coaches/mentors

Rotational assignments

Support for academic training

Interestingly, the least preferred vehicle for training and development was traditional e-learning, pointing to the preference Millennials have for more experiential and personal learning as well as leveraging one’s network of peers and mentors for development.¹⁵ One respondent from the “Managing Tomorrow’s People” survey of college graduates says it best: “Personally I find it critical to have access to coaches and mentors at my job.”¹⁶

Generation 2020: Born After 1997; 41 Million

When it comes to hyperconnectivity, Millennials are the focus at the moment. But forward-thinking employers are starting to research and study the emerging generation, which we call Generation 2020 (Gen 2020). Members of Gen 2020 were born after 1997, making them roughly 11 years old and younger as of the writing of this book. But they will enter the workplace as college graduates in the year 2020.

As a group, they have grown up in a hyper-networked world. For many, their first exposure to social networking started before they entered school on sites such as Disney’s Club Penguin. In elementary school, they learned to network on Webkinz World, a type of Second Life for kids. In this virtual world, children build profiles much like those on Facebook, while chatting with their friends. Each Webkinz comes with a unique secret code, allowing users access to the Webkinz World. You might be wondering how much time these kids spend in Webkinz World. An amazing two hours and eight minutes per visit. Compare this with an average visit on YouTube, which is thirty-two minutes, or an average visit on Facebook, which is twenty minutes and fifty-two seconds, as of April 2008. As 11-year-old Liana Crandall, a fifth-grader, says, “I get all my homework done during recess because then I can go home and play Webkinz. I play at least an hour a day, two hours tops.” Liana is one of 20 million U.S. kids aged 8 to 14 who are online in social networks and playing with Webkinz.¹⁷

If we think Millennials are connected, we have yet to encounter Gen 2020 in the workplace. They will bring a heightened set of requirements and digital expectations with them as well as a “wish list” of what they expect of their employer. To see just how hyperconnected Gen 2020 is, CTIA—The Wireless Association, in conjunction with Harris Interactive, surveyed a nationally representative sample of 2,089 teenagers 13 to 19 years old about their mobile phone usage in a report entitled “Teenagers: A Generation Unplugged.” The results show the following Gen 2020 values:

• 66 percent want the freedom to get an education anywhere on Earth, even through their phone.
• 66 percent want to have their medical records and other critical information available to rescue workers via a mobile device.
• 57 percent of smart phone users and 29 percent of regular cell phone users said they carry their cell phone because it is how they stay connected to their world.
• 59 percent want mobile access to help them organize their volunteering opportunities and corporate social responsibilities.¹⁸

For many of these kids, the ideal mobile phone is a fully featured multimedia device that is essentially an MP3 player, GPS, desktop/laptop computer, portable video player, text-messaging device, and phone all rolled into one.

“THE GENERATIONS @ WORK” GLOBAL SURVEY

To understand the needs, wants, and expectations of a multigenerational workforce, we polled more than 2,200 members of four generations currently in the workforce. All respondents were working professionals employed in industries ranging from administrative services to education, financial services, the government, health care, high tech and telecommunications, manufacturing, professional services, and retail. The distribution of these respondents in our survey is shown in figure 2-4. The survey explored the values, behaviors, and mind-set of each generation, along with the expectations they have of their employer.

Figure 2-4: “The Generations @ Work” Research by Industry and Region

Industry

Administrative services

Education

Financial services/insurance/banking

Government

Health care

High tech and telecommunications

Manufacturing

Professional services

Retail/travel/hospitality

Region

Asia Pacific

Europe, the Mideast, and Africa

The Americas

Source: Future Workplace.

The various generations have lived through vastly different world events, and each has developed generational core traits that reflect the eras in which they grew up. These experiences and traits are shown in table 2-1.

TABLE 2-1: WHO ARE THE FIVE GENERATIONS?

