Valentina Asatourians
First Interview:
How old are you?
34 Years Old
Are you a flexible worker? How?
Yes, because I take into consideration other people’s feelings and opinions.
How to be a productive worker to gain better results?
Clear communication at all times.
What motivates you to promote engagement?
A positive and happy environment.
What do you think about having multigenerational workforce?
If everyone can respect each other’s differences.
What are the advantage and disadvantage of having multigenerational workplace?
The advantage is that people can learn from one another due to the different frame of minds. The disadvantage is that there may be a very big gap between the generations which can cause friction and create drama.
Second Interview:
How old are you?
65
Are you a flexible worker? How?
Very flexible, as a teacher assistant, I received assignments in different places and different hours. It doesn’t affect my mobility or affect me in anyway.
How to be a productive worker to gain better results?
Loving your work automatically helps the productivity of your work. Also, preparedness and willingness to learn. Awareness of the demand that you are performing.
What motivates you to promote engagement?
What motivates me in engagement is what I’m doing is helpful, respectful, appreciated at the work place.
What do you think about having multigenerational workforce?
It’s a perfect combination of ideas shared. It’s of course more challenging for balancing ideas.
What are the advantage and disadvantage of having multigenerational workplace?
In my opinion and experience, the younger group seem to be less passionate about working productively.
Third Interview:
How old are you?
61 years’ old
Are you a flexible worker? How?
Yes, I was, I’m retired now but when I was working, yes, I was very flexible. I worked all kinds of jobs and as much as I could, not only I needed more financial help but also wanted to gather as much experience as possible, because it might come in handy one day.
How to be a productive worker to gain better results?
What motivates you to promote engagement?
Engaging with other people is a big key. Connecting and sharing thoughts is more helpful than people think assume. Young generation nowadays are so segregated out of their school or work zone, makes me sad seeing it happen because it wasn't like this when I was young. We all have our unique ways of opinions and thoughts about things, if we can all find even one person to connect and share knowledge it will be fantastic. Lots of shy people I see in the society in today's world. Never be scared or feel embarrassed to reach out to people you don't know
What do you think about having multigenerational workforce?
Throughout my working years, at least in the areas where I worked, there wasn’t much younger people. Now that I see it, it has its’ pros and cons. The good thing is, older generation has much more experience in life and working experience. The bad thing is, not necessarily all of them are as resourceful, every working environment has to accept multigenerational employees. There are things that the younger groups know or vice versa. Both groups can cooperate and make a great at team at their working company. The new generation especially with the new technology and education system, may know things more than us that they have learned in short amount of time. There are more opportunities younger to generation to learn and educate themselves with any field. During our time, there was no internet or anything like that, that would give us information about a thing we wanted to learn in couple seconds. We had to talk to people, professors, teachers, family members to gain such information. Therefore, no work area should employ only one age group, not only it will damage the business but also it will be a very boring area to work. Every workplace needs that variation.
What are the advantage and disadvantage of having multigenerational workplace?
There are more disadvantages than advantages. Disadvantages are there won’t be anything new brought to the company, elderly people like me, have experience but people younger than us, have the knowledge and information more than us, also, they are more tech friendly. Every employer seeks for innovators and people who are working smarter than harder. When experience and knowledge are put together it’s going to be a result of a successful working area.
Fourth Interview:
How old are you?
28
Are you a flexible worker? How?
Yes, by working in a different pattern and open to change.
How to be a productive worker to gain better results?
What motivates you to promote engagement?
Acknowledgement and appreciation and outcomes.
What do you think about having multigenerational workforce?
I think it’s where we are heading we need to be more flexible, open and accepting of every age, group, religion, etc.
6. What are the advantage and disadvantage of having multigenerational workplace? Advantage: benefits of different age groups with new and old experiences, traditional and technology advantages. Disadvantages: the needs are different, friction among colleagues. Different communication styles, negative stereotype and cultural expectations.
Fifth Interview:
How old are you?
64 years old
Are you a flexible worker? How?
