Managing Generational Change - Part 1 of 4
- Matt Manning
- Apr 4, 2022
- 6 min read
This series focuses on the critical and constant issue of generational change. I wrote this paper as the capstone to an MBA course titled "Management of Organizational Change."
Introduction: How generations are a change management issue
This report will examine one of the most consistent and ongoing evolutions that an organization needs to address – generational change. This is a change management issue because with every new employee who enters the organization (and with every departing employee who leaves it), it alters the generational makeup. While this is an incremental change that occurs slowly over time, the impacts are continuous and far-reaching. As this report will discuss, the differences between generations in terms of demographics, psychographics and preferred workstyles means that companies need to be nimble and adaptive in how they support each generation’s needs. This requires a constant evolution over time.
The principles of change management indicate that change should be viewed in terms of the sources of change, types of change, the value that changes, the readiness for change, the levers of change, and finally, the processes of change. Generational differences apply to each of these change management topic areas. In terms of internal sources of change, generational differences impact the expectations and preferences for how each employee wants to be treated, as well as their level of perceived reality. Externally, these differences impact the mindset and actions taken by the individuals who comprise the organization’s ecosystem of suppliers, competitions, customers, and regulators. In terms of types of change, this is an incremental change that occurs over a long timeframe (which is interesting in and of itself because the model indicates that incremental change typically occurs on a shorter timeframe). Regarding the value that changes, companies can use a resource-based view to understand the ongoing inflows and outflows of each generation in order to develop a clear and dynamic view of their generational makeup. In terms of the readiness for change, each generation has different economic, political, cultural and social values, which impacts the agreements and assumptions that they make. For the levers of change, organizations that have a deeper understanding of these generational differences and preferences have a strategic high-leverage intervention to manage the organization more effectively and ensure that each group is well supported. Finally, in terms of processes of change, organizations can create (or access) playbooks to outline best practices for managing this continuous, disruptive change caused by generational differences.
This report focuses on the four generations that are most predominant in the workforce today: Baby Boomers, Generation X, Millennials, and Gen Z. The report itself is broken down into three main sections. The first is a deep-dive analysis profiling each of the four generations from a variety of perspectives, including their demographic information, and psychographic information in terms of the impactful events, key cultural influences and education styles that shaped their lives. This is intended to provide a guide for how each generation thinks, acts, and what “makes them tick”. The second section will shift the focus to how these generations operate in the workforce. This will include concepts like communications styles, knowledge transfer and retention, preferred management styles and more. Finally, the third section is a playbook that organizations can use to monitor and manage the various generations that make up their workforce. (Please note, this report focuses on the United States, so these demographic and psychographic descriptions do not reflect a global perspective.)
Section 1: Generational Analysis
This section breaks down each of the four generations using a consistent set of demographic and psychographic criteria.
Timeframe definition
Age range in 2021
U.S. population in 2021
Defining events
Cultural influences
Education
Values
Baby Boomers:
Timeframe definition
Born 1946 – 1964[i]
Age range in 2021
57 – 75
U.S. population in 2021
70.68 million[ii]
Defining events
Many Boomers’ early childhood occurred in the post-war 1950’s timeframe. America had emerged from a depression and a war to become a world superpower. An economic boom led to many new advancements, including the emergence of television and the widespread ownership of cars. Investments in the Interstate Highway Act led to an exodus from crowded urban areas to the newly created suburbs.
As Boomers entered their teenage years, the 1960’s proved to be a much more tumultuous decade than their childhood in the 50’s. Societal and cultural views rapidly changed, with the Civil Rights Movement springing from a series of high-profile incidents that visibly demonstrated the injustice in America’s racial status quo and the need equal rights for all. Unfortunately, high-profile political assassinations of JFK and Martin Luther King Jr. derailed some of the optimism and progress of the decade. By the end of the decade, America’s misguided expedition into Vietnam meant that some older Boomers were drafted into military service, with others becoming vocal opponents of this war.
Boomers reached early adulthood during the post-Vietnam, Watergate, stagflation years of the 1970s. Boomers then reached their prime adult years during the 1980s and 90s, benefitting from the tremendous economic and technological growth of the eras.
As they entered the new millennium, Boomers reached later adult years. Their influence and leadership have been felt in every public sector and private industry, as Boomers held the presidency from 1992 to 2020, and became some of the most influential figures in business (Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos).
Cultural influences
Culturally, Boomers’ childhood occurred during the time of the “traditional nuclear family”, where mothers acted as caretakers and fathers as the breadwinners. Television introduced these Boomers to a shared popular culture (albeit with far fewer options than the younger generations in this study could access). The “typical American values” of the 1950s began to shift in the 1960s with the growing need for progress and equality exemplified by the Civil Rights movement.
While this was going on, rock and roll music became an important cultural symbol of the Boomers, with groups like the Beatles, Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan vocalizing their beliefs and embodying their youthful activism. Some of the Boomer-driven counterculture movement was exemplified by the newly named “hippies”, whose movement can be seen as a rejection of the suburban conformity and “traditional” lifestyles of their parents, as well as an embrace of the wave of change brought on by activism.
Boomers’ activism incited a number of impactful cultural changes, including the environmental movement, which resulted in the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency and other regulations. They also spearheaded a women’s movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, which enabled Baby Boomer women to assert themselves politically, socially, and economically. Women entered the workforce in record numbers, and took advantage of government programs aimed at encouraging higher levels of education. New laws for birth control, and changing attitudes towards divorce further enabled women to gain more independence.
In the 1970’s, disillusionment in the government and economy led Baby Boomers entering their 20’s and 30’s to look inward and explore themselves. In what became known as the “Me” decade, individual expression was on display in exaggerated fashion with wide lapels, bellbottom legs, and long hair.
As they aged, Boomers became parents to the younger members of Generation X and the bulk of Millennials. Their focus on enabling their children led to the “helicopter parenting” trend of nurturing to the point of micromanaging. As they have entered retirement years, Boomers are working longer years than predecessors, or are pursuing post-retirement ventures.
Education
In terms of education style, most Boomers were taught through instructor-driven lectures. Similar to the parenting style that they experienced at home, teachers were formal, structured, and enforced discipline. Students were encouraged to speak only when called on, and spent most classroom time listening to teacher’s lessons. Technology in the classroom was limited, consisting primarily of books, maps, filmstrips, and projectors. By the time Boomers reached college, modular lessons and independent studies became more prevalent, but technology had not yet permeated the system.
The major change that occurred with respect to education is the rapid growth in higher education. College enrollment rose by 50% in the 1950s, and 120% during the 1960s as a result of the expansion in public colleges and governmental programs to spur education levels. The percentage of women in higher education also rose dramatically during this time.[iii]
Values
Equal opportunities, idealist, optimistic, driven, workaholic, derive self-worth from work, loyalty to a company, teamwork, competitive, structure, discipline, respect[iv]
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