Employee Discipline Procedures: Progressive Discipline

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Below we talk about the following aspects of Employee Discipline Procedures:

  • Setting the stage for Employee Discipline Procedures
  • Issuing Warnings
  • The Progressive Discipline Meeting
  • Taking Corrective Action

Setting the Stage for Employee Discipline Procedures

Many managers fail to do their homework prior to launching in to Employee Discipline Procedures.  There are some things to do ahead of time:

Articulate clear expectations.  You cannot take an employee to task on things they were not aware they are accountable for.  There are a number of mechanisms to articulate those expectations:

  • Job descriptions
  • Performance agreements
  • Regular one on one meetings

Document everything.  A key part of Employee Discipline Procedures is the paper-trail.  You should have a file on every employee, and that file should contain details of all communication pertaining to performance.

  • Notes about informal discussions
  • Any emails pertaining to performance.
  • Documentation from more formal interventions.

Ensure you are prepared to focus on the behavior, not the person.  If you make it personal, it will much more difficult, and you may incur needless legal risk.

Have a Progressive Discipline process.  You must being your Employee Discipline Procedures knowing the various steps, and how it might end.

Progressive Discipline Process

Your first step in Employee Discipline Procedures is to check with your HR department or person to fully understand what systems and processes are currently in place.  In the absence of any such tools, use the following as a starting point for your Employee Discipline Procedures:

  1. Ensure expectations are clear.
  2. Highlight the gap between desired and actual performance.  You need to be as specific as possible when describing this gap.
  3. Issue verbal warning – Tell the person specifically what you want them to change, and in what time frame.  If there is a knowledge or skill gap, you will need to assist the person in bridging this gap.  Write down the details of the verbal warning (date, time, discussion points, and any witnesses present).
  4. Issue written warning with consequences.  If the performance has still not improved, you need to issue a formal written warning.  This should include very clear consequences as to what will happen if performance does not improve.  Again you need to be very specific about the gap between desired performance and actual performance.  You also need to specify timelines for improvement, and the next meeting.
  5. Issue second written warning.  This will have all the elements of the first letter, but also include a much more urgent sense of the consequences of continued poor performance.
  6. Take corrective action – a demotion, a suspension, or termination.  At this stage it will be largely dependent on the circumstances, but you need to follow through on the promised consequences in the previous warnings.

How to Issue Warnings in the Employee Discipline Procedures

  1. Highlight the gap between the desired performance and the actual performance.
  2. Issue a verbal warning.  Be as specific as possible, and make suggestions for improvement.  You need to document the verbal warning with the date and time, the details of the conversation, the follow up actions discussed, and any witnesses to the conversation.
  3. Issue a written warning. Be specific.  Be clear on the consequences
  4. Issue further warnings after an adequate period of time has passed to allow him/her to make the required improvements.

The Discipline Meeting

What to say:

  • Clarify the process, and what is about to happen
  • Provide in as much detail as possible with behavioral examples the deficiencies of performance or transgression that has brought everyone to this meeting.
  • Point out the negative impact to the organization and to the people that the undesirable performance has.
  • Describe in detail the desired behavior or action, and reference when and where this has been made clear to the employee previously

How to Say It:

  • Present case in neutral language
  • Be calm
  • Be as specific as possible (when, where, how many, etc.)
  • Focus on the facts
  • Be professional

Ask the employee to reply

  • Listen carefully
  • Ask for clarification if necessary.
  • Ask the employee for comments or potential solutions to resolve the issue.

Taking Corrective Action

Corrective action as part of your Employee Discipline Procedures, can take a variety of forms.  You need to determine what will be most likely to solve your problem.  In some cases, it may be suspension, in others it may be termination.  One thing you need to ensure when you get to this stage is that there are no surprises to the employee.  There should have been adequate warning and notice before you ever advance to this stage of the Employee Discipline Procedures.

3 Things to Remember about Employee Discipline Procedures

  1. Document everything, every time, always.  You need this to mitigate the risk of harassment or wrongful dismissal claims.  It is also good practice.
  2. Don’t over or under react to a situation.  Ensure the action you take is commensurate with the nature of the transgression
  3. Don’t make it personal.  It makes it much easier for all concerned if you can adequately detach personalities from the situation

Watch the ‘3-Minute Crash Course’ about Employee Discipline Procedures (CLICK THE ARROW TO START THE VIDEO):

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When Command and Control Works

It seems to me that Command and Control as a management style has gotten a bum rap.  You’ve heard the disparaging remarks, “She’s a complete command and control style manager” – implying there is something wrong with that.

