Generation Gaps within Organziations
Most of the companies today have employed staffs and personnel from different age brackets. This situation somehow triggered the generational gap in the workplace. In an organization, the boss will ask the researchers to make a proposal about a considered strategy. One made a research through the internet, and the other preferred the help of books and manuscripts in the library.
The two researchers, one 25, and the other 55, display one of many variations of the different generations on how they are going to get things done at work. Both get the job done, only in a different approach. Generation gap can hurt a company’s effectiveness because of the disparity in attitude, character and reactions to stimuli. The younger and older ones might find it difficult to reconcile in the workplace if the management will not give it proper attention.
There is no other choice, but to strengthen the work relationship between and among the different generations in order to achieve the company’s maximum efficiency. The workforce of today has three generations working side by side: the baby boomers are those who were born between 1940 – 1960, on or after the World War II; people born between 1960 – 1980 are the Generation X, and the Generation Y or the Millenials, from the late part of the 80’s up to the present.
The focus of this essay will be between the Baby Boomers and the Generation Xers since they basically compromise the workplace. These generations have somehow extreme differences maybe because of their distant age and difference in life orientation. Baby Boomers who were born between 1943 and 1960 are the postwar babies (Zemke, Raines, and Filipczak, 1999). Baby Boomers invented the phrase “Thank God, it is Monday”, and the 60-hour work week.
Boomers are eagerly concerned about participation in the workplace, about bringing heart and humanity to the office, and about creating a fair and level playing field for all (Zemke, et al. , 1999). With this, we can say that baby Boomers are driven, interactive, and often have good personal skills. They are sometimes reluctant to go against peers, overly sensitive to feedback, selfish and judgmental of those who don’t see things as they see them. (Zemke, et al. , 2000).