Generation: Traditionalists Major trait: loyalty

Major Influences: World War II, Cold War, Korean War, rise of suburbs

Broad Traits: Sacrifice, loyalty, discipline, respect for authority

Defining Invention: Fax machine

 

Generation: Baby Boomers Major trait: competition

Major Influences: Watergate, women’s rights, Woodstock, JFK assassination

Broad Traits: Competitive, sandwiched generation, hard work, long hours

Defining Invention: Personal computer

 

Generation: Generation X Major trait: self-reliance

Major Influences: MTV, AIDS, Gulf War, 1987 stock market crash, fall of Berlin Wall

Broad Traits: Eclecticism, self-reliance, free agents, work/life balance, independence

Defining Invention: Mobile phone

 

Generation: Millennials Major trait: immediacy

Major Influences: Google, Facebook, 9/11 terrorist attacks, election of Barack Obama

Broad Traits: Community service, cyberliteracy, tolerance, diversity, confidence

Defining Invention: Google and Facebook

 

Generation: Generation 2020 Major trait: hyperconnectedness

Major Influences: Social games, Iraq War, Great Recession

Broad Traits: Mobility, media savvy, life online starting in preschool, reading books on e-readers

Defining Invention: iPhone apps

 

Source: Future Workplace.

FIVE KEY FINDINGS FROM “THE GENERATIONS @ WORK” SURVEY

Each generation brings a different lens to the workplace. They have differing expectations for how they want to work, learn, and communicate. The different lenses of each generation will impact the employer-employee relationship. Five findings from “The Generations @ Work” research reveal how these preferences and expectations will play out in the future workplace.

1. Traditionalists and Boomers Are as Likely to Be Web Contributors as Millennials Are

It is not only the Millennials who are active contributors on social media sites; members of all generations are engaging with and contributing to these sites. However, Traditionalists and Boomers are more likely to be active contributors to existing content, while Millennials focus on creating and publishing new content.

Figure 2-5: Social Media Usage of “The Generations @ Work”

Source: “The Generations @ Work” survey, Future Workplace.

Figure 2-5 shows how the use of social media varies by generation, with contributors represented in all four generations. We were surprised to find that the contribution rate for each generation was remarkably similar, meaning that working professionals across the spectrum were active contributors of content on the Web. However, while each generation contributes to the Web, the quantity of contribution may vary, even though the ability to contribute may be similar.

Variations in the usage of social media thus may be more likely to reflect the differences of individual mind-sets than generational biases. Some Traditionalists view the latest technologies as toys they will perhaps get around to learning to use someday, while other Traditionalists view experimenting with the latest technologies as an extension of themselves and an important way to stay on top of their game. Many Boomers also fall into this category. Jean Frink, the 48-year-old owner of Frink Family Farms of Fayetteville, North Carolina, says this about how she uses Facebook: “I find myself able to rapidly communicate with a group of ‘friends’ on Facebook. I use Facebook to give me feedback on new products at the farm—in fact, I think of my time on Facebook as providing me with a mini new-product test kitchen. My Facebook friends have been instrumental to helping me build my business.”

2. Boomers and Generation X Look for a Work Life/Home Life Balance, While Millennials See Work as “Part of Life”

Boomers and Generation Xers place a high value on being able to blend their work and home lives, while Millennials consider work to be part of life. For Millennials, finding a balance between work life and home life seems “irrelevant,” in the words of one survey respondent, because “work is part of life, not separate from it.” Millennials live in weisure time, the next step in work life, where work and leisure are one and the same.

Millennials see their work as a place to make new friends and develop work relationships that will benefit them for the rest of their lives. As Joy Thomas, a 24-year-old Millennial based in California who works as an accountant for Aera Energy LLC, says, “I do not think of work being separate from the rest of my life. I think the term ‘work/life balance’ is out of date and not meaningful at all. Rather, I’ll stay with a company if I’m able to be challenged by the work, make new friends, learn new skills, and be fulfilled in what I do.” Though Millennials want more flexibility in choosing where to work, when to work, and how to work, they still want and expect interaction with teammates on the job.

