Meagan Johnson - Generational Speaker

Solve Your Challenges and Bridge the Gap between Generations at Your Multigenerational Workforce

Generational Challenges

Millennial Managers – Challenges Millennials Face in the Workplace

Millennial Managers face many challenges in the workplace today!

How are these millennial managers and bosses shape the culture of a company? Is there a guide for successful management?

I was recently pulled over by a police officer because I was speeding.

It’s embarrassing enough getting a speeding ticket, but imagine my embarrassment when I rolled down the window. I took a look at the officer and blurted out: “You’re not old enough to have a driver’s license much less write me a ticket!”

As she wrote me the ticket it dawned on me that I was guilty of something that many of my baby boomer parent’s friends are guilty of. They have this frozen picture of me in their mind as a kid. The idea that I am an adult, live on my own and have a job – they struggle with that.

Many of us have similar thoughts about Millennials.

The oldest millennial was born in 1981. That makes them about 37 years old. When I was 37, I already had a divorce under my belt!

So this idea that they are still new to the workplace, they’re just out of school, that’s really outdated.

Challenges Millennials Face in the Workplace

Millennials are facing the challenge that many of us didn’t face at that age. Managing people that are considerably older than they are! The teams that these millennial managers are leading are all ages.

The older people distrust Millennials because they do not feel the Millennials have real-world experience. That lack of trust from older employees can be a roadblock to success and building strong work relationships.

Millennial Managers

Millennial Management Style

I interviewed a millennial manager and I asked him how he dealt with these issues. He said that when he joins a new team, he just treads really carefully at first. No need to go in with guns blazing talking about change.

He takes time to get to know the team members and he’s upfront with them. He states the obvious – that he’s younger than them, and that they most probably have more experience than he does. When issues arise, he asks them how they’d handle this problem.

Millennial Managers in the Workplace

You have to keep in mind if you are a Millennial that some of your older employees will look to you to demonstrate traits that they find are important in a good leader. And some of those traits may seem somewhat traditional to you, such as coming in early, staying late, working from the office etc.

Those are traits that baby boomers and Gen Xers associate with hard-working leaders.
According to a Deloitte survey, Millennials want to make a difference and they want to challenge the old ways of doing things.

As more millennials become leaders and managers, they will continue to challenge and change corporate culture. Not only the culture but rules and policies that older employees have always perceived as untouchable. Policies like dress code, time off, personal time, and working from home. And when that happens, I encourage older employees to not take it personally.

Millennial Leaders

As one millennial manager said to me: “When I make a change, I’m challenging the process, not the person!”

No matter what generation we belong to, we all benefit from strong leaders. Leaders who see opportunity. Leaders who encourage us to grow. Ones who support us even when our ideas are not successful.

It’s good leaders from every generation – that’s how we’re going to work and live successfully as one.

Millennials and Money

Let’s discuss Millennials and Money, as well as what help do millennials really wish for when it comes to working in your organizations.

Financial stress can cost organizations up to 250 billion. That’s billion with a B! I don’t think I ever learned to count that high. Two hundred and fifty billion dollars in lost wages, according to a Mercer report.

The number one generation worrying about their financial situation you think are baby boomers, right? Baby boomers – because they’re getting close to retirement. Or Gen Xers. We should have started saving sooner. No, none of the above.

Millennials and Money

It’s Millennials. Millennials worry more about their financial situation when compared to Gen Xers or baby boomers.

If you haven’t heard of Millennials, you’re living under a rock. They’re the 80 million people born after
1980. They’re the largest living generation in the United States. In four years, they’ll be 40% of the workforce and by the year 2020, it’d be the largest share of the workforce.

Millennials spend more time worrying about their financial situation when compared to any other generation. Sixty-seven percent of Millennials feel that financial stress interferes with productivity at work. What are Millennials worry about?

Understanding Millennials in the Workplace

We see organizations doing crazy things to get their attention, keep them on board, entertain and engage them.

Millennials graduated during the Great Recession. Therefore, stalling the beginning of their career or forcing them into lower paying jobs. The average millennial makes $10,000 less than their baby boomer parents did at the same age.

