Leading An Intergenerational Workforce

Effectively managing a multigenerational workplace is one of the key challenges facing leaders today. Managers ask us: "How do I adjust my leadership for a Boomer, Gen X, Millennial, or the latest crop of job seekers -- Gen Z?" It’s a valid question. Each generation has unique expectations and perspectives about work, and achieving higher levels of employee engagement and retention will require leaders at all levels to pay attention to their differences.

Why Is This Conversation Important?

Retention is at the forefront of many business strategies in 2018. And it should be! With our shrinking labor pool, finding and keeping the right employees is harder than ever. The future of work conversation needs to start now (or yesterday) because the standard view of employment practices will need to shift significantly.

Millennials make up the largest segment of the active workforce in the United States and there’s no shortage of content on the web about what they expect from work. One thing is clear: their expectations extend well beyond a paycheck. For this essential segment of the labor force to perform at their best and decide to stay, companies can either choose adapt how they lead or lose their younger employees. The early adopters who adjust the outmoded workplace norms will be the big winners going forward.

The Intergenerational Workview

That begs two questions for leaders: what does it look like to more effectively lead Millennials and Gen Z, and where does that leave Boomers and Gen Xers, who still make up a significant and valuable part of teams across America?

Companies can either choose adapt or lose their younger employees. The early adopters who adjust outmoded workplace norms will be the big winners going forward.

Here's what we know: what drives human behavior in the workplace at its most fundamental level is the same regardless of generation. We are all hardwired with a need for validation - to be seen, to be noticed. We're hardwired to be recognized for what we do, the things we accomplish, our special skills. We're also hardwired to get feedback on our performance to know where we stand within our work tribe. Regardless of generation, the question the limbic system is asking all the time is "How am I doing?" Leaders must address these same three imperatives - validation, recognition, and feedback - across all generations.

Now, what is different? The key marker of generational differences is the sociological signatures of their formative years. Each generation absorbs unique experiences as they grow up and these experiences, both cognitive and emotional, contribute to their worldview and I would add, their workview.

For the Greatest Generation, their era was marked by deprivation stemming from either a depression or a World War. Those experiences had an impact on their worldview; it helped determine how they saw the world and what they considered important. As a result their children, Boomers, grew up with parents holding a scarcity mindset. They entered the workforce with parents who told them they were lucky to have a job. Their workview included a pervasive mentality that conditions of a job mattered much less than the security it represented.

If you're a Boomer, and certainly for some Gen X, you likely define work more as a survival issue. That is, if you have a job, you have food on the table and a roof over your head. You are more likely to frame work as a means to ensure your family is properly cared for. Work doesn’t have to be fun or enjoyable and you don’t necessarily have to find meaning and purpose in it. You just needed to count on a regular paycheck.

If you're a Millennial, you grew up in a different era. Generally speaking, you didn't have extended years of deprivation in your childhood like your parents or grandparents likely had. That's a good thing! The American economy is robust and has been on an upward trajectory for more than nine years now. As a result, Millennials have a different workview. They don't see work as survival issue. They simply see work differently.

For example, research shows they see work as a place to extend their social network. They want to enjoy the people they work with, to build and extend their friendships and connections with colleagues. They want to find meaning and purpose in what they do. Many Millennials and Gen Z employees are also very values focused. If an organization has core values, they expect them to be followed by every leader in the organization, much more so perhaps than previous generations do. The expectations of this new workview are a struggle for many managers who haven't developed the leadership breadth to guide a new generation.

Validation, recognition, and giving supportive feedback resonate the same neurochemically across all generations.

From the start, I made it clear that at our core, what drives our behavior is the same, and that is really good news for managers. It means the things you do around validation, recognition, and giving constructive and supportive feedback, resonate the same neurochemically across all generations. It has a uniform benefit. How those forms of communication play out, however, may differ. Boomers may not expect validation and recognition as much as Millennials, but their brains still crave it. It should be reassuring to a leader to know that when you do certain things with your team it has equal benefit across the board, from a brain perspective.

The Changing Pace of Promotions

Now, here's one other generational issue we see in our client companies: the impact of a changing pace in career growth. Let's say for a Boomer it took eight years to get from one title iteration to the next when they were starting their career - from Analyst to Manager to Director, for example. For Gen X that same iteration between titles might have dropped to five or six years. Today, that that iteration between title changes for a Millennial may have collapsed to two or three years.

This change in pace is great for Millennials, because they want to have a more consistent sense of progression. As they improve their skills and contribute at increasingly higher levels, they want to be seen and receive the validation of having progressed, such as with a title change. But for Baby Boomers and older Gen Xers it could feel unfair and a bit threatening if Millennials move up the organizational ladder so quickly. It’s a valid feeling managers need to be attuned to.

Leaders should listen and express understanding and empathy when older workers raise their concerns. They should acknowledge that it's happening, but also to say "The the pace of life has changed across the board, and it's no different here either. Everything is moving more quickly. Yes, it feels hard and in some cases it might not feel fair when it took you longer to get where you are. It is important to me that you know how valued you are, and it’s also important that we show our younger employees how valuable their contributions are. Promotions might look or feel different today than when you were just starting out your career, but that’s the new norm and its important that we adapt in order to thrive."

Managers who lead with the nuances and impact of different generational workviews in mind, and even talk about it openly with their staff, will reap valuable benefits.

Key Takeaways:

• Each generation has unique experiences that have helped form their workview.
• What drives human behavior at a fundamental level is the same, regardless of generation.
• Leaders need to embrace and implement regular practices of validation, recognition, and feedback.
• How, and how often, leaders give validation, recognition, and feedback may look different across the generations.
• Leaders need to practice talking about and modeling core values. Their behavior has to be congruent with the values and expectations of the company.
• Leaders should create more opportunities for growth and challenge, especially for their younger employees, to ensure all employees feel like they are on a continual upward trajectory in the organization.
• Not everyone in the team will feel comfortable with the pace of change a new generation brings to the workforce. Leaders should listen and empathize, while bringing them alongside the shifting environment.

For more guidance on how to adapt to the changing state of work, I go into detail on the neuroscience that drives high-performance cultures in Thrive By Design (ForbesBooks). Read it already? Let me know what you think!