3. Millennials and Generation X Place a High Importance on Working for a Company That Develops Both Their Career and Life Skills

Millennials and Generation Xers acknowledge that establishing oneself in a career is vastly different from going to school. What’s important to members of these two generations is being able to take advantage of company-funded training and development programs. As figure 2-6 shows, members of Millennial and Generation X could also be called the Learning Generation, for the importance they place on continuous skill development on the job.

Figure 2-6: The Percentage of Respondents in Each Generation Who Placed High Importance on Developing Skills

Source: “The Generations @ Work” survey, Future Workplace.

Perhaps most surprising, Millennials and Generation Xers are requesting training and development in “life skills” as well as technical skills. In fact, two-thirds of those polled in the PwC survey “Managing Tomorrow’s People” would be comfortable with the idea of “employers providing more personal services to workers, such as housing, food, and regular doctor and dentist appointments.”¹⁹ Similarly, “The Generations @ Work” survey respondent Debbie Merrington, a 40-year-old executive assistant at a travel and tourism agency in Cape Town, South Africa, says, “I think employers should not only train employees in job-related skills, but they should also give employees assistance with building better life skills. By life skills, I mean training in areas such as financial literacy (i.e., buying a new car, investing in the stock market, or buying a new house), learning a new language, and health and wellness.” Millennials and Generation Xers see a growing blurring of the lines between work and home life, and as they spend more of their leisure time working, they expect their employer to play a greater role in assisting them with developing their life.

4. Millennials Are Likely to Select an Employer Based on the Ability to Access the Latest Tools and Technologies at Work

Fifty-eight percent of Millennials and 52 percent of Generation Xers agreed that having access to sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube is a factor in selecting a new employer.²⁰ Figure 2-7 shows the importance of access to the latest tools and technologies at work. And what happens if employers do not allow access to these sites? A recent survey conducted by Accenture reports that Millennials will use their own technology and mobile devices at work, and one factor they will use in selecting an employer will be how accommodating the company is to their personal technology preferences. The survey polled more than four hundred students and found that they expect their employer to accommodate their IT preferences. These range from the type of computer used at the company to access to instant messaging, RSS feeds, and social networking sites.

Figure 2-7: The Importance of Having Access to Web 2.0 Technologies

Source: “The Generations @ Work” survey, Future Workplace.

Percentage of each generation who say having access to external social networks (LinkedIn, Plaxo, Facebook, YouTube, MySpace, external blogs, and wikis) at work makes them more likely to consider a job

Interestingly, almost half of all Millennials surveyed who use social networks, blogs, and Twitter do so without the support of their employer’s IT department (and occasionally against the IT policies of their companies). The Accenture survey argues that over time companies will have to acknowledge their employees’ technology preferences, since more than half of the survey respondents said a company’s usage of technology was a major factor in their selection of an employer.²¹

Brad Hargreaves, the 24-year-old founder and CEO of GXStudios, a company that creates games for corporate learning, says this: “The Millennials I hire to work in our company expect us to provide them with access to external social networking sites—we trust them to use these sites to do their jobs, and we train new hires on how to be responsible using these sites at work.”

5. Both Traditionalists and Boomers Place High Importance on a Manager Who Understands Age Diversity in the Workplace

Surprisingly, Traditionalists and Boomers are the ones most concerned with working for a manager who values employees across all four generations. One might expect Millennials to be the most concerned as they enter the workforce and see established generations in front of them. But in fact the reverse is true. Why is this? It may be that Traditionalists and Boomers see the increasing focus now going to how employers integrate Millennials and Generation Xers into the workplace. Some may be saying “Not so fast, what about us?” Traditionalists and Boomers want to work for managers who value and understand how to deal with age diversity in the workplace.