And the biggest difference is that Millennials have student debt! Millennials have more student debt than any generation previously. The average student loan is $37,000. They can expect to have that paid off by age 35.

40 percent of Millennials feel that worrying about their student loans interferes with their health.

So what can companies do?

The obvious answer is to help them with their student loans.

Millennials and Financial Health

90 percent of Millennials said that they would commit to a job for five years in exchange for assistance with their student loans.

Keep in mind, three years is the average job stay for a millennial. They are looking to their employers for help with their finances. Many Millennials feel that education did not prepare them to handle their finances once they graduated. They are turning to their employers.

What do they want to help with?

They want help with investing, how to do their taxes, saving for a home, and of course, student loan debt. What can a company do? They can offer a variety of financial wellness tools!

Some organizations have a financial professional on staff to assist Millennials in planning for their finances into the future and to provide education training tools. They are helping the Millennial understand their finances. Not only is this good for the organization but it also helps build a foundation that Millennial will stand on for the rest of their lives!

Helping Millennials with Money

A lot of people get close to retirement and the big thing they say is ‘Oh, I should have started saving sooner! ‘ So what can organizations do?

Show Millennials where they can save.

What’s interesting is that they tend to save for more short-term goals like a vacation. It’s the long-term goals that they really want to help with. Save for retirement.

The average American worker spends three thousand dollars a year on coffee and lunch breaks at work.
However, the run to see their barista to get their favorite cappuccino or double latte fizz is what costs companies twenty-four billion.

Twenty-four billion hours of lost productivity!

Here’s a win/win offer:

Offer in-house meals, healthy sacks and save the Millennial money. Save your organization productivity hours!

Millennial Boss: How to Give Corrective Feedback to a Baby Boomer

How to Give Corrective Feedback to a Baby Boomer, when you are the Millenial Boss? Yes, a much younger person trying to lecture to an experienced one?

I’m talking to my dad, professional speaker Larry Johnson. He is a co-author of the best-selling an absolutely fabulous book ‘Absolute Honesty’.

When a Millennial Is Your Boss

Recently I had a Millennial audience member ask me about how to best give an honest feedback to somebody she was managing. Somebody much older. Old enough to be her dad. She felt a little awkward giving the corrective feedback.

I thought I’d asked my dad, who is also a baby boomer and a co-author of the best-selling book ‘Generations Inc’.

Giving Negative Feedback to Baby Boomers

“How best should this millennial give honest feedback to this person she’s managing?” And I think we’re safe to assume that it’s a corrective feedback. It’s not a compliment but rather that she wants the person to change their behavior.

I think it kind of depends on where the other person perceives this younger person’s area of expertise.

In other words, the baby boomer may question what right does this person have to tell me how I should do anything? I know as a baby boomer, I really appreciate the younger person who coaches me on how to better use my software, how to use my computer, or how to use social media.

How to Give Corrective Feedback

Baby Boomers Working with Millennials

We get into some tricky territory when the younger manager is going to coach me about something I think I know everything about.

It’s very important that you preface whatever you’re going to say to this person with some acknowledgment of her experience.

Say: “I know you’ve got a lot of experience in this area of dealing with customers who are upset. However, I’m concerned. When you said to the customer ‘don’t worry your pretty little head’, it could have been considered offensive.”

The Millennial that’s giving the feedback needs to voice that it is not appropriate. It could almost be interpreted as sexual harassment. It could be considered offensive.

How to Give Corrective Feedback

I would say in that case that you pose it in terms of how it might be experienced by the customer or even by the Millennials.

Describe the effect of what he’s doing okay and maybe make a suggestion on how he might approach it differently.

The Generation X Management Style – What You Need to Know

Recently a reporter asked me about the Generation X management style – what type of managers are Gen Xers?

What is the Generation X Management Style?

I thought to myself: “Gen Xers as managers? What? No way! We’re too young to be managers! We can’t be managers! We’re still too new. We’re too young or we’re just getting our feet wet. You can’t put us in charge now?”

Gen Xers are managers. In fact, we’re in our working prime. In a survey, they found that over half of executives believe Gen Xers are the most engaged generation. We have a unique Generation X Management Style!

