Page 33 - AIMA : Foundation Day Souvenir

Organisations must take active steps to ensure that their leaders and managers learn the art of empathy when it comes to younger generational cohorts. This requires both training and awareness. The Deliotte Global 2022 Gen Z and Millennial survey reveals that cost of living expenses is the biggest worry of these two generational cohorts and most of them are living pay check to pay check. Majority of them do not believe that they will be able to retire comfortably and also feel that the gap between the rich and the poor is widening in their respective countries. Most of them actually have taken-up a second part-time job, besides their full-time employment. Other concerns include political instability and disturbances caused by wars and conflicts. Their priority in job includes good worklife balance, opportunities for learning and development, flexible work arrangements that helps them work remotely so that they can save on expenses, and free time to pursue their passion and spend more time with their families. Both these generations look for values alignment when taking-up an employment and two out of five have rejected job offers from companies who have no commitment to issues like diversity and inclusion, sustainability, etc.
Empathy goes a long way in creating a better understanding between mature and younger generations and thereby the ability to understand each other standpoints.
• Train managers and leaders
When we talk of developing empathy, how does that really occur? How fair will it be to point fingers at managers and leaders, blaming them for lack of empathy and poor understanding of the younger generations. And then, is empathy just expected from mature generations and not from the younger generations? What will we do about the millennial managers? Do they need to learn empathy for understanding their own generation reportees or Generation Z workers?
Empathy needs to be learnt and comes through structured learning programs for managers of all generations on issues related to generational diversity. In the year 2017, when a prominent bank, headquartered in Dubai, was at the cusp
of launching a millennial version of their bank, they encountered survey findings about their own managers doing not too well when it came to engaging millennial team members, leaving them baffled. My subsequent engagement with them and the series of structured training workshops that I conducted for the CXO-level leaders as well for their senior business managers was a mutually rewarding experience. They went on to successfully launch the millennial version of their business and have continued to retain their market leadership position. Recently, I was invited by iPlace USA, a prominent global recruitment firm to discuss about generational diversity and millennial engagement. The fact that this event was attended by their CEO himself, showed their commitment to generational diversity.
Mentoring by senior leaders is a great way to enable younger generations to develop empathy and improve generational diversity. Such engagements improve understanding between generations and create a more inclusive environment.
• Culture of openness and inclusivity
A very interesting study was done recently by resume.io, wherein they analysed LinkedIn median tenure of employees and identified top 20 companies where employees have stayed the longest, averaging between eight and ten years, and another list of 20 companies where employees have lasted less than two years. The study revealed that companies where employees stayed longer were the ones who offered them greater freedom to use their initiative and craft their own roles, flexible work from home options among others.
“In our organisation, generational gap is bridged in a variety of ways. We celebrate Bahrain Sports Day forming teams with a varied spectrum of age. Teams working on any project is always a mix of young and old. Further, factory acceptance test visits also always constitutes of old and young professionals.”- Saikat Sarkar, Chief (Engineering Design, Planning & Studies), Electricity & Water Authority, Kingdom of Bahrain.
“In our company, we have done away with any form of hierarchy. The respect is for your
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