I wrote recently about how managers and leaders are getting frustrated with the rise of Gen Me. That is, Generation “Me, Me, Me”. Or if you prefer, Gen-I-Want: I want a pay rise. I want a promotion. I want the corner office. I want …
Is this a new thing?
Nope.
Society, culture and attitudes change over time. We all get that. Sure, there is a bit of value – but not huge value, in my opinion – in giving consideration to the four different generations that make up your staff. You know the drill: Baby Boomers, Gen X, Millennials and Gen Z. Soon, there’ll be another one, as we witness the rise of the Alphas. I suspect some leadership gurus are already frantically putting together their brand new course on “How to Manage Gen Alpha”. They make me laugh 😂 Their argument? Managers like you need special techniques, strategies and approaches, to manage a particular generation “the right way”.
Err … no, you don’t.
Whilst I appreciate that each generation may be deemed to have certain traits or characteristics, lumping a (very large) percentage of your workers into one pot and saying “here’s the Nirvana approach to managing this lot” is both silly and wrong. That’s those naughty gurus again, deliberately making leadership far more complicated than it needs to be.
The best way to manage your people? There is no single best way. But I do know one simple and reliable method that works: stick to your values and principles, and use the same special* approach with each individual staff member. Which is? You’ve seen it from me before:
👉 KNOW YOUR STAFF
(*It’s not special at all. It just works.)
That is: get to know each one of them. Find out what makes them tick. What drives them. What their strengths are. Their weaknesses. Why they come to work (bar the obvious money answer). And so on. It doesn’t take long. I’ve managed Boomers with (so-called) Gen Z traits. Gen Z staff who acted like Gen X-ers. I heard all those Gen Me statements listed at the start of this post, every single year since I stumbled into my first manager role back in 1993. Nothing has changed on that front. Maybe the noise is a bit louder and happens more often these days. But the sounds coming out of mouths? They’re the same.
I’m not poo-poo-ing the Gen stuff entirely. Read the articles and research if you want to. Some of it can be interesting. If it at least makes you think about HOW you’re managing people, then that’s a good thing in my book. But managing staff according to their Gen-tag? It’s a no-no; don’t waste your valuable time on that one. Treating team members as true individuals, rather than the “let’s lump ‘em all in this one bucket” approach, is how you get the best out of them.
Which in turn, will bring out the best in you.
Gen Me? Let’s go with Gen Us. That’s a bit more like it.