Gen X Managers

So what type of managers do we make?

Well, I think Gen Xers are in a really good position because they are open to change.

Especially when it comes to technology. We began using technology in school before we entered the workplace. Many baby boomers began using technology in the workplace after their careers were already established.

But Gen Xers? We started using technology before we began our careers. When Millennials approach us to try a new technology, we’re open to it.

I think about my own business in the past, when it came to running credit cards.

I would write down the credit card number while I was traveling. Then took the written credit card number back to my assistant. My millennial assistant would then enter it into the little box we were given by the bank and processed the credit cards. She approached me about this thing called ‘Square’ at the time. It reinvented the way that I handled credit cards. Many of you know and use square today.

Generation X Management Style

Gen X Leadership

Despite our unique Generation X management style, here’s where we might stumble.

We were ‘latchkey kids’. Came home from school and we had a list of chores on the kitchen counter. It was up to us to decide when we wanted to do the chores and how we did those chores. We just had to get them done before management, ‘aka mom and dad’, returned home.

As managers, sometimes we think we want to manage people the way we wanted to be managed.

When I first began my career, I wanted a manager who would listen to my input and then let me do my thing. You know? Give me what I need. Then tell me what you want to be done. Give me the tools and training to do it and then just leave me alone.

Gen X Engagement

However, with this new super engaged millennial generation that many of us are working with today as Gen X managers, we may need to step out of our comfort zone and engage with the Millennials with a little bit more frequency.

We may feel this as ‘hand-holding’, but I don’t perceive it that way. I perceive it as engaging the younger generation. Also, that engagement helps to transfer that knowledge between Gen Xers and Millennials. That is our Generation X Management Style!

I look forward to seeing you next week when we talk about the ever-changing generations in the workforce in the marketplace today.

Understanding Generations in the Workplace – the Point of No Return

Understanding Generations is not always an easy task! 

I was honored to be a keynote speaker for the facility management fusion conference in Chicago. While I was attending the conference, I was fortunate enough to see another speaker. Her name is Alexis Thompson and you can find her on her Facebook page titled ‘Trybal Performance’. She speaks about leadership and she said something that struck a chord with me. She said that to be a good leader we often have to let go of control. To allow others to grow around us.

How does letting go of control to let the others grow around us? How does that tie in with the generations?

Working with Generations in the Workplace

I thought that it really does apply. We often have to let go of the way we’ve done things in the past to allow the multiple generations around us to flourish.

Every generation is marked by what I call ‘points of no turning back’. The way we do business. How we communicate. The way we facilitate our day-to-day lives. Sometimes it changes so drastically that the way we were operating previously becomes almost obsolete.

There was a time when we thought a typewriter was high-tech. I mean if we have tools like these we could get our jobs done in no time whatsoever. Things changed and our expectations of how to do our jobs have changed.

Hence the importance of understanding generations. We had to let go of control of the old ways of doing things to embrace the new.

Understanding Generations

I was at a shopping mall directory that shows you an outline of the mall. A list of all the stores. Typically, there’s a red star that says ‘You Are Here’.

There was a three-year-old little boy.

Understanding Generations

He was standing in front of the directory. Took her little fingers and placed it on the side of the digital directory. He was moving her little finger across the side, tried to manipulate and change the images. When the sign didn’t move, he looked at his mother and said ’It’s broke and it bores me!’

Our expectations have changed because technology has changed. That little boy’s expectations have changed too. He has a different expectation of what customer service should be like. What the marketers should do to connect and communicate with him.

For all those vendors, customers service personnel and marketers – for them to be successful with him, they’re going to have to let go of control of doing things the old way and to embrace the new.

Understanding Generations does apply at our workplaces, as well as in our day to day lives.

Leading Generations at Work

That little boy, just like the multiple generations you encounter on a daily basis, has a different expectation. An expectation of what you’re going to do to connect and communicate successfully with him.

I encourage you to think about ways to let go of control of the old ways of doing things to let the new generations flourish around you.

I look forward to seeing you next week when we further discuss what we can do to communicate effectively across generational lines.