Simon and I were at Roffey Park on Friday presenting our Gen Y research at all an all-day event. Our very own Lamorna was part of a Gen Y panel – five twenty-somethings talking about their views of work and answering questions. I already knew how inspiring Lamorna is. She is 22 years old, well-travelled, interesting. She co-founded a fabulous company that won last year’s Shell Entrepreneur of the Year Award.
The other 4 were equally inspiring. It struck me how confident, self-assured and entrepreneurial they all were. It was interesting to hear the audiences questions which were nearly all indicative of what a struggle it is for Boomers and Xers to understand the world of Gen Y. Questions like “how come you are so confident?”, “don’t you ever feel insecure?”.
I for one felt pretty envious. Oh to be 26, to have already worked in 6 countries, to have been head of social policy for a think tank and decided to leave all that and become a freelance speechwriter (for some well-known and incredible people) and to be writing a book. Wow.
This was clearly a very special group of people but I am willing to bet that the confident, fearless, or, as they put it, we “don’t see barriers” mentality is common amongst Gen Ys. The big challenge is for organisations to find a way of harnessing that instead of stifling it and driving them away.
Generation Y’s different values and attitudes are causing tensions in the corporate world and the military too. Gen Ys are natural networkers, they do not respond well to command and control styles of leadership. This actually poses a huge opportunity to those organisations who see the benefit in collaborative working. And there are an increasing number who do.
I was recently talking to a senior manager in a big media company who told me that the only way they would be able to reach their high revenue targets is if people start to work together more effectively. The challenge is for older managers who are used to a hierarchical way of working. They want to keep control and feel uncomfortable with the idea of encouraging their staff to cross organisational boundaries to work together. They simply do not want to do things differently. Why would they? They have always worked in a hierarchically-based way.
I have been working with my co-directors to design a leadership programme that helps such managers. It is desperately needed. It is surprising how much leadership development is still based on outdated assumptions. It is also surprising how few leadership programmes take account of the new context within which leaders have to operate.
The military have of course had to respond to new contexts in recent years. One of these has been the threat of terrorist organisations that operate on a non-conventional, networked model. I was interested to know whether the military were thinking about how they need to change in light of the external changes. As let’s face it, if they can get to grips with a new kind of leadership anyone should be able to. And sure enough, they are taking the issue very seriously. This excellent article describes the changes that they need to make and the opportunities that this affords them. Businesses would do well to take a leaf out of their book.
This TED talk is enlightening, profound, incredible and moving – and that is to understate the case. It answers some questions that I have been carrying around for years about the nature of our experience of life, the human brain and our spirituality.
FreshMinds, the research company, have just released some research into different generations attitudes in the workplace. It makes for interesting reading and stimulates managers to think about how appropriate the workplaces of today are for the mix of generations in them.
We would counsel a bit of caution though. We advocate that generation is an attitude not an age and with any research it’s important to remember the individual not the stereotype of the group. With a norm group of only 1000 respondents it would be dangerous to generalise across Boomers/Xers/Ys.
Our own generational research “ tellithowitis” gathers data on attitudes of more than 3200 Gen Ys and we are still very careful not to generalise across all Gen Y. They are not all the same, and companies that make changes in their people practices on that basis would be mistaken. Sure normal distribution rules apply, but some of our clients called us in precisely because they came a cropper by putting all Gen Ys in the same box. One company (a bank) made the assumption that Gen Ys are really into Corporate Social Responsibility, and so organised a volunteering day for all their graduate employees. It bombed. Their feedback was that they would rather have given money. Whoops. They realised that not all Gen Y are the same and they should really have done a bit more homework before stereotypes.
See the Management Today article here. Stefan Stern, the author, declares himself an “anxious X-er”. This raises a question for all journalists out there: “To what extent are you still appealing to your readers? They are getting younger and they have some very different ways of seeing the world.”
There is a great piece on the front of The Lawyer this morning headlined “Mishcon courts Generation Y with working hours revolution.”
It goes on to say that it “is set to offer all of its lawyers the option of working whatever hours they wish on an annual basis. The firm has opened discussions to test reactions to the proposed scheme, which is likely to split lawyers in to three streams: those who want to work 800 hours, 2,000 hours and those who want to work somewhere in between.” The piece finishes with a wonderful quote from the managing partner, Kevin Gold: “People are turning around and saying “I don’t want to live like you guys – I don’t want to be here day-in, day-out and look like a big fat pig at your age and live your life.”
The legal sector is one of the most resistant to change, but the (expensive) retention problems many are experiencing with their trainees is forcing them to take note. Raising awareness of the problem with the partners and senior management is still an issue for many – maybe this quote will get their attention!
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