I think such comments display a startling lack of understanding of what leaders are required to do in organizations.  Command and control is a very useful managerial tool for certain situations.

People love to use fire-fighting as an analogy to describe modern management practice.  I would challenge anyone to go find himself a Fire Chief and ask him/her if command and control is a bad idea.

When a building is burning and lives are at stake, the Fire Chief very much relies on command and control as the appropriate management tool for that situation.  Can you imagine the fire department showing up at an emergency, and the Fire Chief requesting that everyone break up in study groups, to hold hands and sing camp songs?

“OK – everyone brainstorm ideas for how we should tackle this, and I’ll give a special prize to the group that comes up with the best idea.  Make sure everyone participates equally, and remember that everyone’s feedback is valuable.  This is an excellent opportunity to reinforce how much we value each other, and I’ll float between the groups to help facilitate.”

Glad it’s not my house on fire.  I want the Fire Chief standing on top of chair barking out orders as fast as she can to get the situation under control.  I also want the Firefighters to listen carefully to the orders being dispatched, and execute as they’re being instructed to do.

When they are back at the Firehall, and practicing for such emergencies, or doing community outreach, then the Fire Chief would be well advised to pull a different tool out of his box, and to engage his people in a more collaborative style.

The problem for people that disparage command and control is that they confuse this very important managerial style with a lack of respect.  Lack of respect is never appropriate, but many times it is a leaders job to tell her direct reports in no uncertain terms what they are required to do.  Setting clear expectations, holding people to account for those expectations, and administering the appropriate consequences are what we pay managers to do.

Command and control is one legitimate tool to get this done.

 

 

Contingent Decision Making: The Vroom Yetton Model

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Below we discuss:

  • What is the Vroom Yetton Model?
  • How the Vroom Yetton Model is different than other decision making models
  • The five decision making styles of the Vroom Yetton Model
  • How to choose the appropriate style to your situation

What is the Vroom Yetton Model?

The Vroom Yetton model is a decision making model that recognizes the situation or environment may change how decisions get made.

How the Vroom Yetton Model is different than other decision making models

Other decision-making models can be very useful, however one needs to assess what assumptions those models are based on.  For example, often a decision making model assumes:

  • There is adequate information that is accurate and of reasonable quality.
  • There is some knowledge of cause & effect.
  • Alternatives can be rationally and objectively judged.
  • People will act rationally and free from organizational politics

The Vroom Yetton model challenges the decision maker to assess these things in the context of the situation she finds herself in.

Five Decision Making Styles of the Vroom Yetton Model

  1. Autocratic (A1) – The leader chooses using information available to her at the time
  2. Autocratic (A2) – The leader collects specific information from people and then decides.
  3. Consultative (C1) –The leader meets with people one on one to gather information and solicit input.  That input may or may not be reflected in the final decision.
  4. Consultative (C2) – The leader meets with the group to gather feedback and input, and then makes the decision.  That input may or may not be reflected in the final decision.
  5. Group (G) – The leader looks to the group for consensus, and the decision is made collectively.

How to Choose a Style of Decision Making Based on the Vroom Yetton Model

The Vroom Yetton model suggests seven key questions that guide a leader to choose the most appropriate decision making style to the situation.  Answer the questions below, and follow along on the accompanying flowchart to determine the best decision making style for your situation.

  1. Is the outcome critical?  Are there technical or rational grounds for selecting amongst options?  Is there a quality requirement?
  2. Do I have sufficient information to make a quality decision
  3. Is the problem structured?  Are the alternative courses of action and methods for their evaluation known?
  4. Is acceptance of the decision by subordinates critical to its implementation
  5. If I were to make the decision by myself, is it reasonably certain that it would be accepted by subordinates?
  6. Do subordinates share the organizational goals to be obtained in solving this problem?
  7. Is conflict among subordinates likely in obtaining the preferred solution?


3 Things to Remember about the Vroom Yetton Model

  1. Don’t make it complicated.  You should be able to run through the model in a few minutes to assist you in choosing your style.
  2. Realize some decisions should be autocratic.  Well-intentioned advisors tell you to always involve your people in decisions.  In reality, some decisions belong to the leader alone.
  3. Don’t over-rely on one style.  If you become over or under-participative in successive decisions, you will ultimately fail.  Each situation must be assessed according to the situation.

