Team Partners Telecommunications

Working alongside different generations

Posted on Mar 21, 2023

There’s been a bit of a theme running through these blogs over the last couple of months. You’ll remember that we started with the difference between sympathy and empathy and how being empathetic to our customers will be mutually beneficial. They’ll appreciate the degree of your concern and care for them, and you’ll benefit by their continued custom through and beyond any current crisis.

We then turned attention on our own businesses and staff, in essence underlining the importance of being empathetic around and towards those we work with, of being a safe listener and support, and how this garners trust and loyalty.

This month we have a couple or three not dissimilar ideas for you to mull over! The first is this: did you know that having strong social networks in ‘mid-life’ can prevent long-term health problems further down the line? Most of us know that regular exercise as we grow older will help keep us from becoming decrepit, but what you might not have known is that, according to a research paper published in the British Medical Journal, strong social networks will help too. The paper mentions that strong interpersonal relationships with colleagues (and relatives, etc.) will help to preserve mental acuity and memory and could help keep conditions such as dementia at bay. A good reason for developing those empathetic relationships at work!

A second idea this month is based around another business observation. Apparently now is the first time that the wider labour market has within it five different generations. Those in management positions reading this might already be aware that business and, more specifically, the office environment within business, is often considered to be where generational conflict kicks off. You may have been told of the need to address each generation differently. Perhaps going against the run of opinion, we would suggest this isn’t true. A friendly and, dare we say, empathetic, approach applied across all generations (backgrounds and ethnicities!) will work equally well. The ability to communicate effectively, which usually involves a disproportionate amount of listening, together with a level of emotional intelligence (i.e., empathy) is all that is needed. Interestingly 40% of GenZ and millennials report that it’s an employer’s culture that heavily influences their decision to stay in any job. For Baby Boomers it’s only 30%. Being understood and able to be heard is paramount.

And lastly, this! Thinking about working alongside different generations, an idea being adopted by some companies is to encourage what is known as reverse mentoring, in which junior staff mentor their more senior, and older, colleagues. The potential pit-falls are obvious but, if done well it can be the catalyst for new ideas, encourage culture change and help attract and keep young talent. It’s another view on empathy really!