A CEO’s Role in Cultivating the Best Multi-Generational Team: In today’s business environment, diversity can give corporations and their teams a significant advantage over competitors. Diversity, in short, provides a mix of perspectives and experience that generates a higher level of performance.
As more people are working longer into retirement age, it’s not uncommon to find two, if not three, generations of people working within the same company.
A CEO’s Role in Cultivating the Best Multi-Generational Team
However, this multi-generational component can also present differences and disputes in values and opinions, making for an interesting, yet challenging work environment. As a leader of a multi-generational workforce, the key to thriving is to know where to focus your energy so your team can work together in harmony.
Research suggests that executives are five times more productive when working as part of a high-performing team than they are when working as part of an average one. Toronto banking executive Sean St. John affirms the notion that having the right team of people is the number one factor when it comes to a company’s success.
To become a successful leader, you have to know how to build trust for diversity of thought and approach. This is done by communicating effectively with your team and by demonstrating that you value, understand and welcome new ideas and different ways of working
Leading a multi-generational team requires going beyond asking for input — members need to be provided with an opportunity for the open expression of differing takes on issues. Respect and trust can only be built when people realize that their values and perspectives are taken seriously.
To best tap into this, consider focusing your team meetings on open discussion rather than updates and information sharing. Ensure time on every agenda meeting for team members to ask questions and brainstorm together.
Additionally, be sure to establish the team’s main priorities by agreeing and committing to what the team is working toward and how they will achieve it. In multi-generational teams, it is common for members to have differing expectations regarding how work is done.
Create an opportunity for team members to share how they prefer to work and why their method makes sense to them. This can lay a foundation that’s required to form a strong team.
Leaders can present their staff with the following question: What do we need to do to work together even better? This can be answered by developing agreements within the group.
Bring everyone to consensus on the top five practices they can agree to live by. Hold your employees accountable to the agreements by reviewing them monthly and asking, “How are we doing living up to these?”
Each practice you adopt furthers the process of leading people from an assembly to a vital collaboration. Once everyone begins to recognize their differences, they will be able to reach a higher level of work performance and probably find their workplace a more enjoyable place to work in.
