Baby Boomers in the Workplace: Ensuring Knowledge Transfer
Generations: Employee Training Methodologies for Diversity and Inclusion
In nearly every industry, today’s workforce is made up of people of all ages. Currently there are four generations of people working side-by-side to accomplish specific goals for your organization. These generations are called:
- Traditionalists (also called Matures or Seniors, born 1925–1945)
- Baby Boomers (born 1946–1964)
- Generation X (born 1965–1980)
- Generation Y (also called Millennials, born 1981–2000)
A fifth—Generation Z (also called Nexters, born after 2000)—will soon enter the workforce. Each generation; however, has a different way of learning new skills. Since employees are trained continuously, how can you accommodate for training such different groups?
Before constructing your method of training, you need to understand how each generation behaves in order to create a training module that will be the most effective for all employees, regardless of age. Because these behaviors are generated by differences in attitudes and beliefs, it may be helpful to consider some of them:
Traditionalists and Baby Boomers
Traditionalists and Baby Boomers frequently see intergenerational distinctions as a politically correct form of stereotyping to excuse the immaturity of Generation Xers and Yers. They often believe that the younger workers will either “catch on, or take off.” The Traditionalist and Baby Boomer worker is much more structure and command-line oriented, so they are off-put by all the questioning of the younger workers—they believe that greater experience is sufficient authority, and that the less experienced should just follow the guidance they are given, period. They’re thinking, “I have the experience; just follow it, and stop asking me so many questions!”
Generation X and Y
Generation X and Y workers are just as puzzled. They’re often thinking, “What’s up? The managers are almost technologically illiterate, but they never listen to how technology can improve our processes—what’s up with that? And why are they always trying to get a 70- hour work week out of me, like I have nothing else to do with my life; don’t they have a home to go to? I can work as hard as the next person, but I don’t live to work, I work to live!” They’re thinking, “You don’t answer my questions because either you don’t have the answers, or you’re mad that you didn’t ask the question yourself!”
The younger members of the workforce have been socialized for quick-impact processes; whereas workers of the middle generation are mission-oriented. The oldest generation dislikes ambivalence, and there’s plenty created by all the others. This thinking has led to generation-based behavior sets and cultural lenses. It isn’t the values that are different; it’s the behaviors.
Generational Traits and Differences
Traditionalists / Matures
This generation is sometimes referred to as the Veteran Generation and the Greatest Generation. They have low risk tolerance, are financially conservative, believe strongly in seniority within a structure, prefer a command and control leadership style, and are the generation that have set the rules—and they obey them.
• Patriotic system of values
• Hard workers
• Tends to put the good of the corporation over the good of the individual
• Mostly willing to learn new job skills
• Need stability and thorough organization from training staff
• Prefer information that is straight to the point with few personal anecdotes
Baby Boomers
Boomers until recently made up the majority of the workforce. They grew up in the abundance of a strong post-war economy, and became a more egocentric generation than the Traditionalists. The nuclear family became the norm, and work became a defining characteristic of their evaluation of self and others. Although more egocentric than Traditionalists, Boomers did make sacrifices; however, these were typically for occupation (and home, if domestically occupied).
• Hard workers
• Want to be rewarded for their years of loyal service
• Tend to put their job before social duties
• Lacking some technical skills
• Willing to learn new job skills
Generation X
This is the first generation to grow up on “to do lists” and a significant blended family rate. A part of this high rate of blended families was divorce as a result of the Baby Boomers’ self-identification with occupation and the long work day that came with it, so Generation Xers don’t see this as a good thing the way Baby Boomers do. Generation Xers are therefore more behaviorally independent, resilient and adaptable, and tend more toward cynicism and distrust than previous two generations.
• Very skilled in technical fields
• Prefer to work without supervisors hovering nearby
• Less optimistic about companies taking care of employees
• Willing to learn new job skills
• Need a balance between work and social duties
• Tend to be more loyal to people than to corporations
Generation Y
This generation, like the Baby Boomers before them, has the ability to transform each life stage due to its sheer numbers and is therefore tremendously powerful. Generation Yers grew up in the era of “empowerment.” They were typically raised by parents who encouraged them to question authority, make their own informed choices, and to seek safety in their families. The children of a consumer economy, they have an expectation of influencing the terms and conditions of their workplace and that employers accommodate these expectations. This generation is the first to grow up with computers and the Internet as a significant part of their lives, and is therefore much more networked than preceding generations. Their worldview is global-minded, and the interactive skills of instant messaging, texting, blogging and multi-player games has made them different in that they have an “always connected, always on” mindset. They are challenged by the rigidity of the traditional workday in terms of both time and space.
• New to the job world, but highly motivated
• Incredibly techno savvy
• Prefer interactive and technological learning modules
• Task oriented, but tend to lose sight of the bigger picture
• Need a balance between work and social duties
• Looking for their superiors to take them under their wing
• Tend to work well with employees from older generations
How Can You Benefit From Knowing These Differences?
As different as these four generations are, their similarities can be used to help you and your staff create cross-generational training modules. All of these groups are willing to learn new skills; they just require trainers to have a certain amount of flexibility.
Since Traditionalists and Baby Boomers tend to prefer formal instruction inside a classroom setting, and Generations X and Y tend to prefer faster learning through technology, offering both options would be the optimal decision—hybridized training models are one way to accomplish this.
However, your organization may not be able to provide multiple mediums for training employees and there will likely be times when you are simultaneously training employees from all four generations.
Here Are a Few Things to Remember When Training Individuals Across Generations:
• Be mindful of ageism: Regardless of age, members from each generation want to be treated like valuable members of the company.
• Balance tradition and technology: PowerPoint is great for presentations, but some people learn better with a pen and paper, so provide all of your employees with paper handouts.
• Be careful about singling people out: Keep the training session engaging so that your employees feel comfortable enough to speak up in front of everyone else. Traditionalists and Generation Xers will offer their opinion, if they feel it is appropriate, but usually prefer to not be called upon.
To learn how Hureco Maverick can help you to examine cross-generational learning styles to design effective employee training programs, give us a call today!
About the author
Regina Jones and Rashied K. Sharrieff-Al-Bey are the principals at Hureco Maverick; they enjoy co-authoring blogs, journal articles, case studies and white papers about various human resource, organization development and business topics.
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