Watch the ‘3-Minute Crash Course’ about the Vroom Yetton Model (CLICK THE ARROW TO START THE VIDEO):

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Socrates, Lincoln and ADD

One of the hazards of living in a society that doesn’t value anything remotely old, or any person over 25, is writing about people who lived in different centuries.  I’m taking a bit of a risk here… by way of this first sentence, 50% of the reading audience has already ADD’d onto another subject.

You see, Socrates and Lincoln were masters of the art of asking questions.  A key part of each of their distinct repertoires was to ask questions to guide and persuade people to their way of thinking.  Undoubtedly, it was a special skill in their respective times.  Now, it is probably an extinct form of communication.

The benefits of guiding conversation by questions are well documented and obvious.  What is not as evident is why people don’t bother to use this powerful method of communication.

I’ll go out on the limb here, and suggest it’s because we don’t think we have time.

We live in an instant gratification culture with an overwhelming societal case of Attention Deficit Disorder – communal ADD.

In the course of investigating this phenomena, I turned to the ultimate authority on all things cultural:  the TV.  I watched a few unscripted TV shows (I won’t call them “Reality TV”, because Star Trek is closer to reality than any of these shows).

It seems effective communication requires us to:

a)    Have all the answers, right away.  If you don’t know the answer, make something up, and stick to your guns, lest you look weak.

b)   If you don’t know the answer, shout louder than the other person to make your (incoherent) point.  It doesn’t really matter what they are saying, or even if they are right.  What is most important is that you win.

c)    You are entitled to an opinion, even if you have absolutely no clue what is being discussed.  You are not only entitled, you are obligated to weigh-in with your clueless drivel.

d)   Everybody is exceptionally good looking.  Ugly people make for bad TV, and are thus completely ignored even if they do have something intelligent to say.

I wonder what questions Socrates would ask about this?


 

The Art of Asking Questions

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Below we talk about the art of asking questions, and about how this can be a powerful managerial tool.  Specifically, we address:

  • The power of asking great questions
  • What are empowering questions
  • How to ask great questions
  • Responding to questions with “positive understanding”

The Power of Questions

The art of asking questions well is a powerful tool for managers and leaders of organizations.  By effectively using questions, managers can realize a number of benefits:

  • Facilitation of individual, team, and organizational learning.
  • Enhanced accountability and clearer responsibility
  • Improved innovation and problem solving
  • Movement of people from dependence to independence.

Using Empowering Questions

It is important to understand the difference between disempowering and empowering questions, and to maximize the use of empowering questions.

Disempowering Questions threaten self-esteem and thereby cause people to get mired in their problems.

“Why are you behind schedule?”

“What’s the problem with this project?”

Empowering Questions build positive attitudes and self esteem.  They get people to think and allow them to discover their own answers, thus developing self-responsibility and transference of ownership for the results.

“How do you feel about the project thus far?”

“How would you describe the way you want this project to turn out?”

“Which of these objectives do you think is the most important to accomplish?”

“What do you think is the logical first step?”

How To Use The Art of Asking Questions as a Powerful Leadership Tool

There are three immediate things leaders can do to tap into the power of the art of asking questions:

  1. Use Confirming/Clarifying Questions:  Listen and look for themes, key issues, and feelings.
  2. Focus on Empowering Questions:  Focus on the gateway to success or deeper understanding.
  3. Use Action Questions:  Moves toward a course of action or plan of attack.
  • “What if you/we were to try …”
  • “Based on your experience, what do you suggest we do next?”

Responding with Questions of Positive Understanding

When using the art of asking questions to respond to people, focus your questions on the positive aspects of the others’ statements:

Others’ Statement: Positive Understanding Questions:
I’d like to try that but … I’m not sure that the others will go for it.
  • What can I do to help you give it a try?
  • How can we overcome others’ resistance?
  • How soon can we try?
Are you kidding, this is not a pragmatic approach!  That is not even close to how things really work in my department.
  • How do things work in your department?
  • Tell me more about it.

3 Things to Remember About the Art of Asking Questions

  1. This is not as easy as it sounds.  You’ll have to make a conscious effort to move to asking questions rather than telling people the way it is.
  2. Use Empowering Questions.  There’s more to it than simply using Open Ended Questions.
  3. Asking rather than telling, questions rather than answers, is a key leadership skill.

