“Talking about my Generation” – How organisations can get ahead in attracting and retaining talent

by Keith Freeland and Paul Page

About the Authors

Keith Freeland has over thirty years experience in HR within BP leaving in 2006 from the position of global talent manager. He has specialised in leadership development for the last 10 years and his work in the area of talent management has been recognised as global best practice. He is a fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development in the UK and a Professional Coach accredited by the International Coach Federation.

Paul Page has worked in the music industry for over 30 years. He founded and owns the Trackside recording studio in London, UK and has been record producer and coach to artists who have achieved many industry accolades over a period of 22 years. His unique approach to coaching was introduced into the world of leadership development in 2004.

Together, Paul and Keith formed The D&G Partnership in 2006 specialising in experiential leadership development interventions and authenticity as the basis for great leadership.

Introduction

Talking about my Generation is based on observations by the authors about how talent is identified and developed within large organisations. The themes discussed in this paper are the result of patterns becoming apparent over a period of many years and many thousands of conversations. In this paper the following issues will be explored:

	The “unconscious” selection process. How does this impact talent identification.
	Searching for talent that is different or the same?
	Where diversity and inclusion meets talent management. Are corporations really acknowledging diversity in leadership?
	The music industry where diversity of talent can mean the difference between a successful business and no business.
	The leadership generation gap. How organisations are stifling the potential of their future leadership.
	Work/life balance redefined.
	Developing generational awareness inside organisations. How senior leaders should bring some of their awareness from home into their business.
	A new world of talent. How talent and succession management could look very different.

What exactly is the issue?

If you can remember when “Talking about my Generation” was released by The Who that firmly puts you in the category of the babyboomer generation as of course are the founder members and composers of the song. The babyboomers were or rather are a groundbreaking generation who have achieved great things for themselves, their businesses and hopefully will leave the planet a better place for future generations. But as far as large organisations are concerned this generation is still very much in control and, somewhat arrogantly believe they have all the answers. That may have once been the case but time is changing.

If you are in that category of being a babyboomer you will probably have children of the age you were in the late sixties/early seventies when life was much simpler, computers did not dominate our lives and the future was out there to grab if you wanted it.

Have you ever looked at your children and realised just how different they are? Have you ever had those conversations with your children where they appear to have come from another planet? The music they love is just a noise to you unlike your own choice in music when musicians could really play and write their own meaningful songs (which of course was just a noise to your mum and dad….remember) The fact is that as parents we are, every day, aware that our children are different, they think about things very differently, have very different attitudes towards issues we are passionate about and are passionate about things that we may not have even considered important in our world. For the enlightened parents, investing time in understanding exactly where our children are coming from and appreciating them for who they are yields great benefits at home. But what about at work?

In one sense our own version of the world as we regard it inside our own head is very different from anybody else’s. Across generations there are some similar themes in the way we make sense of the world. And of course from generation to generation, those themes change. In industry, the babyboomers occupy the most senior roles in large organisations, run their own companies and in general are in positions of influence all over the world. They are in the process of identifying and developing talent in their organisations to take the reins in years to come. The pool they have to select from now contains individuals who are not much older than their children at home. And this is what is at the heart of the issue……………..

The Generation Gap in the Workplace

So we can engage with the generation difference at home. We can go the extra distance to understand and communicate with our offspring in a meaningful way. But what happens when the big leaders in industry get to work. In the words of a senior executive of one of the largest organisations in the world, “ I now realise that I have spent years leaving part of me at the office door each morning…………….and that is not to my, or the organisation’s benefit”.

There are already individuals occupying that leadership space in large organisations who are in the same generation as senior executives sons and daughters. But the time invested in understanding the needs of those individuals in the same way as we do our offspring is lacking. The conversation is about work, business, objectives and how we are doing against them. All very relevant in the interests of shareholder value, return on investment and the ever important cash flow but at another level missing the point entirely.

Right now there are three generations of leaders occupying the same space in large organisations. All have different needs, values, beliefs and drivers. There is conflict between the generations right now. There are judgements being made of highly talented people because they are perceived as being less committed through the lens of one generation’s values. There are individuals leaving organisations as a result right now. There are individuals giving up the battle because they haven’t got the energy right now. Individuals will never reach the potential they are capable of and will never add the value to an organisation that they could. And be clear this takes dollars off the bottom line, difficult to measure but nevertheless there.

And most organisations have no ideas what is going on!

What are these generational differences as they show up in business and in particular style of leadership.

