Emerging Leaders: Implications for Engagement and Retention

Author: Rudi Plettinx, Managing Director, Center for Creative Leadership Europe
First published: 2006

Introduction

A recent Economist magazine survey on talent highlighted urgent issues for companies around the world related to attracting and retaining the best people ("A Survey of Talent", The Economist, October 7^th 2006). The lead article in the survey points out that the war for talent is being fought not only by companies but by countries, and cites a poll from the Corporate Executive Board (CEB) in Washington, DC that shows that 75 percent of senior HR managers surveyed said that "attracting and retaining talent" was their number one priority.

The CEB also found that almost one in three employees had been approached by another company trying to attract them to a new job.

One of the drivers is the globalisation of business, and the mobility of workers. Another is the ageing of the population, which the Economist survey predicts will be most dramatic in Europe and Japan, but will also be felt in China (due to the one-child policy) and in America with the retirement of the baby boom generation.

Emerging Leaders, Revolution, Evolution, or Status Quo is a current research initiative by the Center for Creative Leadership that is looking into generational differences in the workplace. There are a number of findings already from North America and more recently from Europe that have implications for talent management, employee engagement and retention.

Emerging Leaders

In much of the developed world, it has been accepted wisdom for a least a century that generations have their own well-defined and unmistakable characteristics, shaped by demographics and historical events during childhood, adolescence and young adulthood.

In the mid-1990's, many companies and organisations began asking questions about managing "talent" – high potentials within their groups or sectors – and retaining key staff in times of business and societal change. This was in the context of a growing mythology around generational differences, with increased media attention on supposed conflicts between Baby Boomers and Generation X in the USA.

To respond, the Center for Creative Leadership embarked upon the Emerging Leaders research project in 2001, looking for similarities and differences among generations in areas related to leadership and to examine myths and realities, with the idea that this information would lead to a better understanding of the challenges of working across generations.

The myths that we wanted to challenge were identified from a survey of general and social science media, and also from concerns voiced by our clients, and included:

• Older and younger people have different values.
• Older people aren't as interested in learning on the job as younger people are.
• Older people want training in broader issues such as strategy and leadership, while younger people want training in specific areas such as business skills.
• Older and younger people are different in how they want to learn; younger people want to learn everything through the computer.
• There is so much conflict between older and younger people that they find it difficult to work together!
• Younger people are always looking to leave.
• To retain younger employees all you need to do is give them more money; older employees are easy to retain because they have everything they want.

To examine the truth or fiction of the myths, the survey included questions on the following topics:

• Values
• Desired leadership attributes
• Learning topics, venues and behaviors
• International experience
• Generational conflict
• Career challenges
• Retention strategies
• Attitudes towards management, other generations, coaching, work, etc.

We wanted to know how different generations were similar or different in these key areas.

Five years down the road, the data not only appear useful in management and development of employees – especially high potentials - throughout the workforce but also in facilitating their mobility around the world as they respond to the needs of their companies and individual aspirations and careers.

And, given the demographic time bomb of an aging workforce, the data provide insight into managing and developing talent in every age group throughout the organisation.

Phase I: North America

Phase I of the research was conducted in North America in 2001 to 2003, and most participants were born in the US and residents of that country (3,448 North American respondents, 779 from other, non-European countries). To determine the generational parameters, researchers looked at population and birth rate data, and then overlaid cultural or historical events that were life-altering or otherwise defining (such as the World Wars, the Vietnam War, the Beatles, computers, etc) The following age groups were identified:

Around 3,400 respondents provided information, with most of them in the Early Boomers, Late Boomers, and Early Xers categories (89 percent).

An analysis of the data revealed that most of the conventional wisdom about generations was fiction rather than fact. Regardless of age, people generally expressed the same values, citing family, integrity, achievement, love and competence among their top five values. Fame, affluence, authority, competition and advancement were of low importance for all generations.

There was also general agreement across the generations that learning on the job was important to all, and that what people wanted to learn was the same – leadership, skills training, team building, and problem-solving and decision-making.

Contrary to the popular belief that younger people want to learn everything on the computer, the survey showed that all groups preferred face-to-face interactions, including peer/manager interaction and feedback. A high percentage of respondents said that coaching was a very suitable method for learning soft skills (such as conflict management, negotiation and influencing). Even technical skills were viewed as best learned through methods other than computers.

For CCL staff working in Europe, the big question was would these findings hold true for non-Americans? And would Europeans have the same priorities for career development and methods of learning as Americans?

Phase II: Europe

Phase II was launched in April 2004 in Europe, and an analysis of responses indicates broad-brush agreement with Phase I findings, but some differences in details (career challenges, priorities for development, how Europeans view coaching, etc). There also appear to be some differences between Eastern and Western Europeans.