Watch the ‘3-Minute Crash Course’ about The Art of Asking Questions (CLICK THE ARROW TO START THE VIDEO):

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Delegating Responsibility: The Monkey on Your Back

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Delegating responsibility is a core function of any leadership role.  Yet many times, people at all levels of an organization will find themselves with “the Monkey” back on their desk.  Below we discuss the following aspects of delegating responsibility, and keeping it delegated:

  • Different types of “Manager Time”
  • Why Managers end up “buying-back” responsibility for certain tasks
  • How to keep responsibility delegated.

Source:

Oncken, William, and Donald L. Wass. “Management Time: Who’s Got the Monkey?”  Harvard Business Review, Nov-Dec 1974, Reprinted and updated in HBR: Nov-Dec 1999

Types of Manager Time

When delegating responsibility Managers need to ensure they fully understand the three kinds of management time:

  • Boss-imposed time – used to accomplish those things that are important to his or her boss
  • System-imposed time – used to accommodate requests from peers for active support.
  • Self-imposed time – used to do those things the manager originates or wants to do.  Self-imposed time, can further be divided:
    • Subordinate-imposed time – This is time well spent when it is coaching and leading others.  However, a manager needs to minimize the time she spends solving her subordinates problems for them.
    • Discretionary time – the time that is the manager’s own.

Managers have enough of their own boss-imposed and system imposed time without taking on more subordinate imposed time that comes about by not properly delegating responsibility.

Inadvertently De-Delegating Responsibility

  • Your direct report brings a problem to you that you know enough about to discuss, but not enough to make a decision on the spot.
  • The boss tells the direct report, she will get back to him.
  • The delegation of responsibility has just been reversed.
  • The manager ends up with more to do, while the direct report ends up with less responsibility.

Delegating Responsibility and Keeping it Delegated

  • Provide Support Without Removing Responsibility.
  • Regularly scheduled One on Ones with all direct reports
  • Use the Wily Manager Coaching Model.
  • Lead With Questions.

The Care and Feeding of Monkeys

Following Oncken and Wass’s analogy of the Monkey jumping from the subordinates back onto the boss’s, here are five rules for delegating responsibility:

  1. Monkeys should be fed or shot.  Do not allow them to linger on your back for any length of time
  2. The monkey population needs to be kept below the maximum the manager has time to feed.
  3. Monkeys should be fed by appointment only.  The responsibility for a the completion of a delegated task needs to be left with the person to whom it was delegated
  4. Monkeys should be fed face to face or by telephone.  Regular one on one meetings are very effective.
  5. Every monkey should have an assigned feeding time.  Delegated tasks need to be monitored regularly.

3 Things to Remember about Delegating Responsibility

  1. It’s not your job to do their job.
  2. Be vigilante about the Monkeys whereabouts.
  3. Helping with an employees Monkeys is best done during a one with one.

Watch the ‘3-Minute Crash Course’ about Delegating Responsibility (CLICK THE ARROW TO START THE VIDEO):

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When Your Buddy Becomes Your Boss

I spent much of my early adult years working the graveyard shift in a grocery store to work my way through University.  I’m not really sure why any thinking employer would leave four or five twenty-year-olds unattended in the middle of the night with several hundred thousand dollars worth of inventory, but they did.  It’s a good thing we didn’t sell booze.

There was a camaraderie on the Night Crew that comes when a group of like-minded individuals works closely together.  All was fine until one of the guys figured out he was in charge.  I suspect the store manager worked night crew once himself, and knew it was a debacle, and figured out how to solve the problem:  make someone accountable.

This was fine, except that because he was accountable, he, in turn, wanted all of us to be accountable.  I didn’t want to be accountable, I wanted to be at home, in my bed, asleep.  This guy took us to task on the length of our breaks, and how many bananas we consumed in the middle of the night without ringing them through the register.

In short, he did exactly what he should have, as our boss.  The problem was, this guy was our buddy a short time ago, and all of sudden he was the boss.  What happened to all those drunken stoopers where we’d backstab the management bozos?  Now he was one of those management bozos.

In some cases, when two highly-professional people decide to make it work, a new boss and his/her former peers can make it work.  Most of the time, however, you have to choose between being a buddy or being a boss.

If you are doing your job well as a manager, you’re not there to make friends.  You’re there to do your job to the best of your ability, which occasionally may mean pissing off former peers.

