Managing with Generations X and Y: Communication, Conflict and Rewards Chantal Westgate

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Managing with Generations X and Y
Communication, Conflict and RewardsChantal
Westgate Suzanne GagnonDesautels Faculty of
Management
La fin d'une génération les baby-boomers à la
retraite The End of a Generation Baby Boomers
into Retirement
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In our private lives, generational diversity
plays an important role.
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It typifies our families.
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It structures our institutions
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• We are used to living with generational
  diversity.
• Why, then, should it be a problem for life in
  organizations?

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Four propositions
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• 1. There are now FOUR generations in many
  organizations war for talent, plus people are
  working longer
• 2. The four have different life histories to
  some extent, different attitudes towards work,
  careers, success
• 3. Seniority, hierarchy and inequality no longer
  define the way we work in many cases
• 4. With group differences comes the potential
  for conflict judgmental attitudes,
  stereotyping, in-group/out-group behaviour

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The Challenges and Promise of Working with Gen X
and Y

• The different generations
• Communication, Conflicts and Rewards
• How can you help build collaboration across the
  generations?

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Generational Differences

• How we view the world is shaped in part by
  watershed events and conditions that each of us
  experience during our formative years.
• Generation of origin is one aspect of diversity.
• Helps determine individual values, motivators and
  needs, in much the same way as culture, gender.

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The Generations

• 1 - Greatest or Silent Generation/Veterans
  (born 1922-1945)
• 2 - Baby Boomers (born 1946-60s)
• 3 - Generation X (born 1960s-1980)
• 4 - Generation Y/Echo/Nexters (born 1980-2000)
• Representation in the room?
• Key common life events that distinguish each
  group?

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Greatest Generation some key influences

• The Great Depression
• The New Deal
• World War II
• The Holocaust
• Urbanization
• Rural Electrification
• Radio and the movies

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Baby Boomers some key influences

• Economic Boom
• Womens Liberation
• Trudeaumania
• Rise in Civil Rights Activism
• Quiet Revolution
• Rock Roll
• Race to Space
• Vietnam War
• Watergate

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Gen X some key influences

• Demolition of the Berlin Wall
• 24-hour live remote news coverage
• Dot-com economy
• Hi-tech start-ups
• Challenger disaster
• Abundant
• economy in the
• 80s recession
• early 90s

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Gen Y some key influences

• Internet communications explosion
• Y2K
• Iraq War
• Columbine Shootings
• September 11th
• Corporate Scandals, e.g. Enron
• Video Games
• Instant messaging
• Global awareness
• Volume of information available

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Each generation can be associated with different
values, assets, liabilities and motivators for
the workplace
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• Greatest Generation
• Core Values dedicated, disciplined, respectful
  of authority, prefer hierarchy, sense of personal
  organization
• Assets stable, loyal, detail-oriented, thorough,
  hard working
• Liabilities discomfort with conflict, coping
  with ambiguity, reluctance to buck the system
• Motivators being valued for their experience,
  wisdom, knowledge
• Leadership Style more directive,
  command/control, make the decisions and delegate

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• Baby Boomers (born 1946-1964)
• Core Values optimism, teamwork, personal
  gratification, growth, youth, hard work,
  involvement, prestige and status
• Assets service oriented, willingness to go the
  extra-mile, desire to please, team spirit, good
  working relationships
• Liabilities conflict avoidance, process over
  goals, sensitivity to feedback, judgmental,
  self-centered The Me Generation
• Motivators being valued for their unique
  contributions personal achievement, wealth
  acquisition
• Leadership Style collegial, consensual,
  passionate, concerned about fairness but may also
  be directive or lack supervision skills

-
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• Gen Xers (born 1960-1980)
• Core Values balance work and home, self-reliant,
  casual about authority, pragmatic, egalitarian,
  global awareness
• Assets adaptable, technological, independent,
  voracious learners, financially savvy, not
  intimidated by authority, team players
• Liabilities impatient, poor people skills,
  cynical, low expectations about job security,
  less willing to make personal sacrifices at work
• Motivators new technology and doing it by their
  own rules
• Leadership Style less comfortable with
  traditional chain-of-command, bureaucracy,
  procedures

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• Gen Y ( (born 1980-2000)
• Core Values sense of civic duty, confidence,
  achievement, optimism, sociability, street
  smarts, appreciation for diversity
• Assets multi-tasking, tech savvy, optimistic,
  tenacity, collective action, want to work closely
  with senior people
• Liabilities need supervision, cocky,
  inexperienced with interpersonal issues
• Motivators working with people like themselves,
  making change happen, goals
• Leadership Style resiliency, combine teamwork
  ethic of Boomers with tech skills of the Xers and
  a can-do attitude

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Stereotyping

• Stereotyping Assigning identical
  characteristics to any member of a group
  regardless of his or her individual differences.
  Can be unconscious. Can lead to bias, prejudice.

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Ethnocentrism

• Ethnocentrism tendency to think ones own group
  or race is superior to other groups or races.

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Generational Differences Management Issues

• Stereotypes of each generation, based on your
  experience or impressions -- How did you arrive
  at the stereotypes?

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Characteristics of Inter-group Conflict
Stereotyping
Overvaluation of ones own group
Devaluation of the other group
Polarization on issues
Distortion of perceptions
Escalation
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Inter-group Conflict

• In-group/out-group dynamics may help explain our
  tendency to stereotype We want to feel good
  about the group we belong to, and one way is to
  think less well of other groups.
• Research shows tendency to see members of own
  group as individuals.but members of other group
  as undifferentiated.
• Can learn to manage stereotyping through
  conscious awareness and control.

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HOW TO COLLABORATE MORE

• Get curious ask questions
• Express own concerns unemotionally
• Keep to issues on the table and in the present
• Take responsibility for your own part in
  conflict
• The Platinum Rule rather than Golden Rule (others
  may not want or value the same things as you)

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Motivation/Rewards
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Expectancy Theory

• Work effort is directed toward behaviors that
  will lead to desired outcomes
• Emphasizes the important role of perceptions of
  probability that
• Ones effort will lead to performance
• The performance will lead to a particular
  outcome
• That the outcome will be valued.
• In rewards, look for valued outcomes. Beware that
  these may differ significantly from your own.

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QUIZSome Valued Outcomes

• New technology and doing it by their own rules?
• Working with people like themselves making
  change happen work to live?
• Being valued for their experience and knowledge?
• Being valued for their unique contributions
  personal achievement live to work?

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Exemplary employers proactively seek generational
diversity Why?

• Wisdom and experience
• Fresh ideas and fearlessness
• Individual skills
• Need for best talent
• Reflection of the
• marketplace
• (Hankin, Harriet (2004) Boomers
• and Echoes and Nexters)

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HOW TO BUILD COLLABORATION, 2

• Awareness
• Adjustment
• Long-standing norms and policies allowed to
  change
• Includes face-time expectations, leave, rewards
• Meeting challenge of internal equity
• Cross-generational mentoring
• Nursing, healthcare
• Building ties
• Multi-age teams, expectations of synergy, mutual
  respect

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Challenges

• Recognize groups, see people as individuals.
• Manage (your own) resistance
• to change.
• Ensure that segregation and
• tokenism are minimal, and
• integration is the principle.

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Thank you for your attention