I’m flexible when I see respectful behavior from my coworker. When I make a mistake I apologize and accept that I was wrong. If my coworker gets me engaged in planning and decision making about an issue. I will be flexible by changing my workstyle in a way she suggests.
How to be a productive worker to gain better results?
I have been teaching for 25 years as my experiences if the workplace making me feel anxious or something happens that causing emotional pain like gossiping and etc. The quality of work will go down. Therefore, inculcated in my mind the importance of being satisfied in my work, moreover, if I do a good job I expect to be praised and feel valued, so it will encourage me to work hard in order to get better results.
What motivates you to promote engagement?
First of all, co-workers have to care about each other, in order to have a positive working environment. Respecting and listening to each other is an important thing I can show to my coworkers. Also I ask to offer ideas, and I appreciate her. If conflicts happen, I try to see the situation from her perspective and by taking initiative I’ll try to solve problems peacefully without disrespectful attitude.
What do you think about having multigenerational workforce?
I as a 65-year-old woman, I can see nothing negative about having young and active ones in my workplace. Because, I don’t use to work smoothly by using technology. So by having mutual respect, I can ask help in using technology, and I will be happy and satisfied to teach whatever I experienced during my 25 working years.
6. What are the advantage and disadvantage of having multigenerational workplace? Advantage of the multigenerational workplace is, thoughts and ideas can be shared throughout coworkers. There is no disadvantage of having a multigenerational workplace.
Paper Outline
Introduction
Establish a median
Age is used as median
Questions 1 & 2
Establish foundational questions on how workers view their own flexibility in the workforce.
Continue this by obtaining their opinions on how a cohesive workforce is successful.
Question 3
Assess workers’ responses to the advantages or disadvantages productivity of workers has to the work environment.
Show how communication is imperative to a cohesive working environment.
Question 4
Assess workers’ responses to what motivates people to work.
Show how motivation is derived from a workforce that works in harmony together.
Question 5
Consider workers’ opinions on what working in a multi-generational workforce is like for them.
A short discussion on the advantages each age groups sees in other age groups when working with them.
Question 6
Further investigate workers’ opinions on the advantages or disadvantages of a multi-generational workforce.
Consider bias in their answers.
Conclusions
A multi-generational workforce has more advantages than disadvantages for all participants.
Discuss how life learning occurs when working with different age groups.
This paper addresses the concerns shown in a multi-generational workplace setting. This is a personal experience; therefore as researcher I have a vested interest in finding out how my co-workers view this situation. I used age as the median for this study. While only six people were available to participate, I found it necessary for these workers to look at, consider, understand and hopefully set about to change the work environment we are in. After establishing age as a base, I then asked their opinion on how they viewed themselves as being flexible in their working capabilities. Furthermore, I hoped this standard would help them see the “reality of” their perceived flexibility as we went further into the interview. After all, sometimes we do not see how we behave with others, unless someone points out to us what is not working or does work when we interact. The rest of the questions dealt with the workers ability to promote engagement and in doing so, their opinions and attitudes toward a multi-generational work environment.
Research has shown support that there are considerable advantages to this type of work situation, one being the ability to learn the perspectives of each generation through mutual respect. In addition, studies have shown that younger workers are at an advantage of learning from more experienced workers; mentorship is a key to helping young workers get better at their jobs and feel more confident in their ability to do a job. Older workers can learn from the confidence shown by younger workers with their new ideas or approaches to old ways of doing things. Overall, the advantage of a multi-generational workforce goes both ways. The paper is structured in a chronological order of the questions, answers and my opinions of the interviews I conducted. Conclusions follow. Now let us begin.
During my years of employment one of the obstacles I faced was working in a multi-generational workplace. Disagreements and misunderstandings happened a lot. Some of this was because of the generation gap between staff members; conflicts were inevitable As a result, I chose to my research on a multigenerational workplace so I could understand and find the factors, present and missing, that have led to conflicts happening in this workplace. My primary research included my interviewing six members of this environment. This study consisted of six questions, with age being the base question, and others consisting of their self-reflective views on the type of personality and work traits they have when working with other people. The following reflects my findings.
