Introduction I have been with my company for over twenty years and have seen many organizational changes throughout my career. In my role as a hiring manager, I think it is important to understand the generational differences between employees. Generational terms like, Baby Boomers, Generation X, Millennials, and whatever comes next may be indicative of general patterns. However, we must be mindful that, while each generation develops a kind of collective identity, generational stereotypes must be seen for what they are, oversimplified labels. It is much more helpful to view all generations as complex groups made up of people with all kinds of values, goals, and points of view. I think it is important to understand each generation's characteristic …show more content…
Generational terms like Traditionalist or Veterans (people born before 1945), Baby Boomers (people born from 1946 – 1964), Generation X (people born from 1965-1981) and Millennials or Nexters or Generation Yers (people born from 1978 – 2002) are all generational profiles that make up the current American workforce. Traditionalist or Veterans have been historically defined as the oldest generation in the workplace. The Great Depression, World War II, McCarthyism, the Cold War, and the start of the Civil Rights movement all had an influence on this generation. Traditionalist have been conservative and disciplined, as having a sense of obligation, and as observing fiscal restraint (Niemic, 2002). Traditionalist have also been described as preferring top down chain of command, needing respect, and a preference to make decisions on what worked well in the past (Kersten, 2002). Traditionalist, seen as hard working, team players, task oriented, doing more with less, also, believe in paying their …show more content…
The name Baby Boomers was derived from the seventeen million babies born during that period relative to the prior year (O’Bannon, 2001). This generation, seen as optimistic and competitive, willing to work hard to ensure organizational success. The Berlin Wall, the Civil Rights movement, MLK and JFK assignations, the Vietnam War, and the first moon landing had an influence on this generation. Boomers believe in a step by step approach for promotions and thrive on collaboration and group decision making
The baby boomers are the generation of people who were born between the years of 1946 to 1964. At the time of the baby boom, social change was very prominent. According to History.com, baby boomers
For an example “The common theme is a fear or a reluctance to hire people under 30, because they are unpredictable, and, ‘they don’t know how to work,’” says Cam Marston (Wooldridge). In the same way this goes along with older people seemly more intelligent, Reliable instead of collage kids which briefly explains why it’s hard to find a job in that sense. Additionally labeling helps discriminate millennia’s especially if from older employees example “Wilkie notes that it’s common for older workers to see younger workers as a threat, and take the easy way out by labeling them as somehow different” (Wooldridge). Hence the reason the older won’t like the younger because of the fear being replaced so they start shaming millennia’s. This is important because ageism is seriously a huge common stereotype in a sense people might judge you on because they feel
Veterans Born in years prior to 1945, this generation is generally referred to as Veterans, Silent’s, Traditionalists, Matures or Pre-Boomers. They have had their life experiences shaped by events such as the Great Depression, Lindbergh flying across the Atlantic, the Hindenburg disaster, construction of the Empire State Building, Golden Age of Radio, World Journal of Behavioral Studies in Business Identifying strategies, page 3 War II, and the Korean War. There are approximately 50 million of people of this generation still in the workforce (Smith Clark, 2010). Baby Boomers are those born between the years 1945 and 1964. Their life experiences were shaped by the Vietnam War, Woodstock, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Civil Rights Movements,
Employers need to have a solid understanding of what is important and valued by each generation when deciding on their recruiting strategy. It definitely helps understanding each position by itself and the ideal requirements before determining what generation to key in on for a hire. “Managing multigenerational workforces is an art in itself.! Young workers want to make a quick impact, the middle generation needs to believe in the mission, and older employees don’t like ambivalence.! Your move.” (Harvard Business School) Is it an opportunity for career growth, do you need more experience in the position, can you live with a part time employee? Based on the answers to some of these questions plus others can weigh heavily on employee retention and be significant factors on deciding which generation to focus in on for your hire; this can save costs both on the front end with ease of recruitment and backend due to retention. Thus let’s look at the different generations and what they look for in a career and a company....
The millennial generation according to Dictionary.com is “a term used to refer to the generation,
With the current change in demographics throughout the workforce, organizations are feeling the effects of a larger percentage of baby boomers retiring and a large percentage of millennial new entrants. The words used to describe millennial employees, “spoiled, trophy kids, ambitious”, seem to be as everlasting as the constructive and negative perspectives attached to them. Many can debate on the entitlement of these employees within an organization, how these employees can be groomed and managed to better fit the organization, the positive and negative attributes they bring into the workplace, and how the preceding can benefit or derail the effectiveness of an organization. Nonetheless, a harder debate, comes about in denying that organizations must adjust to and integrate these employees into the workforce.