The bottom line is if your friendships at work are really important to you, you may want to think long and hard about how badly you want that promotion to becoming the boss.

Managing Former Peers: What Happens After Your Promotion

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Managing former peers is probably your most immediate challenge if you’ve just been promoted.  Below we suggest five key steps to managing peers.

“Congratulations… you’ve got that promotion you wanted so badly.  Now go fire your best friend.”

5 Steps to Managing Peers

  1. Decide if you actually want the job of managing peers
  2. Reach out to all stakeholders
  3. Establish one on ones with your new direct reports
  4. Strike the balance between over and under managing peers
  5. Be a professional

Decide if You Actually Want the Job of Managing Peers

Just because you are offered a promotion, doesn’t mean you necessarily have to take it.  You need to think through whether you want the added burden of managing peers.  Some things to keep in mind:

  • Your peer relationships will change whether you want them to or not.  Don’t be naïve enough to think they won’t.
  • You can’t control others’ attitudes and/ behavior.  Even if you are ready to make the new relationship work, that doesn’t mean others will be as willing.
  • If your personal relationships at work are really important to you, you may want to decline your new role of managing peers.

Reach Out to Stakeholders

For anyone in a new position of leadership, it is crucial to reach out to important stakeholders.  It is especially important when managing former peers.  You should speak with your new direct reports, your boss, and other people you interface with often.  Here are some thoughts as to what to ask them:

  • What would you focus on if you were me?
  • What can be done better?
  • What would you suggest is the top priority?

Be systematic and thorough – even when it becomes onerous and time consuming

Establish One on One Meetings With New Direct Reports

When managing peers, it is important to establish structured and regular one on one meetings with these people.  Well-executed one on one meetings will ultimately save you time, and make managing peers easier.  These meetings provide an opportunity to:

  • Set expectations
  • Reinforce and reward desired behaviors and performance
  • Communicate and clarify roles and goals
  • Update status on action plans.

Best of all, regular one on one meetings significantly reduce the number of “drive-bys” or drop-in meetings when managing peers.

Strike the Balance When Managing Peers

Do not come on too strong and micromanage your new situation.  BUT… you are no longer “one of the girls”, either.  If you experience any significant challenge to your authority, you need to deal with it directly and quickly.  Also make sure you delegate appropriate when managing peers.  If you hoard all the work yourself, you will ultimately fail.

Be Professional

Professionalism is paramount when managing peers.  In order to do so effectively, you need to detach yourself from your personality, and rather view yourself as the new manager of the group or department.  Here are some guidelines for maintaining professionalism when managing peers.

  • Stay focused on facts
  • Maintain confidences
  • Tow the company line.  You are management’s representative in your work group.  You undermine your own credibility, and are not doing your job if you don’t properly represent management views.
  • You need to refrain from company gossip and going out for cocktails with you direct reports should be done with extreme caution.
  • Don’t play favorites

3 Things to Remember About Managing Peers:

  1. Figure out if you really do want the opportunity.  Most often you do have the opportunity to say “no”.
  2. Your friendships will change.  It won’t be the same once you are the boss.
  3. Communicate several times.  Everyone in a new leadership role should look to over-communicate by a factor of ten.

Watch the ‘3-Minute Crash Course’ about Managing Former Peers (CLICK THE ARROW TO START THE VIDEO):

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Gen X is a lot Like Jan Brady

This Generation X cohort is a real piece of work, isn’t it?  Is it possible to have a whole generation stuck in a massive inferiority complex?  It’s kind of like meeting a Canadian backpacking across Europe.  Yeah we get it – those 500 Maple Leafs you’re wearing mean you come from Canada.  The rest of us don’t really care that much, but you go ahead and dress up like a Mountie.

Gen X is not unlike when Jan Brady got completely bent out of shape because everything was “Marsha, Marsha, Marsha.”  (You have to be a Gen Xer to get that reference).  Grow up Jan, and stop being so annoying.

Actually all this generation talk is getting a bit boring.

In 1994, I suffered through a breakfast seminar where the guest speaker was telling us how this new generation of worker was completely different than anything that had every come before it.  These Generation X types were not loyal to any employer, didn’t care too much about their jobs, and were just generally hard to get along with.