First I asked about their age, which allowed me to classify them by age categories. The second question concerned their ability to be a flexible worker. I chose this question because in my opinion flexibility in any work environment is an essential factor, especially nowadays when diversity is our country’s norm. This means every worker has to accommodate diversity when working and interacting with others. “Flexibility enables both individual and business needs to be met through making changes to the time (when), location (where) and manner (how)” (2). Overall the participants responded positively and were in agreement that they were open to change. I did get the feeling while to older participants said they were open to change, they were in fact not. It seemed they were telling me what would make me happy, not what they really thought or were willing to do.
The third question addressed their perception on whether or not they saw themselves as productive workers and if so what was a productive worker in their estimation. Because I believe that when a group works in any workplace then it should be natural to work toward the same goals, I also believe that communication is an important factor in making this happen. When a working group collaborates and works as a team then all should flow well. When working together a form of “friendship” should develop; this must be accomplished while following the company’s policies and goals, and in still producing a good quality of service or product. The results of my interviews show that four of the six believed that clear communication is the result of a willingness to work with each other. This creates a happy atmosphere and has a positive effect on productivity in the workforce. The other two participants noted that education would help increase the productivity. I also agreed with all suggestions and perspectives.
The fourth question dealt with the promotion of engagement. It is my belief that when a workforce in unable to communicate or collaborate with each other then a negative working environment is created. This creates a secularization of workers. All participants agrees that having mutual respect for each other could be reached by keeping co-workers engaged in planning and decision making. Also, one of them mentioned that being appreciated is an important factor, too. Brooks notes that “employees who are known and appreciated by their manager or co-workers are more likely to feel engaged in their job and positive about the organization.’’(3) Therefore, the engagement of the workforce produces a positive reaction and results on both the workforce and organization.
The fifth question was more direct to their current working environment, asking their opinion about working with a multi-generational workforce. In preparation for their responses I did secondary research on multi-generational workforces. What I discovered was that “older workers’ experience is valuable, but can also become an obstacle if they rely on ‘been there, done that’ attitudes that preclude new ideas.” (4) Two participants responded that they had mutual respect for each other’s differences and were flexible in working with others. One respondent said, “What a perfect combination of ideas.” Of course, I agree with all of them, preferring what one respondent had to say: “It would be more challenging for balancing ideas.”
The final question investigated their points of view of advantages and disadvantages of working in a multi-generational workplace. Their opinions related to the disadvantages: friction, among workers and bosses, different communication styles, negative stereotypes, and cultural expectations. The advantage of such a group was concluded as they could learn from different frames of mind. L notes that “the practice of multi-generational workplace mentoring offers many advantages. In a mixed age workforce where companies value knowledge, experience and skill above age, seniority or gender, employees of all ages have the opportunity to teach, share and learn from one another.’’(5) Here I concluded that a multi-generational workplace can be beneficial for everyone. It also can be challenging but it’s not unbearable.
In conclusion, my final note is that the experiences from the different generation workers are valuable and create life learning experiences. Many factors such as collaboration, compromise, admitting our mistakes all help in creating and opportunity to build relationships with each other. This makes us all the more us more willing and appreciative of working together for the same goals and values of the company.
Works Cited
1. Reflective Study: Research Design Paper
2. Center, Sloan. “What is workplace flexibility?” Focus on Workplace Flexibility. n.d. Web. 24 Nov. 2016.
3. Brook, James. “5 steps to building a highly engaged, productive workforce.” Blog. Strengths Partnership, 28 May 2013. Web. 24 Nov. 2016.
4. Taylor, Nichole Fallon. "Tackling the Challenges of the Multigenerational Workforce." Business News Daily. Business News Daily Managing Editor, 16 June 2014. Web. 24 Nov. 2016
5. L. (n.d.). The Advantages of Diverse Ages in the Workplace. Retrieved November 24, 2016, from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/advantages-diverse-ages-workplace-17928.html
