Generation Labels: A Barrier to Creating an Age Inclusive Workforce?
This month, we explore whether the effective operation of an age-inclusive workforce is well served by segregating it by generational descriptors? Certainly, there are business consultants making a good living by deliberately emphasising differences between generations described as either Baby Boomers, Generation X, Millennials or Generation Z and advising how best to manage them as a collective. Supposed generation labels and their accompanying unique outlooks, behaviours and preferences more reflect marketing mythology than evidence- based research. We argue that associating an employee’s age with a particular generational label whilst very colourful is unhelpful in promoting a productive age inclusive workforce.
Research evidence continues to reinforce the increased effectiveness and productivity of age inclusive work teams. Academics found in 2012 when teams mixed older and younger workers, productivity increased and novel solutions to complex problems were generated because the strengths and weaknesses of both groups were balanced. A 2014 UK Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) study exploring the benefits of working with colleagues of different ages, in order of importance found knowledge sharing topping the list followed in order by the benefits of greater innovation, enhanced customer service and finally improved problem solving.
Inserting generational labels into the management of age inclusive workforces’ risks reinforcing assumed division and added complexity with no organisation upside. The Pew Research Centre, a US based empirical social science research organisation, observes a growing chorus of criticism about generational research and generational labels, noting a flood of clickbait material purporting to be generational research.
Researchers understand ‘generation’ as a slippery concept, recognising that the notion it represents a set of experiences and characteristics has no scientific basis. In fact, the variation within members of a given group, those people born between 1980 and 2000, for example, is greater than the variation between generations. Critically, when comparing generations, it’s important to control for age. When doing generational research, Pew notes, the question isn’t whether young adults today are different from middle-aged or older adults today. The question is whether young adults today are different from young adults at some specific point in the past.
Generational labels are more than colourful shorthand descriptors to characterise workforce makeup. The impacts of how we categorise each other are not necessarily benign. The belief that by homogenising a group of people born at a certain time into a generational typology increases the risk of stereotyping and age bashing by focusing on assumed differences and not similarities.
Research published in the Harvard Business Review reveals minimal ‘generational differences’ despite what many generational experts want us to believe. A thorough analysis of 20 different studies with nearly 20,000 people revealed small and inconsistent differences in job attitudes when comparing generational groups. It found that, although individual people may experience changes in their needs, interests, preferences, and strengths over the course of their careers, sweeping group differences depending on age or generation are not supported.
Writing recently in Forbes, the anti-ageism journalist Sheila Callaham observed what matters at work is not differences between differently aged employees, but the attachment to the belief that differences exist. This fallacy gets in the way of team collaboration and how employees of different ages are managed and trained.
The question then becomes if generational labels have no validity why do they remain so prevalent in the workplace and broader society? Regrettably, in a commercial sense, promoting difference and intergenerational conflict appears good for business. The business consultant creates demand for their services through a marketing strategy conjuring up a generation management workforce problem. Media deliver strong audience traffic to their platforms and more subscriptions by creating ‘click bait’ headlines capitalising on a real or perceived ‘generational war’ or tension, negatively portraying older people as vulnerable, a burden, or the beneficiaries of a tax system that disadvantages younger people.
By way of example who would want to identify as a ‘baby boomer’ these days? This generation is singularly being blamed for everything from rental hikes to inflation through their supposed greed and selfishness ostensibly due to the hoarding of wealth and houses. Apparently, their self-interest no longer contributes to social or economic progress by ‘stopping others from getting a look in’. Public ethics professor Clive Hamilton challenges this perspective with the view the Baby Boomer generation is an easy scapegoat for the major national issue of widening social inequality. The point is that a non-scientific label used to characterise older people is contributing to a negative and inaccurate stereotype of this group for what purpose? In the workplace how might being stigmatised as a ‘Boomer’ actually contribute to a more age inclusive work environment? Equally, how does being classified a Millenial, Gen Z, Gen Y or Gen X promote workforce unity and cohesion?
Language matters. Imposing a generational label on people allows language to shape who they might individually and collectively be. Generation language risks becoming a tool for promoting bias and stereotyping. Reducing complex age-related phenomena to simplistic labelling ‘dumbs down’ the possibility of informed discussion and actions underpinning the formation of high performing age inclusive workforces.
In the development of age inclusive workforces there is no ‘silver bullet’ solution. Old-style, broad-brush management techniques are no longer fit for purpose. Everybody is an individual and will need to be managed as such within the context of building sustainable productive age inclusive work teams.
A great way to start enhancing understanding and co-operation between work colleagues of different ages is simply by enabling ongoing contact between them. Mutual mentoring represents a practical way to facilitate this activity. Often called reciprocal mentoring, partnering two employees with an age gap of 15 plus years can eradicate perceived stereotypes and bias. Based on the work of the American psychologist Gordon Allport and his ‘contact hypothesis’ theory, a multitude of studies suggest proximity and personal interactions create social bonds and disrupt bias, myths, and stereotypes one might have toward someone in a different age group. The reason contact works is primarily at the emotional level. Whilst one might hold to stereotypes about the other group, despite them, you grow to like the person anyway.
We also cannot overemphasise the importance of providing education and training to build increased age inclusive awareness. Helping employees to identify the many ways age bias and stereotyping appear across the age spectrum is vital if they are to hold themselves and others around them accountable for change. Of course, such an initiative only works if a company is committed to delivering systemic change in addressing workplace ageism and is committed to realising the business benefits delivered through age inclusive workforces.
Not sure how to get started? We can help you identify how promoting generational labels in your organisation could be embedding ageist thinking within your business operating structures.
We’re happy to speak to your organisation on the business case for older workers and how to make age-inclusive teams’ work. It's a winning proposition for your organisation
References
Applewhite, A. (2016). This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism. Melville House. UK
Butler, S. (2019). Manage the Gap: Achieving Success with Intergenerational Teams. Rethink Press. Great Britain
Callaham, S. (2023). Don’t Fall For Ageist Click Bait: Here’s The Number 1 Giveaway. Forbes. (Nov 28) https://www.forbes.com/sites/sheilacallaham/2023/11/28/dont-fall-for-ageist-click-bait-heres-the-number-1-giveaway/?sh=7a77e85d5fc8
Callaham, S. (2024). Research Shows It’s Time To Ditch The “Generational Differences” Myth. Forbes (Sept 30). https://www.forbes.com/sites/sheilacallaham/2024/09/30/research-shows-its-time-to-ditch-the-generational-differences-myth/
CIPD. (2014). Managing an age-diverse workforce: employer and employee views. Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. London.
King, E., Finkelstein, L., Courtney Thomas, C. & Corrington, A. (2019). Generational Differences at Work Are Small. Thinking They’re Big Affects Our Behaviour. HBR (Aug 1). https://hbr.org/2019/08/generational-differences-at-work-are-small-thinking-theyre-big-affects-our-behavior
Parker, K. (2023). How Pew Research Centre will report on generations moving forward. Pew Research Centre. (May 22). https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/05/22/how-pew-research-center-will-report-on-generations-moving-forward/
Sato, K. (2023) Baby boomers are scapegoats for ills of the world, Charles Sturt University researcher says. ABC Radio Brisbane. (7 Dec). https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-12-07/baby-boomers-scapegoats-clive-hamilton-history-csu/103179636
Wegge, J., Jungmann, F., Liebermann, S., Shemla, M., Ries, B.C., Diestel, S. & Schmidt, K.H. (2012). What makes age -diverse teams effective? Results from a six-year research program. Work, 41, pgs 5145-5151
