Working With a Multigenerational Workforce: Benefits and Challenges

From Baby Boomers to Gen Z, today's workforce has four active generations working side by side, each with unique characteristics and worldviews. While each generational cohort has unique characteristics, values, and perspectives, it can be challenging to manage a wide range of age groups and ensure everyone's needs are met. Understanding these team nuances can help organizations turn generational differences into competitive advantage and build a mechanism for long-term success. 

The blog explores the benefits and challenges of managing a multigenerational workforce, highlighting how diverse age groups can complement each other to drive organizational success.

Why Wield a Multigenerational Workforce?

Companies have developed a perception that the younger workforce is more adaptable and open to new ideas and practices. On the other hand, older workers are perceived as less agile and "less willing to roll up their sleeves and do something new." However, research has debunked this myth and highlighted that older workers bring benefits that companies often overlook—in particular, loyalty, wisdom, and experience. The qualities that make baby boomers great mentors can also make them good team players and leaders. It wouldn't be wrong to say that when different generations come together, they strengthen each other's weaknesses.

How a Multigenerational Workforce Can Prove Beneficial

Here are some benefits of a multigenerational workforce:

• Cognitive diversity leads to enterprise agility.

Older generations bring in-depth knowledge and industry experience gained over the years. Tech-savvy younger generations can bring fresh thinking, diverse experiences, and a willingness to hold employers more accountable for both work-life balance and DEI in the workplace. Research into the impact of cognitive diversity on team creativity and knowledge sharing has found a significant relationship between the two, emphasizing the role of cognitive diversity in building a more resilient and innovative culture ready to accelerate change in the face of increasingly complex and interconnected global challenges.

• Innovation fueled by diverse perspectives

People tend to feel comfortable around others who have a similar working style or preferences to their own. Unfortunately, a culture that (explicitly or implicitly) encourages conformity of thought cultivates stagnation and jeopardizes the company's growth. A team with diverse perspectives can think outside the box and unlock a world of possibilities. When individuals from different generations come together, they bring a diverse range of life experiences and perspectives, resulting in a richer and more fulfilling work experience for everyone.

• Talent attraction, engagement, retention, and more

A workplace that embraces age diversity is more likely to attract and retain top talent. Deloitte’s DEIB report found that 40% of respondents would not prefer to work for an organization that does not follow DEIB practices.

An age-diverse workplace can be a great learning platform for developing new skills and advancing your career. Furthermore, learning and development is one of the key drivers of employee engagement. This is exactly what a multi-generational workplace offers. A more experienced generation, which has proven its ability through years of dedication, can effectively share its wisdom with people new to the field as they try to advance their careers. In turn, the digital natives can be seen to have a special gift with the unknown frontiers and cutting-edge disruptive technologies. However, establishing and maintaining symbiotic relationships within an age-diverse workforce can be challenging.

Challenges Arising Due to Disparate Experiences and Approaches

There is no doubt that conflict is one of the expected outcomes when you start working with people who have different values, attitudes to work, communication styles, and ways of using technology.

Different generational cohorts tend to have a particular approach to workplace practices and rules. For example, when it comes to verbal recognition, baby boomers prefer verbal recognition in a more formal setting in the presence of their peers. Conversely, millennials prefer small yet frequent informal acknowledgments. The same goes for performance management.

In the Gen X era, performance reviews focused more on one-way communication, with managers evaluating employees and giving feedback. Managers only evaluated people based on their output, and employees were not allowed to give feedback to the manager. Millennials are skeptical about being scrutinized in terms of ratings and rankings that have been quantitatively measured; they prefer to give immediate feedback and stay more involved. They want managers to take note of their feedback and make changes that make work more interesting.

Establishing Synergy Across Generations

Here's how HR professionals can create and sustain an environment where each generation feels valued, understood, and empowered to contribute their best.

• Encourage reverse mentoring

Younger generations are more familiar with modern technology and find it easier to use. They may also be more tech-savvy than veterans. But reverse mentoring is not just about guiding older workers through upcoming software or gadget updates. It's an excellent way of capturing and sharing the experience of two generations. It can also expose veterans to new cultural trends and ways of thinking that are relevant to the target market, thereby enriching their output.

• Set up a cross-generational team

Encourage building relationships with other teams, departments, and even people from other companies in similar fields but different generations. By exploring how others face similar challenges, you can identify the strengths and weaknesses of their methods. These new-found insights can be used to reinforce your own team's successes and dispel harmful and unfair generalizations about the age of the workforce.

• Leverage tailored communication

Use a variety of communication channels, including email, messaging apps, social media, and video conferencing, to meet the preferences of different generations. For example, Gen Z may prefer instant messaging, in contrast to Baby Boomers, who find email or face-to-face interactions more appropriate. Additionally, tailor messages to resonate with specific generations, using language that aligns with their preferences. For example, baby boomers may appreciate formal language, while millennials prefer a more casual tone.

Lead with a Kaleidoscopic Approach

Celebrating the richness that comes from unique perspectives and experiences and fostering a community that thrives on mutual respect can help organizations stay relevant and competitive. Multi-generational diversity enriches the lives of employees in myriad ways. It fosters creativity, innovation, and problem-solving, making organizations inherently happier, more productive, and more competitive in their industries.