Generational Diversity At The Workplace Essay

Every generation is influenced by its period 's economic, political and social events. From the Great Depression to the civil rights and women 's movements to the advent of television and advanced computer technologies. Thus generational background/situation may also affect the way they work. The key is to be able to effectively address and take advantage of the differences in values and expectations of each generation in the workplace. The current work place consists of four different generations; The Baby Boomers (1946-1964) who are slowly retiring and existing the workforce, The Generation X (1965-1976), The Generation Y or millennia (1977-1997), and the Generation Z who are about to or are just entering the work force. Although these different generations tend to want similar things in a workplace their environment/background has shaped their character, values, and expectations (Hahn 2011).

The most prominent change in the workforce affecting human resources at St. Anthony’s is the rise of a multi generational workforce. Providing different human resource needs for various employees is an evolving challenge. Being aware of different workplace standards between generations is taken into consideration to reduce “pain points” (Calvert, 2015). In the interview, Judie grouped Generation X and Millennials into the same group, and focused primarily on the differences between Baby Boomers and Gen X/Millennials. She described the Baby Boomers as

The Tethered Generation, written by Kathryn Tyler, a self-identified member of Generation X, published this article in HR Magazine, a magazine for HR Professionals. In this piece, Tyler elaborates on what she believes to be the most dependent generation to exist: Millennials. A “frequent contributor” to the publication as a freelance writer, she has quite the background in human resources and training, which reflects in the style of this particular article. In the beginning Tyler discusses the effect that tethering to technology, peers, and parents has had on this generation. Towards the end, she writes a sort of “how to” guide on dealing with those effects in the workforce, and how to make the transition into the workplace for those individuals (and other employees) as smooth as possible. Her thesis is evident in the beginning of the article. Tyler argues that because millennials are too attached to technology and dependent on other people that are close to them (like parents and peers), they lack the skills and traits that previous generations possessed, as well as autonomy, and in the process created an epidemic of very overbearing parents that may be too concerned and involved in the life of their children, which could be detrimental to the new young adult’s development of their professional life. This rhetorical analysis is going to dissect the writer’s use of logos, pathos, and ethos in her argument.

In her versatile article, “The Tethered Generation”, published in HR Magazine in May 2007, educated freelance writer Kathryn Tyler expresses her opinion of technology and its effects on the millennials generation (those born in the United States between 1978 and 1999). Tyler’s intended audience includes the many readers of HR Magazine, those who probably work in the Human Resources (HR) Department themselves. Her purpose is to educate other HR professionals on how they should become aware and prepared to a millennial generation too soon start working in the same workforce they are in. She shows this by arguing that since the reliability of technology, millennials have slowly started to drift away from their own responsibilities, causing a changed etiquette in professionalism while in a workforce environment. Tyler, a member of Generation X (those born in the US between 1960 and 1977) and a former Human Resources generalist, often writes passive, two-sided articles, addressing that neither side of the argument is to blame, according to her previous work in HR Magazine. This conversant piece continues that pattern of examining the cultural change from the perspective of human resource issues. what follows, I will try to reach out to my audience of classmates in order to have them agree with me that Tyler’s persuasive appeal is not strong enough to appeal to her audience.

In Canada today we see a new future of demographics at work: soon there will be five generations in the workplace at once. The mutigenerational diversity in the workplace has many advantages and disadvantages, it offers a broader range of talent, but it can often mean conflicting ideas and stereotyping. “Canada is becoming a nation of the aging and the very young.”

First off, retention for all generations starts on day one of employment (Martin, 2006, pg. 118). Beginning in orientation, it is a good idea to ask workers what their ideal career path would be and what can be offered throughout each stage of their career.

The most prominent change in the workforce affecting human resources is the rise of a multi generational workforce. Providing different human resource needs to various employees is an emerging challenge for Judie. In the interview, she grouped Generation X and Millennials into the same group, and focused primarily on the differences between Baby Boomers and Gen X/Millennials. She described the Baby Boomers as skilled in their jobs, thankful to be working, and without questioning change or decisions in the organization. However, she felt Gen

