by admin on December 11, 2009
I went to the book launch of “And What Do You Do?: 10 Steps to Creating a Portfolio Career” by Barrie Hopson and Katie Ledger a couple of weeks ago. The book is a guide to anyone who wants to explore having two or more ‘jobs’.
Having now read the book (it’s great by the way – very practical and full of examples and stories) there were a few of things that struck me.
Firstly how technology has enabled more people than ever to have portfolio careers. Katie and Barrie are bang up to date in their exploration of this, from the practical delivery of work to marketing yourself using social media.
Secondly, that while anyone of any age can be attracted to a portfolio career, there is some evidence that younger workers (Generation Y) are more comfortable with the idea of finding ‘clients’ to sell their skills to, rather than looking for just one job. I guess this is a result of seeing work more as something to do, rather than a place to go – a hang up that Generation X and the baby boomers find harder to shake off. This combined with the changing world of work and more enlightened companies benefitting from the flexibility this provides suggests this may become far more the norm.
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by HongBerry66 on October 30, 2009
We’ve been doing a lot of work with investment banks recently. A common feature within all of them, is that they all ban (or at the very least severely limit access to) facebook and other social networking sites, usually on the grounds of ‘productivity’.
The ‘banning’ of course is done by senior management, mostly Gen X or babyboomers.
Working with these groups, most would agree that an organisation has three types of ‘capital’ it can draw upon, and which help add to its ‘value’. These are:
- Financial (money and assets)
- Human (talent and skills)
- Social or Network ( connections with others, whether they be colleagues, partners, consumers or just ‘contacts’ which have some value)
To a Baby-boomer and, to large extent a Gen Xer like me, this network capital is represented by a contacts list or address book. It’s who you have lunch with, who you can pick up the phone up to or who you might know at a social or business function.
But for Gen Y (and increasingly Gen X through networks such as LinkedIn) this is now also represented by online social networks.
So why ban facebook when it increases social/network capital which we know has considerable, even if intangible, value to an organisation? It’s illogical and I think the true reason is poor performance management.
If organisations truly manage outcomes, then why should they care if someone uses facebook for two hours a day? You never know, your organisations next big deal/idea/strategic relationship might just come from within these networks.
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by admin on November 18, 2008
In my previous blog post on Obama I wrongly quoted the numbers of fans he had on Facebook. It was/is actually 13.4 million according to Don Tapscott who, back in September, correctly predicted Obama’s victory in an interview with Stefan Stern of the FT.
Anyone who doubts the power of such social networking sites and of the internet in general should think again. I sometimes hear people questioning whether Gen Y are that different from the rest of us. YES THEY ARE. They are wired differently because of the technological landscape that has always been a very comfortable home for them. They are natives to this world. Us Gen Xers and Baby Boomers are immigrants and always will be.
Sally
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by admin on November 12, 2008
I love this new Facebook application. It allows users to send snail mail to relatives who don’t have a computer. What a great way of helping, and maybe even encouraging, the younger generation to keep in touch with grandparents who are not online.
Sally
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by Sally Bibb on April 20, 2008
I have become increasingly aware of a number of different mind sets that are emerging around Gen Y in the workplace. They broadly fall into the categories of those that will move organisations forward and those that won’t. I have observed three predominant mind sets:
"Gen Y are a pain and they ought to change their ways"
This is the ‘I don’t see why we should change for them folk’. It’s the recruitment manager who has experienced much more demanding Gen Ys in the last couple of years who want to know what the company can do for them as much as what they can offer. It’s the HR manager who has a view that Gen Ys should have more realistic expectations towards work life. And it is the manager who is resentful that when they were in their 20s they knew their place and would not have dared challenge their employer.
I have noticed a certain amount of anger and resentment amongst this group. They are stuck in complaining mode and struggle to understand the underlying motivations to the behaviour let alone want to respond to it in a way that is useful to all concerned.
" Gen Y are the future opportunity and must be embraced or there will be big problems"
This attitude resides at the other end of the spectrum. It is those who feel that Gen Y are the answer to all organisational problems and that things should change according to their view of the world. This view is held mainly by the supremely self-confident Gen Ys who know they are talented and have a lot to offer and feel that they are the ones with all the power in the employment relationship.
"I struggle with some of Gen Ys attitudes but want to understand them and find a way that works for all of us"
The individuals and organisations who are making the most effective steps to attract and retain Gen Ys fall into this camp. They are the ones who realise that we all see the world through our own particular generational lens and that gain is to be had by understanding the others perspectives too.
Most of us do struggle with difference, whether the difference is generational, gender or whatever. The trick is for all parties to understand the others. With understanding comes the creation of possibilities. Possibilities give us choices.
A refusal to consider other possibilities of ways of working is a core barrier to positive change. For example, working time. The 9 to 5 culture only exists because in the industrial age factories had to be run on schedules that meant workers had to be at work between certain hours. There is no reason for that rigidity today, especially in the knowledge sector. The third category of mindset: "I struggle with some of Gen Ys attitudes but want to understand them and find a way that works for all of us" is the most productive one. If I were to give any piece of advice to companies about how to tackle the challenge of Gen Y in the workplace, my starting point would be to be clear about your mind set first. Change only happens when you really want it to.
Sally
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