Babyboomers – the values of this generation have been responsible for massive changes in society in the western world. For the first time potential was not limited by education or social/family background. Anybody with the ability and drive could be successful. This generation is represented across the globe  in senior leadership positions of large organisations.

There was a price to pay for individual success in business and career. For the babyboomers the price for success in their career was sacrifice in other areas of their lives. There have been many impacts on families and individual health as a result of the demanding work ethic adopted by this generation. It is possible that the values and beliefs of the generation to follow has been influenced by the absence of key family figures though their lives due to their attitude to work.

Generation X – This generation are now reaching key positions in organisations and, in moving up the hierarchy are interacting more closely with the previous generation, often reporting directly to them. There are some significant differences in beliefs and values that are causing friction between the two generations. For this generation, individual success has a more holistic meaning than the previous generation. For them success must include every aspect of their life. An individual who is committed to their own good health will wish to invest a significant proportion of their time and energy attaining success in this area as well as having a successful career. Parents want to be a part of their children’s life and growth as well as achieving their potential at work. High achievement in one aspect of their life at the expense of another is not regarded as success by this generation.

Typically individuals will look at the demands made of them as a senior leader in an organisation and doubt whether that is what they want for themselves. They are making life choices on this basis. Viewed through the eyes of the babyboomers this generation may be regarded as lacking commitment. In actual fact, given the space in which to grow, this generation will be able to figure out how to achieve success on their terms and the authors are confident that they will be no less successful in their careers than the previous generation.

Generation Y (The Millenium Generation) – Representatives from this generation are already showing up in leadership positions and on succession plans in large organisations.

Individuals from this generation like the generation they are succeeding want success and balance in all aspects of their life. They however have grown up during a period of remarkable development in technology and also in organisations much flatter than previous generations had been a part of.

The result is that this generation has a very healthy disrespect for hierarchies and do not rely on line management to set context and provide them with information they need to be successful in their jobs. They gain information from multiple sources, the internet being a significant source.

This generation also regard career and personal development as a journey that involves working for different organisations with less and less seeking a career limited by the scope of one organisation.

These three generations are, right now, occupying the leadership space in organisation throughout the world. We believe that compression of the generations has taken place. Rarely has the needs, values and beliefs of three generations of leadership required to be met simultaneously. As has been illustrated, when it comes to work and careers, the three generations of leadership have very different needs. This can, and is, causing a breakdown in communication across organisations with resulting dissatisfaction, frustration and friction.

But of course the senior leadership in organisations still come from the babyboomer generation in the main. They are accountable for decisions about who features on succession plans and who their successors and future successors should be. The beliefs and values of future generations of leadership are being judged through the filter or lens of the babyboomers.

Redefining Work Life Balance

The exploration of the differences between generations of leadership has provided a richer understanding of the issues organisations are wrestling with labelled as work/life balance. As the babyboomers moved up the corporate ladder, their attitude to work, we would propose, have created the issues we label work/life balance now. If you happen to be part of the babyboomer generation, think back to your parents and grandparents. It is unlikely that you will recall that their lives were unduly burdened by their work in the same way as today.

So if we consider the thought that work/life balance is an issue created by this generation, as leaders trying to bring about some solution to the problem, their own values around work will make the solution almost impossible to contemplate. The reality is that the successful babyboomers are unable to see how their success at work and business could have been achieved without making the sacrifices in their lives that they have made. They are coaching and mentoring the next generation of leaders to consider whether they are willing to make the sacrifices it takes to be successful whilst also trying to solve the problem called work/life balance. Their values are showing through very clearly and any initiatives are seen as ineffective and insincere because of the incongruence with their beliefs.

It is much more likely that the generation of leaders following the babyboomers will create an environment where individuals do not consider their work and life as separate and needing to be balanced. Their belief system supports a holistic approach where every aspect of an individual’s life coexist in harmony.

On the subject of talent…………..

Talent management is a very overused phrase now. The war on talent has given rise to a whole new genre of HR expertise. Talent Managers are now appearing all over organisations to address some of the issues organisation have in attracting and retaining talented individuals for the future. But what is talent in the first place?

In most large organisations there is a list of leadership behaviours or competencies that define what talented people who may be future leaders should look, sound and feel like. It is likely that the organisation will have some kind of process to assess whether individuals are displaying those behaviours or competencies and whether they have the potential to grow their effectiveness in the future. This may be some kind of assessment centre involving a business simulation or perhaps a testing process of some sort. This is all very well but somebody somewhere must have identified a particular individual as suitable to attend the assessment in the first place. What criteria determines whether an individual is selected and do those individuals accountable for that selection process, normally line managers, have the same perception about who is talented or not. We doubt very much whether this is the case because, as we have said above, each individual’s version of the world is different, including of course what we might identify as talent.