Upon reflecting on the three main generations that comprise the workplace today, a few differences emerge. “Baby Boomers” grew up in a time when movements were prominent, the Vietnam War occurred, key figures were assassinated, the Watergate Scandal occurred, and television was introduced (Twenge et al., 2010; Schullery, 2013). Overall, “Baby Boomers” seem to exhibit a distrust of authority, value hard work, and want to enjoy their achievements (Robbins & Judge, 2015; Twenge et al., 2010). As such, they are results driven and give their utmost effort (Robbins & Judge, 2015). “Generation X” grew up in a time of computers, divorce, two career parents, MTV, and economic uncertainty (Twenge et al., 2010; Robbins & Judge, 2015). For the most part, they seem to exhibit the workplace behaviors of independence and a lack of commitment to employers (Twenge et al., 2010). They value a balance between work and life and place more focus on extrinsic rewards such as monetary compensation (Twenge et al., 2010). “Millennials” grew up in prosperous times with technology dominating the era and over-protective parents (Robbins & Judge, 2015; Schullery, 2013). Generally, they seem to place a greater value on employee benefits, leisure time, teamwork, and open communication (Society of Human Resource Management, 2004; Twenge, 2010; Myers & Sadaghiani, 2010). In addition, they have also been given the labels of “self-centered” and “entitled” (Myers & Sadaghiani, 2010).

The most prominent change in the workforce affecting human resources is the rise of a multi generational workforce. Providing different human resource needs to various employees is an emerging challenge for Judie. Being aware of different workplace standards between these generations is taken into consideration to reduce “pain points” (Calvert, 2015). In the interview, she grouped Generation X and Millennials into the same group, and focused primarily on the differences between Baby Boomers and Gen X/Millennials. She described the Baby Boomers as skilled in their jobs and maintaining the implicit

The workplace of today involves interactions among people from four different generations often causing much conflict for leaders and organizations. Each generation represented has its own set of different values and beliefs. These differences can easily lead to conflicting barriers within the workplace. This can pose a significant problem for those in leadership. In order to combat this issue, leaders and organizations can effectively deal with these issues by offering different programs such as executive mentoring, town hall meetings, and leadership seminars for those in leadership.

“The number of employees over the age of 55 has increased by 30 percent; however, the number of 25- to 54-year-olds has only increased by 1 percent” (Claire, 2009). In 2008 the eldest of the 77 million baby-boomers turned 62. Estimates are that by the end of the decade about 40 percent of the work force will be eligible to retire. As people begin to reach the age of retirement there may be not be enough new employees to fill the gap (Clare, 2009). Companies need to find ways to attract Boomers and Millennials. Companies that want to attract Boomers and Millennials need to be creative in their culture, HR policies and work environments.

Many changes are happening in the workforce today. Our labor environment consists of multiple generations, which creates fundamentally differing approaches to everything from work ethics, business management, and co-worker cooperation. The most recent generation, commonly known as “Generation Y” or the “Millennial” generation, is slowly taking over the workforce. Because they bring with them a radically new mindset and opinion of labor, the global business infrastructure should be modified to not only accommodate “Millennials,” but also to remain sympathetic to the business practices characteristic of previous generations. Doing so will provide more harmony and productivity among co-workers of different generational backgrounds.

In an interview of 2016, Simon Sinek analyses and discusses the topic of Millennials within the workplace. Throughout Sinek’s speech in his interview, he explains the disadvantages which Millennials have faced while growing up in their generation. Now, Sinek claims that the reason why Millennials have been dealt such a “bad hand” in life, is a result of failed parenting strategies, and an imbalance of technology along with social media (which has advanced like never before within the adolescence of Millennials). Therefore, the imbalance of the internet and real-life interaction results in millennials being unable to form deep and meaningful relationships, in order to carry out happy and meaningful live in comparison to previous

SUMMARY OF THE ARTICLE “UNDERSTANDING AND MANAGING GENERATIONAL DIFFERENCES IN THE WORK PLACE” ( Cited from Kapoor and Solomon 2011)

The upcoming generation, millennials, are a new type of generation. They have proven to be the most educated generation, despite the hard times in the economy. Yet they still face criticism from their elders on their work ethic. Although they seem to all be lazy and not interested in working, not all millennials are like that. They just have different values in life, and balance work life with free time. Millennials have faced a lot of criticism on their work ethic, which has many questioning do millennials have a strong work ethic. They are said to be lazy narcissistic tech addicts, who don’t take any job seriously and slack off. What most don’t know is that the economy hasn’t been in the greatest of shape, this makes work ethic hard to