Work + Money

In the song “The Greatest Love of All,” there are the lines ‘I believe that children are our future, teach them well and let them lead the way.’  Truer words were never sung.  These days, our future rides on the millennial generation (born between 1980 and 2000) otherwise known as Generation Y because they so often question the status quo and ask “why?”  This young generation is coming out of school or bypassing higher education altogether and running some of the most exciting new enterprises of the modern day like Facebook and YouTube.  Their large-scale success means that they may be managing people in three older generations: the traditionalists (born before 1945), the boomers (1946-1964), and Generation X (1965-1980) as well as their own.  Increasingly, these ingenious Millennials will need to use emotional intelligence to cultivate employee buy in to the new leader’s agenda.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics data for 2005 shows that some 370,000 young people ages 16-24 were self-employed, the occupational category that includes entrepreneurs; with 5% projected growth of the self-employed category from 2004 to 2014, compared with 2% growth for the decade that began in 1994.  

This trend is a result of the millennial generation growing up on the internet.  They received extreme positive reinforcement from their baby boomer parents growing up in an age when positive psychology burst onto the seen and proliferated the self-help arena. They also saw the fallout of a workaholic lifestyle in rising divorce rates. Therefore Gen Y places a higher value on work-life balance than previous generations, they have a higher risk tolerance, and Gen Y knows that they have very little to lose by striking off on their own and everything to gain.  This tech savvy generation also knows that snazzy websites can conceal low overhead startup ventures, reducing the need for capital or office space while still competing with the big guys.  

With four generations of workers coexisting at once, there is bound to be a lot of disconnect.  The way traditionalists and baby boomers expect to be led, is very different from how the pampered and pushed millenials are going to do things.  With wild ideas and boundless ambition, Gen Y is ready to go on a ride that will involve new age thinking and the use of every new and emerging media, which can pose a challenge to generations that are hesitant to venture into uncharted territory.  These young organization leaders will need to move from generational collision to generational collaboration in order to become truly successful.  That will take empathy and emotional intelligence on their part.  

According to Brent Darnell, an emotional intelligence pioneer and author of the book The People-Profit Connection:  How Emotional Intelligence Can Maximize Your People Skills and Maximize Your Profits, “Millennials that are going to start successful corporations and have to manage others.  These millennials will tend to be the alpha-males and females that have high levels of independence and lack high levels of empathy.”  Darnell went on to explain that by deepening these alpha-millennials levels of self-awareness and interpersonal skills through continuous training, their company results could exponentially improve.  
In order to increase their empathy levels millenials will need to focus on their own feelings first – the different kinds of feelings they’re having and what feelings are associated with what situations.  This kind of self-evaluation is not easy, but is the foundation for empathizing with others.   For those with a seeming inability to evaluate their feelings, training or counseling may be the best recourse.  

The next step to increasing empathy levels is focusing on similarities between yourself and others.  Role-taking and role-playing can help with this pursuit.  It is often hard for a manager or employer to understand the feelings associated with the job of an employee without knowing what it is like to do their job and face their frustrations daily.  By taking on an employee’s responsibilities for a day, a millennial leader can better understand how they are similar to their employees.  A millennial leader at a small company might try to make coffee in the morning and answer the phones for an hour to better understand their employee’s mentality.  

Finally, in order to continue increasing levels of empathy, ongoing practice in imagining and perceiving another’s perspective is necessary.  Once you’ve delved into your own feelings and then into the similar feelings of another, you have probably increased your levels of empathy, however, this is an evolving pursuit that must be repeated and practiced to be effective.  For many people, especially those with already low levels of empathy, the ability to gain insight into another person's point-of-view does not come easily.  Prolonged practice at self-evaluation and role-playing will continue to increase levels of empathy.  Again, this endeavor may take training and/or counseling for optimal effectiveness and noticeable results.

The underlying thread of increasing levels of empathy is communication.  It’s the key to running a successful company and being an effectual leader.  Millenials will need to communicate with themselves first, then with their employees and possibly with a professional in order to obtain the deeper levels of empathy and self-actualization needed to run their companies.

Employees want to be appreciated.  While some may not buy in to a new idea or new way of doing business initially, like the use of text messaging and other viral marketing tactics, if the leader is empathetic, they will include their workers no matter the generation, explain their vision clearly and get their employees excited and on board.  According to Darnell, “We’re seeing an evolution in business that is advanced and yet still fraught with old issues.  It will take a great effort on the part of the millenials to prove their leadership using emotional intelligence and higher levels of understanding.”

The children are our future.  Let’s teach them well and let them lead the way.  Let’s teach the next generation and also share with Gen Y youngsters that they need to begin on their own path and, in doing so, unleash their company’s human potential.

For a better future,

Elizabeth Gordon
Generation X