HONOLULU–Get ready to “erase all the garbage you have ever heard” when it comes to age demographics and what it means for relating to co-workers, subordinates, bosses, and reaching members—both younger and older.
For instance, today’s Millennials are job-hoppers with no loyalty to the workplace, correct? Actually, the data show Millennials are more stable and longer-lasting in their jobs than were Baby Boomers. And older workers are old farts who refuse to embrace new things, right? Actually, many simply have hard-learned experiences that have taught them not to rush into things.
Jeff Havens speaking to NAFCU meeting.
In a light and quick-moving presentation to NAFCU’s annual meeting here, author Jeff Havens, who leads the Jeff Havens Co., challenged numerous assumptions people hold, including credit unions in their training efforts. While CU executives are often told there are four or five demographic groups—and then given schematics and matrixes related to each—Havens said there are really just two groups–old and young–and each can learn from the other.
As an aside, he joked that the four primary groups are Seniors (Really old people), Baby Boomers (Old people who don’t think they’re old people); Gen X (Whiny people who can’t decide if they are old people or young people), and Millennials (Tiny little baby people).
“You cannot be one type of person simultaneously fighting against three types of people,” said Havens. “This doesn’t work because we don’t divide people into four groups. We divide them into two. There are only two buckets you have ever put people into if you are thinking in generational terms. They are young people or old people, that’s all we have. It’s always been that way, and you have to decide which one you are a part of.”
Take This Quiz
Havens gave his audience a fun, 11-question quiz to help them decide if they were old or young, such as “Have you ever used a computer that required you to put a disk into something called a disk drive? Do you now or have you ever owned an 8-track tape? When you see the words ‘Four Square, what is the first thing that comes to your mind?”
The point here, said Havens, is that everyone falls in the middle, as everyone has some qualities that make them young and qualities that make them old. But Havens told the NAFCU meeting, most of those on hand need to admit they fall into the “old” group.
“If you’re an old person who has a problem with younger people you work with or with getting younger people to join the CU, I already know what you think of them: they are lazy and unmotivated,” said Havens. “And if you’re young, you think of old people as out of touch and technologically incompetent. I know what the stereotypes are. Why are the old people you work with so old and boring and why are the young people you work with so young and messed up?”
The Loneliest Generation
There is a fundamental difference between today’s young people and the young people all old people used to be, according to Havens, and that difference is basically this: “Despite all evidence to the contrary, today’s younger generation is actually the loneliest generation, and it’s because of the Internet and connections that have made it harder than ever to find the connections we need to feel we belong somewhere.”
To put that into a broader perspective, Havens explained the concept of Dunbar’s Number, which is an attempt to quantify the number of other human beings a person is capable of caring about at any time. Dunbar’s Number is 150, which research has supported.
“The idea is that all of us have enough room in our brains for about 150 people at any time, and once we fill it up, for new people come in we have to shove out old people,” said Havens. “There is a lot of evidence to suggest this number is really true. Neolithic villages were about 150 people. The average size of an American military company is 160. What’s important is the way we used to find those 150 people compared to how we do it today.”
The Poverty of Choice
For today’s older generation, they found their 150 people in neighborhoods and elementary schools, families and at work.
Jeff Havens speaking to NAFCU in Hawaii.
“In that world, it’s a comparatively easy process; when we went looking for the community we wanted to connect to, we knew right where to look,” said Havens. “But for today’s young people growing up in a world of 500 channels and the Internet, in a world this big finding 150 people who make you feel important and that you matter is an infinitely bigger challenge.”
It’s what’s known as the “Poverty of Choice,” noted Havens: that is, the more options that a person has, the more likely that person is to not choose. “It’s why we sit down in front of a TV and say there is nothing to watch when there is more to watch than ever,” observed Havens.
“It’s so much harder for younger people to find connections. The upside is that when they do find connections they connect a lot more tightly,” he said. “It is borne out in the fact they are often criticized for being so connected to friends and families. It’s borne out in the repatriation of downtowns and walkable communities. It’s borne out in the explosion of craft beer; they want to know their brewer. It’s borne out in two workplace statistics that none of you are going to believe, but according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, today’s Millennials are more loyal in workplace tenure then any similar cohort since 1963. That means they are more loyal than you than Baby Boomers. They are also least likely to want to be entrepreneurs, because being an entrepreneur is very lonely.”
What all that means for credit unions, said Havens, is a “huge potential upside,” because community is a primary selling point of CUs.
Meeting Halfway
According to Havens, here’s what older people/workers can do to meet younger people halfway:
- Remember that loyalty is earned and should not be assumed.
- Appreciate that the world SEEMS to be changing faster for you than it does for younger workers.
- Realize that not all new ideas are bad ideas.
And here’s what younger people/workers can do to meet older people halfway:
- Understand that your company’s practices and processes exist for a good reason
- Realize that not all new ideas are good ideas.
- Let them know you respect their experience and consult them to learn their strategies for success. So, if you treat your older coworkers as a resource rather than an obstacle, most would be willing to help you accelerate your career.
For younger people, Havens reminded, “None of the older people you work with got to where they are overnight. I know one of the most frustrating things for young people is you have a lot of potential and you’ve been here for six months and why aren’t you vice president? But that’s not how things go. Technology has accelerated the speed with which we do everything, but it hasn’t increased the speed at which we get good at stuff. You get knowledge TO YOU faster, but you can’t shove it into your face any faster.”
Advancement is a process, is it not a right, said Havens.
“You earn those things. So, if you want to get along with all those fossils who are in front of you, you need to understand it’s a process that they have been going through and have been working their butts off to get to where they are.”
The Value of Experience
Havens said younger workers also need to realize that experience has a value, which is why older workers don’t always immediate leap at a suggestion or idea.
“The reason all the older people you work with like doing things the way they’ve always don’t them is because the way they’ve always done them has generally worked,” he said. “It turns out that all these old morons know what they’re doing, and it’s working so well they had to hire you to keep things going.”
Havens cautioned younger workers, “If you are a young person who comes in and says everything here is crap and you need to change, you are going to get zero buy-in.”
But understanding the perspective of a different generation doesn’t just apply to young workers, noted Havens.
“We can’t do everything the same way forever.
Sick of Hearing It, But...
I know some older people sick of hearing that the world is changing faster than ever before,” said Havens. “But here’s what’s useful to know: the world is changing faster than it used to. For younger people, the world is changing at exactly the same pace it always has. So, if they come to you with ideas at a faster pace than you think they should, it doesn’t mean they think you’re wrong. This is the way they have always been thinking.”
Havens cautioned older CU workers, especially managers, to remember that for every bad idea brought to them by a younger worker who is convinced it’s brilliant, that same younger worker is going to bring a brilliant idea that the older worker is going to dismiss as bad.
“No matter what generation you are a part of,” reminded Havens, “you don’t know everything there is to know.”