The Guru Nation Blog

The challenge for most leaders in managing generational workforces is actually in comprehending the expectations of each of the four generations currently in the workforce. Tammy Erickson, when she wrote Workforce Crisis, did stunning research to identify not only the value system of each generation but also how those values play out in the workplace. Inside a Fortune 500 company, managing generational workforces means understanding and responding to Traditionalists, Baby Boomers, Gen X and Gen Y as distinct groups. Leadership and motivation around each group cannot look the same.

For the purposes on understanding how we manage generational workforces, let’s “dig down” into the values and expectations of one group as an example. Looking at the portrait of the mid-career worker, we see a segment of people born between 1951 and 1970, most of the Boomer generation and the older part of Gen X. These mid-career players see big picture, are sparked to do something meaningful in their lives, and will work to embrace the hope and vision of their organization. They are self-reliant, ambitious, competitive, expecting clear rules of performance measurement. On whole, this group breaks rules, experiments on many levels, demands participative management, and values horizontal vs. hierarchical organizations.

When it comes to managing generational workforces, the organization can be addressing the management challenge of this generational group by instituting fresh training and development, creating mentoring and knowledge sharing programs, advocating job-swaps inside the company, offering sabbaticals, and providing career-change options. The challenge for organizations is to recognize the talents of each generational co-hort and respond in a newly imagined way. Ms. Erickson can help.

Tamara Erickson -
“Generations Together - The Next Challenge”

With so many generations in workforce, the cry is for more education and continued learning. Whether a Gen Y or a Baby Boomer, men and women at every generational level want to be fed by programs that expand their thinking and their ability to increase their performance.

We now have four generations in the workforce, and companies should pay heed!

According to Tammy Erickson, co-author of Workforce Crisis, companies are offering too few learning opportunities. If the generations in today’s workforce can’t receive proper training and expanded learning, then the employer will pay the price in lost capability, performance, and engagement.

In Workforce Crisis, Ms. Erickson advises that companies can become “Learning Organizations” for all the generations in the workforce. A learning organization is one that is talented at creating, acquiring, transferring and interpreting knowledge. Then, with intention, the company has to modify its behavior to reflect that new knowledge. To do this effectively, an organization has to promote and reward skill development and respect differences between individuals.

It doesn’t stop there!

A strong learning organization feeds its generations in the workforce by encouraging risk taking and asking for timely feedback. Knowledge is openly shared.To meet the needs of the generations in the workforce, here are basic questions to ask in order to begin the process:

What does the organization need to learn more about?
What do we need to know more about our customers?
How can we use what we learn to improve performance?
What must we decide faster?
How can we revise our business processes and re-orient our technology infrastructure?