valeriegd's posterous http://valeriegd.posterous.com Most recent posts at valeriegd's posterous posterous.com Wed, 09 Jun 2010 13:22:52 -0700 Reengaging the baby boomers http://valeriegd.posterous.com/reengaging-the-baby-boomers http://valeriegd.posterous.com/reengaging-the-baby-boomers

Last week I had the pleasure of presenting at a D&I Champions meeting on the topic of Generational diversity.  The room contained approximately 40 persons from many countries, male, female, gen y, x and baby boomers all united in their passion about diversity being important for business.  One of the challenges they had articulated was how to get to grips with this generational diversity!

I shared a great clip from you tube – best search engine - with some scary facts about the aging populations, decreasing number of youngsters in the workforce etc.  We moved on to discuss what events or technologies have shaped these different generations and more importantly what motivates them.  I don’t need to reiterate this all here as enough has been written about on this subject.  The big question that emerged is when are companies going to get the wake up call and understand that they have a sizable part of their workforce who hover around 50+ with an abundance of experience, an effective network and a lot of value to add to the organisations. 

Think of the opportunities that companies have with this particular segment – but to tap into these opportunities, they need to move beyond their current patterns of thinking.  Many companies engage external coaches for both new and experienced leaders, to coach, reorient etc.  In principle a good thing as frequently the external view is needed, but the possibility of using internal coaches for a part of this does not yet seem to be on their radar screens.  An immediate ROI when you consider how much money big organizations spend on external coaches in areas where the expertise is already available internally….  Consider using the experienced associates to support projects – not necessarily lead but to support new leaders, help them keep the project on track, identify key hurdles, and manage  those all important stakeholders.  

Do you know of any companies who do this? Would love to hear about them

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

]]>
http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/535183/Valerie_3.jpg http://posterous.com/users/5AAZPIUR8fm1 Valerie Guertler-Doyle valeriegd Valerie Guertler-Doyle