They have idealistic tendencies and are extremely willing to sacrifice personal time in order to achieve success in the workplace. Even though Baby Boomers are typically seen as micromanagers, they are good at building collaborative relationships with their coworkers and networking. Many Baby Boomers feel that their life’s purpose is to work hard, respect the chain of authority and hierarchy in the workplace. This is due to the fact that Baby Boomers were brought up in a work atmosphere where the chain of command was always respected (Kapoor, Solomon, 2011). Baby Boomers also work very hard for promotions and believe in sacrificing personal for the sake of being successful; they started the ‘workaholic’ trend and believe in paying their dues and step-by-step promotion that comes with age and time worked at a company. They also like teamwork, collaboration, group decision-making and believe in loyalty toward their employers (Tolbize, 2008). Baby Boomers tend to stay with one company for the duration of their professional life.
To be considered a millennial, an individual has to be born within the years 1982-1999. I’m considered a millennial myself (1997). With the advancement of technology, Generation Y has the upper hand automatically on any prior generation. Generation Y also has an advantage because of the way they insist on getting what they want. Instead of Generation Y adapting to the work environment, the workplace will have to change in order to retain young talent. The workplace will have to adapt because according to Matchar, the American workforce will be 75 percent Generation Y workers by
Upon entering the workforce, this generation worked for organizations that had “clear lines of authority, strict assignment of responsibilities, rank based on seniority, and an implied work contract; they expected to work for the same company until retirement and valued job security and stability” (Fore, 2013). However, because this generation was often absorbed with the past, “technology represented an unpleasant change that required training and adjustment, as it affected both their work and personal lives” (Fore, 2013).
Workers are often pitted against each other in the work place as a form of competition. One division that is commonly seen is gender and race, but there is also a divide concerning age that isn’t discussed as frequently. Baby Boomers are those who was born between 1946-1964, when WWII soldiers came back home, settled down and started the “Baby Boom”. While Millennials are those born around 1981-2000, and have a similar population size as Baby Boomers. In the workplace, Millennials are categorized as being bad workers due to how they were raised in sheltered lifestyles and require a different environment than the previous generation, but that is not accurate. Even though the two generations view work different, sometimes to the point of conflict,
Smola, Karen Wey, and Charlotte D. Sutton. "Generational Difference: Revisiting Generational Work Values for the New Millennium." Journal of Organizational Behavior 23 (2002): 363-82. JSTOR. Web. 28 Mar. 2012. .
...The importance of the generational mix within an organisation is that it brings about inclusivity and helps generate new innovative ideas that could bring the organisation to its sustained competitive advantage. With each age group with its expectations by interacting with one another, there is knowledge and experience exchange.
Zemke, Ron. (2013). Generations at Work: Managing the Clash of Boomers, Gen Xers & Gen Yers in the workplace. Edition #2.
Robbins (2013) recognizes that baby boomers have an enormous hard-working attitude with a definitive want to characterize themselves through their expert achievements. Baby Boomers, born between 1946 and 1964 value their achievement, ambition, loyalty to career and dislike to authority in competitive workplace (Robbins and Judge, 2017). Gen Xers, born between 1965 and 1977, who are independent-minded like work-life balance, team-oriented, loyalty to relationship and dislike of rules. The generation born between 1978 and later, known as Millennials value flexible hours, teamwork and collaborative culture, career development, loyalty to both self and relationships with employers and dislike the formality of regular meetings if there
There are many generations in society such as Traditionalist, Baby Boomer, Generation X, Y, and Z. Generation Z is the youngest generation in the list. However, in any work place, Generation Y, which is known as an Echo Boomers or Millenniums, is the youngest. No one knows how it emerged, but it began in 1998 and ended in 2006. The people in this era were born between 1977 and 1994, which is my generation. In the United States, there are seventy one million Generation Y-ers, which takes up the largest part of population. Unlike other generations, Generation Y has very outstanding abilities and environments to success. Those abilities and characteristics are efficient in business and companies. Also, Generation Y’s remarkable characteristics affect their social lives a lot. The Generation Y is very family centric, and able to catch up the trends. Their general cultures are pop-music, iPods, social websites, like Facebook and Twitter, and anything that relates to technology. In principle, Generation Y-ers are optimistic, social, and have high self-esteem. Those characteristics bring many pros and cons to hire them. Pros are general mostly, but cons are not true mostly because of misconceptions.