So we each have a different version of the world we live in. If you are in the business of trying to identify talented people what makes you think a particular individual is talented or not. We would propose that the qualities in others that resonate with us are likely to be qualities that we recognise in ourselves. This is not a conscious selection we make but as human beings we are naturally going to gravitate towards individuals who are congruent with ourselves. In the world of talent identification this means that those individuals we select for the formal talent assessment process are going to be, in some way, similar to ourselves. This means that, without knowing it, organisations are unconsciously filtering for talent that looks, sounds and feels like the previous generation of talent. The formal assessment process merely adds another filter to select the best of the best.

Very few organisations acknowledge the fact that this unconciouos process goes on and where it is, most organisations struggle to know what to do about it.

Another Dimension of the Diversity Agenda

Diversity, much like work/life balance, is an agenda that organisations have been tackling for some years. At a superficial level it is seen as an issue associated with improving gender, race and ethnicity representation in organisations. The underlying direction is that, by improving representation, particularly in leadership positions, a diversity of thought processes will be applied to business with a resulting diversity of business solutions. The benefits of the diversity agenda is a matter of “doing the right thing” alongside a belief that a business benefit will result by delivering a diversity of business solutions. In the main, organisations have struggled to experience the business benefit.

In the authors’ experience and view, many diverse senior leadership appointments have failed because the environment into which the new appointees are introduced is not ready to “listen” to the diverse thought and even less ready to act on it. As a result no impact is made on the business. Many such appointees end up leaving the organisation disappointed and disillusioned.

We would propose that the unconscious selection process discussed above which discounts talent that is “different” is the same process that rejects imported diverse talent or talent which exists right now within organisations. The generational differences discussed above is yet another manifestation of diversity.

Unless the organisational environment is ready to “listen” to diversity of thought, whether the roots of that diversity are in gender, race, ethnicity or generational, the benefits that could result will not be realised. Those organisations able to create the right environment will benefit greatly.

Searching for Talent that is Different – A snapshot of another way

If searching for, and developing talent that is different and new was key to the survival of the business organisations would be exploring the possibilities. One industry where this is the case is the music industry.

Within the music industry there is a continual search for talent that is new, different and refreshing. Fundamentally the industry has a thirst for different talent. It is a matter of survival of the business to be identifying and developing new and different talent, breaking the mould in on way or another. What can other organisations learn from the music industry.

	The search for talent is so fundamental to the business, funding and resources are dedicated to the process of talent search.
	A&R Managers are key to the music industry. Their only role is to seek talent wherever it exists.
	The selection process is rigourous. Only the most talented make it. In the UK the probability that an artist will have a top ten chart hit is 40 million to 1.
	Many talented artists are left by the wayside. The industry is brutal in deselecting artists.
	Feedback is open and honest. If an artist is unlikely to succeed, they are told. If there is a performance gap, they are told.

How much of a priority is the search for talent in organisations? Is it so fundamental that measures similar to the music industry are taken? Take a moment to think what might happen if your organisation were to take the following measures. What might talent look like in the future? What impact could a much more diverse talent pool have on the business? What would the impact on the bottom line be?

We would propose the  Three R’s approach to talent identification:

	Resources – Enlightened organisations are appointing talent managers right now. These are individuals in roles dedicated to improving the way talent is identified and developed. Of course these appointments should not take away the role of the line manager in identifying and developing talented individuals in he/her team. The key role that talent managers must embrace is to educate line managers to be the A&R Managers for their organisation embracing the basis of talent identification used within the music industry.
	Rigour – The reality is that, by investing resources to identify a broader range of diverse talent in organisations, more individual will “show up” as having talent worth developing. As far as leadership talent is concerned, opportunity is limited by the number of leadership roles within any organisation. Processes need to be robust to ensure the very best talent are identified to progress to the biggest leadership roles. In the world of talent management, where opportunities are limited, organisations must choose the size of the talent pool they wish to develop. There is no right answer but the larger the pool, the better the organisation needs to be in deselecting individuals for continued development. The smaller the pool, the better the organisation needs to be in selecting individuals into the pool. Either way organisations needs very rigourous processes to do so.
	Robust feedback – Applying rigour presupposes the need for robust and honest feedback to individuals. Feedback needs to be direct, aimed at the success of the individual and the achievement of their ultimate potential in the organisation. In the authors’ experience, this type of individual feedback is rare in organisations.

