Over the next 10 years, the New World of Work will be dominated by four generations, which couldn’t be any more different:
- Baby Boomers (born between 1946 and 1964 according to Pew Research Center): One of the most significant events of the Boomer post-war years was the moon landing. Broadly speaking, Boomers prefer to have their own offices in the workplace. They are also team players and enjoy working in groups.
- Generation X (born between 1965 and 1979 according to Gallup): The MTV generation is considered ambitious and goal-oriented. They try to reconcile productive work, career goals and a healthy work-life balance. However, in case of doubt, Gen X will put personal preferences aside when the job calls.
- Millennials (born between 1980 and 1998 according to The College Investor): This cohort, also known as Gen Y, is one of the largest generations ever. They grew up with globalisation and have clear ideas about their workplace: Work must be fun and enriching.They do not tend to struggle with work-life balance as this the balance is built into their professional DNA – they wouldn’t accept anything else.
- Generation Z (born after 1998 according to Goldman Sachs): The defining trend of this generation is their intensive use of the Internet at all levels of economy and society. As digital natives, they possess a near perfect command of modern means of communication from early childhood. They are considered to be both conscientious and super outgoing.
Every generation has its own unique characteristics, and demographic trends mean that companies have the challenging task of organising cooperation between all employees, regardless of which generation they belong to.
The challenge for management is to manage the growing diversity in the workplace and to bring employees from different generations together to build well-functioning teams. We researched three strategies which you can discover here.
Paying attention to the uniqueness of each generation – with all their strengths and weaknesses – is the first step in creating the best possible development opportunities for all employees and your organisation as a whole.