Remembering back on this particular breakfast seminar now, it was particularly offensive on at least three levels:

  1. About 2500 years ago, some guy named “Socrates” made the same observation.  I’m more familiar with the published works of Socrates than I am with the guest speaker (whose name I’ve forgotten) that morning, so I’m going to assume it wasn’t an original talk.  Although the flashy Powerpoint slides were something that Socrates never pulled off.
  2. Those entering the workforce in the early 1990s had just watched their parents be laid-off en masse after a lifetime of loyalty to their companies to take on a new role as an unemployed middle-aged former corporate drone with no real marketable skills.  Add to this, the fact that Generation X – to date the most educated generation in history – walked into a job market with very few prospects, and you may begin to understand some of their crankiness.
  3. These Gen Xers did finally manage to find jobs — though not the cool, self-fulfilling ones they were promised.  Fast forward in time twenty years and these Gen Xers are now lamenting the fact that the generation that came after them has no loyalty to their organizations, and don’t care too much about their jobs.  It really does come fully circle, doesn’t it?

We need to quit trying to rationalize and explain the fact it is each generations’ express mission to drive the generation immediately preceding it crazy.  How else can you explain the music of the devil (also known as Jazz) that today’s older retirees used to make their parents foam at the mouth with anger.

Your job as a leader is to get other people to do what you want them to do, because they want to do it (with credit to Dwight Eisenhower).  Spending a whole bunch of time trying to label and define different generations won’t help you with that.

Finally, just to prove there’s no hard feelings about the crack about Canadians above, this week’s video is dedicated to those viewing from Canada:

 

Generation X in the Workplace

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Given how small Generation X is compared to the Boomers or the Millennials, there is much written about Generation X in the Workplace.  Below we discuss:

  • Why managers should care about Generation X in the Workplace.
  • What has shaped Generation X in the Workplace
  • The expectations of Generation X in the Workplace
  • How to lead and motivate Generation X in the Workplace

First, we should define Generation X in the Workplace

Traditionalists:             1925 – 1945

Baby Boomers:           1946 – 1965

Generation X:              1966 – 1980

Millennials:                  1980 – 1999

Why Managers Should Care About Generation X in the Workplace

  • Clashes between generations can directly affect turnover, and unwanted turnover is expensive and time consuming.
  • If team members do not feel like they “fit in” or that their values are not reflected in the workplace, they are more at risk of leaving.
  • Generation X in the Workplace has been influenced by different life events and thus has different perspectives that can impact motivation and performance.  For Example, Generation X in the Workplace:
    • Has unique ways of viewing quality.
    • Has distinct and preferred ways of managing and being managed.
    • Has different priorities that effect how and when they show up for work.

The Shaping of Generation X in the Workplace

  • This generation watched their parents get downsized out of their jobs after a lifetime of loyalty.
  • They graduated from high school and university into a poor job market.
  • They were the most educated generation in history at the time.
  • Gen X came from families that had triple the divorce rates than that of the previous generation.
  • They came of age during the end of the Cold War
  • They saw the beginning of the digital revolution
  • They were the first generation to wonder if they’d be able to do as well as their parents.

Expectations of Generation X in the Workplace

  • They are skeptical of everyone and everything.
  • After watching their parents struggle with large organizations, they expect to be screwed.
  • They are as loyal to their organizations, as they expect their organization will be to them (not very loyal!)
  • They expect to be independent and to do it on their own.
  • Rather than challenge authority they tend to ignore it.
  • Job security is about mobility, not stability.  They believe job security comes from proactively jumping from job to job.
  • They are entrepreneurial.
  • They approach work as a process of acquiring skills or resume building.

How to Lead and Motivate Generation X in the Workplace

  • Let them take risks.  Allow them to take some chances.
  • Respect their time.  Time off or away is often a motivator for this group
  • Be Creative with Time Worked: Sabbaticals, compressed work-weeks, telecommuting, are all very popular amongst this group.
  • Reward them with training or other experience building offers. Gen X values the opportunity to build their resumes.
  • Let them do it their way.  Take advantage of their entrepreneurial spirit.   Give them a challenge and let them figure it out.

3 Things that frustrate Generation X in the Workplace about the other generations:

  1. Boomers are self-absorbed workaholics, who took all the good jobs, and now won’t give them up.
  2. Traditionalists reject change, and are too rigid.
  3. Generation Y expects everything to be handed to them.

Watch the ‘3-Minute Crash Course’ about Generation X in the Workplace (CLICK THE ARROW TO START THE VIDEO):

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