How to deal effectively with age differences in the workplace

Most workplaces have employees that vary in age. One of the most common questions I get - has to do with helping employees and leaders - create cohesive work groups out of teams with large age differences. 

- What requirements do different generations need? 

The big shocker is that there isn’t really much of a difference between generations. They have the same levels of narcissism and emotional problems. They also have similar levels of conscientiousness and stick to itiveness. The big difference actually has to do with social trust. Older people grew up in a time of social investment and as a result – have a lot of social trust. Younger people have been experiencing social disinvestment – so they have low levels of social trust.  This difference in trust may make it seem to an older person that a younger person is less invested. And they may very well be because in their experience, you can’t trust others to follow through on their promises – because society hasn’t.

What younger people need – most companies can’t supply – which is the concept that if they give themselves to the company – the company will reward them for their hard work.  The social trust for that equation – just isn’t quite there for younger people and for good reason.

- How do you avoid workplace conflict and keep everyone happy 

Humanistic communication strategies and a lot of compassion. Everyone has issues. Everyone. The tendency is for people to think they are right and the other person is wrong when a conflict arises. The way around that is to create team cohesiveness. So that everyone sees themselves as part of the same team – working towards a common goal or problem to be solved.  This way – conflicts are seen as disagreement over best course of action as oppose to being seen as life and death struggles for the righteousness of our tribal cause, whatever that is. Disagreements are ok – conflicts are not. Everyone is on the same team getting the same thing done. This means treating everyone with dignity and compassion. If there is a disagreement  - don’t turn it into a conflict. Ask questions so the problem can be solved collaborative. This is true for all groups, not just for groups with age differences.

- How to motivate teams with a mix of generations

Dignity and compassion – for everyone. Foster a culture of social trust and create psychological safety so that people can air disagreements without them blowing up into conflicts. The best solutions are created collaboratively – and that means everyone has input. If you can create a culture where people can pose contrary positions and ideas without being attacked for having different ideas and instead – having those ideas seriously considered, you will create a culture of trust, which will help ensure that disagreements – don’t escalate and that everyone is motivated to contribute because they know their contributions will be welcomed and considered as valid.


And this trust – brings us back to the top. What do people need?  Trust.

To learn more - I have a course on bridging the generation divide – millennials and boomers at Humanist Learning Systems. https://humanistlearning.com/generationaldivide/

Diversity – Age and Millennials

Diversity has many dimensions. It’s root is difference and how we manage differences between people.

There are so many ways humans differ from one another. Sometimes we differ because of culture, gender, race, religion, age, and economic status.

I want to focus right now on age differences as I was asked about this by a client. If you have a big enough business, you have employees that range from young 20 somethings to people of retirement age.  And the differences between the life experiences of the people in the almost ready to retire group are totally different from those just starting out.

Not only is an older person more likely to be married and own a home, they are also more likely to have grown up without electronics (aside from a tv that probably didn’t have a remote) and had an amazing amount of personal freedom in their childhood along with possible mandatory military service.

Young people just entering the workforce, on the other hand, grew up as digital natives. They didn’t have a lot of freedom as children as their parents were too afraid to let them play outside by themselves. They’ve had no shared experience like military service and they have yet to get married and have kids. (check out the research on millennials here - http://www.pewresearch.org/topics/millennials/)

What you need to know about these “differences” is that they are generalizations.  There is no stereotypical baby boomer and there is no stereotypical millennial. Yes, millennials are more narcissistic than boomers (but not by much. Whereas ~15% of boomers are narcissistic – ~17% of millennials are – which isn’t a really big difference when you think about it).

What I’m trying to say is that do not treat any individual millennial or boomer as if they were stereotypical. They aren’t. They are an individual. And as an individual, they could vary quite a bit from what the “average” person of their age group is said to be like based on the data.

As Steven Pinker states in his book The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature - “Equality is not the empirical claim that all groups of humans are interchangeable; it is the moral principle that individuals should not be judged or constrained by the average properties of their group.”

When faced with diversity of any kind, what you should strive to do is to treat people like the individual they are. Get to know them as individuals and don’t resort to stereotyping them just because they aren’t the same as you.

It’s this last bit that gets to the crux of the problem people have with diversity. We want everyone to be perfect for us. We expect other people to respond to us the way we want them to respond to us.

But, I’ve got news for you. The world doesn’t revolve around you and you are unique. Even within your age cohort, ethnic group, gender etc, there is a tremendous amount of diversity!  Allow other people to be who they are and stop trying to impose your ideas of who they should be on them.

If you allow them to be who they are, they may just surprise you by knowing something you don’t that will help make you a better person and your company more effective. Don’t let the lack of shared cultural experiences throw you off. These other people are still human and still want and need the same things that all humans do. To belong and to be respected.