Robert Burnside, a 60-year-old partner with Ketchum, a public relations firm, notes that though the average age of a Ketchum employee is 35 years, there is a great deal of age diversity in the firm. Burnside says, “Managers need to better understand the different expectations of each generation and how each approaches new work assignments. It is to everyone’s benefit to surface these differences early on and learn how to use them to create a better final work product.”

COMMUNICATING ACROSS GENERATIONS IN THE WORKPLACE

Once the personal needs, expectations, and desires of the generations are recognized and addressed, the next hurdle is how to best communicate with each generation in the workplace.

Deloitte Consulting and the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) conducted a survey of 1,279 members of the IABC to identify the optimal communication style for each generation. As shown in table 2-2, the differences are sizable.

TABLE 2-2: TALKING ’BOUT MY GENERATION

The four generations represented in the current workforce have very different preferences across all aspects of communication. It is clear that communication preferences have changed and we need to adapt to engage diverse audiences.

 

Style

Traditionalists: Formal

Baby Boomers: Semiformal

Generation X: Not so serious; irreverent

Millennials: Eye-catching; fun

 

Content

Traditionalists: Detail; prose-style writing

Baby Boomers: Chunk it down but give me everything

Generation X: Get to the point—what do I need to know?

Millennials: If and when I need it, I’ll find it online

 

Context

Traditionalists: Relevance to my security; historical perspective

Baby Boomers: Relevance to the bottom line and my rewards

Generation X: Relevance to now, today, and my role

Millennials: Relevance to what matters to me

 

Attitude

Traditionalists: Accepting and trusting of authority and hierarchy

Baby Boomers: Accept the “rules” as created by the Traditionalists

Generation X: Openly question authority; often branded as cynics and skeptics

Millennials: OK with authority that earns their respect

 

Tactics

Traditionalists: Print; conventional mail; face-to-face dialogue or by phone; some online information/interaction

Baby Boomers: Print; conventional mail; face-to-face dialogue; online tools and resources

Generation X: Online; some face-to-face meetings (if really needed); games; technological interaction

Millennials: Online; wired; seamlessly connected through technology

 

Speed

Traditionalists: Attainable within reasonable time frame

Baby Boomers: Available; handy

Generation X: Immediate; when I need it

Millennials: Five minutes ago

 

Frequency

Traditionalists: In digestible amounts

Baby Boomers: As needed

Generation X: Whenever

Millennials: Constant

 

Source: Deloitte Consulting and the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC).

 

Whereas Traditionalists prefer digestible amounts of information delivered either in print, by mail, face-to-face, or by phone, Millennials want constant communication, ideally delivered through texting or e-mail or on internal or external social networking sites. Specifically, Millennials want:

• Shorter, more frequent updates: Millennials demand to be kept informed and plugged in. If they sense leadership is not updating them sufficiently, they will find answers elsewhere—most likely in their own online social networks. Bottom line: speed and frequency of communications are critical to them.
• Authentic communications: Marketers from MTV to eBay have bombarded Millennials for years, and in return, this generation has become a tough audience. They demand authentic communications and read each communications message with a “Why should I care?” attitude. They will disengage if they feel they are being spoon-fed a contrived message from the “corporate branding office.”
• “Free-form communications” using real-world collaboration tools such as multiplayer games. Google is perhaps best associated with being a “great place to work for Millennials.” In 2008, Google once again came in first in Fortune magazine’s annual ranking of the “100 Best Companies to Work For.”²² When Google opened its New York City office in 2007, the office space was spread across four floors, placing employees from different projects in close proximity. Google’s management quickly realized that the company could benefit from building stronger connections between floormates, who might not typically interact with one another on a project. The answer: an online multiplayer social game called GoCrossOffice, modeled after the game Risk, in which players collaborate with, organize, and socialize with one another and in the process strengthen their team-building and strategic thinking skills.

So what does this mean for organizations? How can you develop and engage each of the generations to work and ease the tensions that may occur when four generations find themselves in the same workplace?