Open Succession Management

Fundamentally succession management fulfils the following purposes:

	Identifying individuals displaying the potential to fill key roles.
	Planning individual development paths.
	Providing assurance that the organisation has sufficient to fill key roles into the future.

In order to support the succession management process the appropriate information and data is required that inform views on individual potential. In the past the information required was confined to:

	Performance track record.
	Potential assessment.
	Career profile

Most organisations conduct the process behind closed doors with few individuals involved in the decision making. A now retired Deputy Group Chief Executive of one of the world’s largest organisations once described to the author his recollection as a beneficiary of the Succession Management Process. He had no ideas that he was identified as having high potential at all. Every two years he would be asked to move roles, often involving relocating his family. He had little choice in the matter but was happy to make the moves in service of his successful career. The whole process worked well at that time.

Of course time has moved on. Individuals much less readily accept the need to move their families with such frequency . Dual career families have become the norm and individuals less readily hand their careers over to the organisation to manage. In fact, taking account of the generational differences, individuals now insist that they should make the key decisions in the careers for themselves. Whilst the objectives for succession management have remained the same, changes are required to accommodate changing beliefs, values and needs for careers.

Recent literature on succession management have recommended that additional information be included to inform decisions. That additional information is the personal development plan for each individual appearing on succession plans. Individual views on their career and development now need to be incorporated into plans. In the authors’ experience however few organisations are seriously accommodating individual personal development plans into their succession management process. In reality little has changed in the field of succession management despite radically different beliefs around development and careers in those individuals who are going to be the future leaders.

Let us take an even more radical look at succession in the future taking into account those themes discussed in this paper. The authors propose a future model of open succession plans:

·        Individuals, fully accountable for their careers and career decisions expect to be involved in the conversation about their career and the future roles the organisation might like to consider them for in the future..

·        To accommodate individual needs, organisations may need to more frequently facilitate career breaks, part time working, involvement in charitable organisations and a wide range of possibilities that have not been considered before.

·         Individuals will be able to freely access their own information on plans, be aware of the roles the organisation may want them to consider in the future and be involved in that conversation. The information will be available on line subject to security restrictions.

These are simply a few ideas that will transform the way succession management occurs in organisations and involve individuals more fully in decisions about their careers and development. Consider for a moment what would need to happen for your organisation to adopt the concept of open succession management and plans.

And finally………..Our Conclusions

The intent of the authors in writing this paper is to bring awareness to organisations of some underyling changes in leadership styles underpinned by values and beliefs that are not immediately visible but will give rise to significant changes. The price for failing to take account of these changes will be high in the future. The benefits of exploring some of the issues discussed in this paper within your organisation will be significant.

Continuing to motivate and retained talented individuals, in particular those with significant leadership potential, is becoming more complex but crucial given the current war on talent. Those organisations able to create the right environment in which individuals can grow, flourish and succeed will reap huge benefits, attracting talent from organisations who cannot.

In summary the authors recommend, based on their experience in the field and data gathered from thousands of conversations, that organisations take a clean sheet look at how they identify and develop talent. In particular the authors recommend a focus in the following areas:

	How talent is identified: Awareness of the unconscious selection process to encourage a diverse range of talent. Adopt the three R’s approach to talent. Ensure line managers understand their role and are aware how their own filters limit their own perception of talent.
	Create the space for different generations of leadership to grow into the leaders they have the potential to become. Create an ongoing dialogue with each individual. Be aware of the generational value gaps and embrace them. Encourage the diversity of leadership that is present in every organisation. Allow future generations of leadership to create the environment where work life balance becomes a redundant issue. Encourage individuals to be who they are at work as well as outside work.
	Explore the benefits of an open succession management process Open access to personal succession information. Involve individuals in the succession conversation. Be open to non traditional avenues to personal development to satisfy individual needs.

The authors assert that, by embracing the concepts explored in this paper and adopting the principles and processes discussed, the following benefits will occur for your organisation:

	Enhanced ability to engage successive generations of talented individuals.
	Improved track record in attracting and retaining talent.
	Enhanced diversity of thought and leadership in the organisation.
	Better quality succession management and decision making.
	A style of leadership that is more authentic and “in harmony” that is visible to the whole organisation.