Talkin’ bout my generation
I turned 40 years old last week. I haven’t really thought much about age over the years. The only age I ever have squarely in my brain is 58, which is the age when my Dad passed away. Shit, that seems so young now. The only real markers of age that I have noticed are that my fitness doesn’t recover as fast these days and the stupid age grouping on Peloton went from the 30s to 40s — they should update that to ‘early 40s.’
People make age seem like a big deal. We are constantly categorizing people into age groups — Boomers, Millennials, Gen Z... (we Xers are the happily forgotten group). These groupings help us organize the world more easily and make good fodder for Inc.com and Fast Company articles, but they’re also used to make some sweeping generalizations about how people want to work and live. This is a mistake. It turns out that generational groupings serve no meaningful purpose when it comes to work and workplace design.
This was recently validated in a report by the National Academies of Science and Engineering in a study titled “Are Generational Categories Meaningful Distinctions for Workforce Management?” Spoiler alert — the answer is NO. Other research also backs up the idea that age groupings are imprecise ways to distinguish between the preferences of individuals. And these flawed categorizations have major consequences in our society, particularly in the world of work.
I’m not sure how the pandemic will affect the way we address age and grouping by age, but for the first time, almost everyone has been thrust into a single work experience at the same time. Ironically, there seems to be a narrative emerging that Boomers are more successfully navigating the WFH and flex situation than Millenials… completely contradicting all those Fast Company headlines we’ve been reading over the years.
The moral of the story is that we need better ways to group people when it comes to new policy and work experience design.
What’s working in the news:
National Academies — Categorizing Workers Needs by Generation As referenced above, this article summarizes the study showing generational groupings are not effective for workplace design.
Fast Company (yes, they have things worth reading!) — How to build a remote team while bridging generational and geographical gaps A few interesting thoughts from Andrey Khusid, CEO of fast-growing Miro (an online visual collaboration platform for teamwork), including some generational connectivity tactics.
GenHQ — Solving the Remote Work Challenge Across Generations If you want a deep dive into a study about leading different generations, then this one has it all. It also confirms consistent findings that at least 50% of people want to keep some form of remote work moving forward.