First, while each generation brings a unique perspective on what it looks for in a potential employer, there are wide similarities among the generations. Business executives must first tap into generational similarities before moving toward understanding their differences.

Members of all generations want to feel valued, empowered, and engaged at work. This is a fundamental human need, which spans across the generations. Though Generation Xers and Millennials openly discuss and even demand more flexibility in their jobs as they attempt to customize their job to the rest of their lives, Boomers and Traditionalists have this need as well, even if they are less vocal on the subject.

In addition, members of all generations want to be trusted at work. Employees want their leaders to believe that they will perform their jobs as productively and efficiently as possible. Increasingly, this means having access to the latest tools and technologies such as Facebook, YouTube, and wikis at work. Often companies, under the excuse of inadequate bandwidth or increased security, are blocking this access. If we are honest, however, the real issue is usually one of trust.

Not long ago, there was similar hand-wringing over the use of e-mail when some business executives believed that using e-mail might expose corporate secrets to the outside world. The same argument is now being used about social media in the workplace. But by trusting their employees and providing them with guidelines for using social media, companies can create a powerful retention and productivity tool.

As Gen Xers and Millennials bring digital expectations to the workplace, they will demand changes in the types of tools and technologies they can access at work. To address these expectations, forward-thinking employers are leveraging social media tools to create communities of practice, threaded discussion boards, and open innovation jams, as well as wikis and blogs for knowledge transfer between the generations. Chapter 5, “Über-connect Your Organization,” is dedicated to the innovative ways companies are using corporate social technologies to drive innovation in the workplace.

WHAT CAN YOU DO TO BETTER MANAGE AGE DIVERSITY IN THE WORKPLACE?

A handful of companies are dealing with age diversity in the workplace by creating new strategies for managing across generations. These strategies range from developing new training programs to revising performance development processes and to inventing more customized jobs and careers. L’Oréal Canada, with an age-diverse workforce made up of one-third Boomers, one-third Generation Xers, and one-third Millennials, took action by creating a training program for how to manage across the generations. According to Marjolaine Rompre, the director of learning development, “This new generation is so candid about participating and a lot freer. When we saw that, we realized we could be faced with an interesting problem. We called it Generation Shock.” To address these generational needs, L’Oréal created a training program called Valorize Generational Differences. So far, more than 500 employees have gone through the program. According to Rompre, “the Ys told us they were so happy to learn why the baby boomers were so conservative and why Gen X didn’t want to share information with them.”²³

Rompre elaborates on one of the biggest impacts of the program: to showcase the values, myths, and paradoxes of each generation with a focus on Millennials. For example, Millennials at L’Oréal “really want to be autonomous, yet they also want validation. They want to be independent, but like to work in teams. They practice extensive freedom of speech and are very candid, but they lack political savvy. They want to be everywhere at the same time but have real difficulty managing priorities.” Rompre continues, “When I share those things with them, they go, ‘Yes.’ They realize they’re not that easy to manage, and this sheds light on who they are.”²⁴

In addition to creating new training programs, some companies are revamping their performance management processes to set career expectations in increasingly flattened organizations. Danielle Robinson, the director of diversity, talent, and organizational design for the global premium drink firm Diageo, has done just that. Robinson says the presence of Millennials in the workplace “has added a layer of complexity to an already complex work environment.”²⁵ The answer for Diageo was to revise its performance development process and create a new section, called Big Hopes, which encourages an open career dialogue between a Millennial and his or her manager. According to Robinson, “Big Hopes can help to set Millennial expectations for career development. For example, younger employees may have unreasonable but strongly held career expectations. Having a dialogue forces the manager to explain the gap and start a conversation with the employee. The programs have been successful at Diageo because everyone walks away knowing where they stand.”²⁶

