As Published in Business 2 Business, April 2007

Generational Diversity: Trust No One Under 30!

By Ira S Wolfe

A funny thing happened this week on the way to writing this column.

Laura, the executive director of a national sports association, called me.  Laura was frantically looking for a keynote speaker for their upcoming meeting.  When she first described the topic, I immediately thought “The Perfect Labor Storm.”   Unfortunately they already selected another speaker who was presenting workforce trends and demographics.  Laura had another subject in mind.

“Please don’t be offended,” she pleaded.  “I’m just going to say it.  We’ve got a problem: the average age of our membership is in the 50s. Our board of directors consists of members in their 60s and 70s.  We’re losing young members left and right.  Our association is on a collision course between the old farts and spoiled rotten brats.”  

No one ever described the generation gap quite that way before but Laura was right.  Her association, like so many organizations and businesses, is on a collision course.

“Most organizations have found themselves in a quandary,” according to generation gurus Carolyn Martin and Bruce Tulgan.  “They’ve finally figured out how to recruit young talents, only to watch them clash with older, seasoned employees over issues like work ethic, respect for authority, dress codes, and every work arrangement imaginable. And they’re not sure what to do about it.”

Generational clashes have been around for ages.  Each generation has viewed the next generation with skepticism and cynicism: “kid’s today just don’t have the same work ethics.”  

For the past decade all we heard about was the poor work ethic of the Xers, the generation also known as Generation X. That is until Generation Y or the Millennials arrived on the scene.  Ironically in a twist of fate one of the most common conflicts arising in the workplace today is the result of the Xer’s complaining about the work ethic of the Millennials! 

Just last month a controversial study found today's college students are more narcissistic and self-centered than any preceding generation.  A ferocious response erupted on blogs condemning the study: “our youngest generation isn’t more narcissistic,” the offended said. “We are just more misunderstood,” reads one blog.

Yes, that is true.  In a landmark Center for Applied Research study of the Millennial Generation released last year, two responses dominated:

• The Millennials are spoiled rotten brats whose parents have given them everything.
• The Millennials are extremely talented and will bring the most advanced technology and teamwork skills to the workforce.

Here is the best – and the worst – case scenario from the research. What if both sides are correct and the Millennials are spoiled, narcissistic brats who possess the talent and skills businesses need? 

While that scenario may cause your heart to skip a beat, make your skin crawl and send chills up and down your spine, GET OVER IT!  The Millennials are and will be for next two decades, the replacement workforce every manager has been clamoring for.  Blame it on the boomers who lowered our birthrate to historic lows.  Blame it on society who raised a generation of latch-key kids then expected them to play ball with the rest of the kids.  Blame it on the helicopter parents who won’t let go of their kids long after they reach adulthood.  Blame it on immigration policy.  Blame it on whomever and whatever you want.  The fact remains the Millennials are the replacement workers you’ve been waiting for…and they are nearly 80 million strong, equal to or even larger than the Boomer population.

No one debates that each generation is different.  But different doesn’t mean bad – just different. Each generation has a unique set of values, shaped by political events, economic conditions, major crises and societal norms.  For many people in each generation, these values stick with them for the rest of their lives and filter how they see the preceding and succeeding generation.  Members of each generation tend to view the world at work against their own backdrop. 

What Laura and her association members were experiencing was a clash of generations:  the old farts, Veterans and Boomers, pitted against the spoiled rotten brats, the Gen Xers and Millenials.

What’s unique today is that for the first time in history, four generations are working side-by-side: the Veterans, Baby Boomers, Gen Xers,  and the Millenials.  Up until about 25 or 30 years ago we had only two generations working together:  as one generation aged, a younger generation moved in.  Older workers retired. The next generation moved up to replace them. 

Today we have older workers working longer, many in the same jobs they’ve held since ….well since they left school decades ago.  Then we have the youngest workers hoping to hit the financial jackpot quickly and catapult up the career ladder, leapfrogging anyone in their way.  Death of a Salesman and Glengarry Glen Ross are competing with The Apprentice and American Idol for an audience and the workplace is the theatre.  

The result is generation diversity.  Formerly reserved for issues relating to gender, race and ethnicity, employers are now faced with one more diversity challenge when attempting to recruit and retain workers. 

The solution lies in the wisdom handed down from Sun Tzu in “The Art of War”:

So it is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will win hundred times in hundred battles. If you only know yourself, but not your opponent, you win one and lose the next. If you do not know yourself or your enemy, you will always lose.

In other words, you can’t beat ‘em so learn about ‘em.

Sidebar

It’s funny how a few decades changes everything!

The Veterans grew up between the World Wars and during the depression.  Education for most people was limited to high school.  The next career step was the armed forces for most males and combat for many.  Upon discharge, a few men returned to school but most started their one-stop-career, staying with the company from young adulthood through retired.   Most Veterans grew up in a family with the same parents, same home, two siblings, one family car, one family radio, no air conditioning, and maybe a phonograph. For entertainment, the family would spend a few days at the beach or the lake, play board games and attend Saturday matinees at the town movie theater.  Communication was limited to U.S. Mail and phone, often shared with eight neighbors via party lines.  Veterans worked hard and waited until retirement to play.

Now fast forward to the life of an 18-year-old today.  Young lives are shaped by step-families or single parents. Few 18-year-olds have lived in the same house for more than a few years, moving as parents upscale or forced to house-hop to live with divorced parents.  Many are single children who own their first car at 16 years old, joining the three or four other cars parked in the driveway.  They have owned a personal mobile phone since 8 years old and have never lived in a world without the Internet.  In their bedroom you’ll find a digital TV with 500 stations, laptop computer with high speed access, I-Pod with hundreds of music and video files at their fingertips, and a video game console with enough high tech features that makes the CIA envious.  Family vacations include Europe, cruises, DisneyWorld and the Caribbean.

Finally and possibly the starkest contrast of them all: the Veterans grew up in a world  where children lived with their parents until high school graduation or the first job.  From that point on, these young adults were on their own, generally married by their early 20’s  and raising a family just a few years later.

Today our youth lives in a world of “helicopter parents,” hovering over their children’s every move, and “snowplow parents,” clearing a path for their children.  Described in a column posted on The Wall Street Journal Online, “a new generation of over-involved parents are flooding campus orientations, meddling in registration and interfering with students’ dealing with professors, administrators and roommates.”

At the University of Vermont “parent bouncers” are employed.  The job of the bouncers are to “un-invite” moms and dads who try to attend registration. At the University of Georgia, students who get frustrated or confused during registration have been known to interrupt their advisors to whip out a mobile phone, speed-dial their parents and hand the phone to the adviser saying, “Here, talk to my mom.”  According to Richard Mullendore, a University of Georgia professor and former vice president of student affairs, “the cell phone has become the world’s longest umbilical cord."

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