In addition to debunking conventional wisdom about generational differences, the Phase II research seems to have major value in specific guidance on recruitment, management, retention and succession-planning for European companies and organisations faced with an executive workforce that is younger, more mobile, and better educated than ever before.

Methodology

CCL researchers discovered that there was relatively little information about generations and their characteristics in Europe. It was necessary to come up with meaningful groupings derived from a combination of demographic characteristics (such as birth rate) and the impact of the historical/political events over the past sixty years. We had 1666 responses from 38 European countries (female 31%, male 69%), with a higher percentage from upper and middle management when compared with US respondents. The breakdown of these respondents between generations was:

The European research team quickly realised that it would be prudent to divide respondents into Western and Eastern European groupings. A high percentage of young talent entering the managerial ranks (across Europe) is from the East. The researchers guessed that their responses might differ from their Western peers, even within the same generation, because they had experienced certain defining events such as the fall of the Berlin Wall and accession to the European Union far differently.

What Did We Learn In Europe?

Looking at results from the European phase of the Emerging Leaders research, there are some findings with implications for talent management issues.

First of all, let’s look the myth:

To retain younger people all you need to do is to give them money; older people are easy to retain because they have everything they want.

In other words:

When asked what their organisations need to do to retain them as committed employees, do older and younger people say different things?

Our data showed that across generations, Europeans listed the following as top priorities:

1. Development and Learning
2. More challenge
3. Increase salary
4. Clear career path
5. Financial recognition/benefits/ compensation other than salary
6. Non-financial recognition/appreciation and respect
7. Work itself and Job rotation
8. Work environment/organizational climate

The findings from the North American sample were remarkably similar. Interestingly enough work-life balance and work-family balance are more of a concern for younger generations and western European managers, compared to the older generations and the Eastern counterparts.

Learning and Development

The data suggest that top career challenges for both Western and Eastern Europeans managers (across generations) focus strongly on areas where learning and development are required:

• Leadership Skills
• Managing change
• Problem solving/decision making
• Team building
• Skills training in my field of expertise

Additionally, performance appraisal is mostly a concern for the oldest generation and management/business skills for the youngest generation.

This tracked in most respects with North American responses, where leadership skills and job-specific skills also ranked high. This seems to debunk the myth that"‘older employees want training in broader issues such as strategy and leadership, while younger employees want training only in specific areas such as business skills."

Other key points from the European data:

• In Western and Eastern Europe, 91% agreed or strongly agreed that "they are learning in their job".
• 98% said "this was important to them". The younger the employee, the stronger this belief is.
• 88% of Eastern Europeans and 74% of Western Europeans said that, on the job, they are "developing the skills I need for the future".
• 77% of Eastern Europeans and 68% of Western Europeans agreed "My job is aligned with my interests".

Looking at how all European generations want to learn "soft skills", we found that they seemed to prefer almost any learning method other than computers, not only for improving their soft skills but for other learning as well.

Coaching and Mentoring  

Our analysis suggests that there many similarities between the results in the US and Europe with respect to coaching/mentoring. For example, 85% of people in the US thought that a mentor or coach was useful for their development. The same percentage of Europeans said that a mentor/coach was useful for their development.

When asked "who would you prefer to have as a mentor/coach", people in the US, Eastern Europe, and Western Europe, all said they wanted their boss, an expert in the field, a senior colleague, or a coach the individual chose themselves.

This result links also with a characteristic that people of all generations want to find in their leaders – the ability to coach and/or mentor.

This raises some interesting issues for organisations. In today's business climate of tight margins, buying coaching from outside is too expensive. Will the coaching responsibility fall on managers, and if so, how can they be equipped to deliver (in addition to delivering on their operational responsibilities)? What do people expect from mentors, and how are their roles different from coaches?  

Conclusion

The results from the Emerging Leaders research so far lead us to believe that the myths about generations in the workplace are just that – myths that make work unnecessarily confrontational and emotional. In contrast, the "realities" can be summed up as follows:

• People (of all generations) want recognition and to feel valued – this is at the core of what we have learned so far. On the other hand notwistanding a general agreement on the concept, younger generations and older generations present some differences in how they express this need, with younger ones asking for a strict and clear evidence of the relationships between performance and recognition.
• Development is the most valued form of recognition, even more so than pay rises and enhanced titles.
• Constant learning on and through the job is what people demand, especially young talent. Organisations that provide this will have a better chance of retaining their best people. People are likely to leave the organization for another one which would provide better development opportunities. This issue should be linked also to the recent trend in the labor market where job security is low and people need to feel that they are marketable, which explains the objective need for a continuing professional growth other than the intrinsic individual interest.
• Learning is a social activity.
• Almost everyone wants a coach or mentor (but this of much more importance for younger generations).
• The younger the generation, the greater the perceived importance of timely feedback about the job.