Multigenerational Workplace: The Insights You Need from Harvard Business Review

8 BEWARE OF AGE META-STEREOTYPES

by Eden King, Lisa Finkelstein, Courtney Thomas, and Abby Corrington

The five-generation workforce has resulted in conversations about how generational differences will impact the functioning of our organizations. After all, Millennials want to communicate with coworkers only via text—and Baby Boomers don’t text, right? And you need to attract those techy Millennials with promises of flexible work schedules, but their older counterparts all want a traditional workday, correct? Well, actually, wrong.

Most of the evidence for generational differences in preferences and values suggests that differences between these groups are quite small. In fact, there is a considerable variety of preferences and values