Finally, it seems as though everything we touch these days, from our iPods to our blue jeans, can be customized and personalized. But often our jobs and our benefits look and feel the same as last year’s. Susan Cantrell and David Smith argue in their new book, Workforce of One, that companies should adopt a “workforce of one approach” to human capital management, meaning applying customer-driven customization and segmentation practices to employees. After all, at the individual level, even broad generalizations about age may not hold true, as in a Boomer tech worker who may be far more social media–savvy than a Luddite Millennial. David Smith says, “Creating a workforce-of-one approach starts with segmenting employees according to various factors such as value to the organization [i.e., high potential employees,] workforce category such as mission critical areas of sales, supply chain or customer contact and finally age. Then career development, reward structures and even methods for delivering learning and development can be customized to each employee segment.” Using customer segmentation strategies for employees can also lead to personalization of benefits. Rather than a standard package of health, wealth, and paid time off, companies can provide employees with a budget and a widely diverse set of options. These can range from sponsoring paid community service time overseas to allowing for credits to buy a hybrid car or even financially supporting an increased personal skill, such as learning a new language. The options are endless. How to fund this? In one survey, Millennials indicated that they are willing to make trade-offs in terms of base salary in order to have a job that fits with their values.²⁷

As Millennials enter the workplace, they will begin to transform it just as they have transformed the political landscape. In the United States, those under 25 years old not only voted in record numbers in the 2008 U.S. presidential election, but they were highly involved and actively participated in providing policy suggestions to then candidate Obama’s online social network, My.BarackObama.com. This online social network was responsible for raising more money, holding more events, making more fund-raising phone calls, and offering more policy suggestions than any other presidential campaign in history of American elections. If these Millennials played a key factor in deciding who won a presidential election, they will almost certainly play a larger role in a global workplace and shape how, where, and when work occurs.

Thriving in the 2020 workplace will require organizations to understand the various needs, expectations, and values of all the generations. Companies will need to start making some fundamental changes in how they design jobs, careers, learning programs, and even benefits. Increasingly, they will need to take into account the impact online consumer innovations (such as Google, Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter) will have on how, when, and where work is done. MyBarack, MySpace, and MyYahoo will lead to MyCareer, MyLearning, MyCommunityService, and MyBenefits—all powered by the latest technologies we are accustomed to in our personal lives. Though we see the heightened demands for access to these technologies from Millennials, we will soon be overwhelmed by the hyperconnected needs of Gen 2020. R U RDY?*

SUMMARY

• Understand that the generational balance of your workplace is shifting. Traditionalists (those born before 1946) are staying in the workplace longer, just as Millennials (those born 1977 to 1997) are entering the workplace in record numbers, and Baby Boomers (born 1946 to 1964) and Generation X (born 1965 and 1976) are reaching new levels in their careers. Members of Generation 2020 (born after 1997) are not in the workplace yet, but employers need to be preparing now for the needs and expectations this hyperconnected generation will bring to the workplace.
• Recognize the distinct characteristics of each generation. Each generation is defined by certain core traits. Recognizing and integrating these different generational orientations into the workplace will help allow all the generations in a company to thrive.
• Learn to communicate in different ways to reach different employees. Each generation communicates differently, and employers will have to learn how to negotiate their different expectations and desires. For example, whereas Traditionalists prefer information to be conveyed in a tangible form—by print, mail, face-to-face, or phone—Millennials prefer to receive information as a constant flow of communication transmitted via new technology, i.e., text messages, instant messages, e-mail, or updates to their profile on a corporate social network.
• Take steps to bridge the gap in managing employees of different generations. Learn to develop and mentor employees in generationally sensitive ways. For example, research shows that Millennials prefer to learn from coaches, mentors, and in their own networks, so be prepared to expand the delivery modes of corporate learning programs.
• Keep five themes in mind when thinking about the Millennial generation: politically aware, involved socially, tech-savvy, committed to learning, and driven to innovate. Millennials, with their profound passion and commitment to using the latest technologies, will spark the development of new products, new services, new political movements, and a new set of requirements for employers. Forward-thinking companies will have to understand the needs and desires of this generation to best source, recruit, and retain them.