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thewest.com.au
WESTBUSINESS
May 24-25, 2014
3
CONFIDENT YOUTH PUSH THE BOUNDARIES
Divide risks the rise of Gen-Y
■ Ben Harvey
GENERATIONAL
PERCEPTIONS
BABY BOOMERS
Value job security and a
stable working environment
Remain loyal and attached
to an organisation
Idealistic, optimistic and
driven
Diligent on the job
Value having a high degree
of power
Focus on consensus
building
GENERATION X
Next generation of leaders: Leslie Delaforce, Claire Omodei and Stewart Sharp. Picture: Michael O’Brien
Lazy, fickle? No, just less autocratic
■ Kim Macdonald
Gen-Y professionals Stewart
Sharp and Leslie Delaforce
claim they do not need to have
all the answers to manage other
people. But they do need to know
the questions.
They are among thousands of
workers aged up to 33 infusing
workplaces with Gen-Y’s
typically collaborative
approach.
Mr Sharp, a 28-year-old State
construction manager for
Woolworths, credited this
approach for earning the respect
of older and more experienced
workers. “You should never try
to kid people about what you’re
capable of,” he said.
“I have some very experienced
project managers and technical
guys who are reporting to me
and I don’t profess to be an
expert in their fields.
“I utilise them for their
technical expertise and they
look to me for leadership and
management, so I need them as
much as they need me.”
Mr Delaforce, a senior adviser
with the Department of
Corrective Services, agreed his
generation was less autocratic
than leaders from previous
generations and more likely to
use a transformational
leadership approach whereby
they set a vision but allowed
staff the autonomy to handle
their own projects.
Mr Delaforce, 30, said there
was a misguided perception that
Gen-Y was fickle and lazy.
He said one of Gen-Y’s best
attributes was that it was more
likely to challenge and verify
information provided to them —
partly because they had grown
up with the convenience of
online search engines — rather
than accept everything they
were told.
in many workplaces,” Professor
Martin said. “The reality is that
the more people hear unflattering stereotypes about Gen-Y
employees, the more they are
inclined to believe them.”
The research, which was based
on in-depth interviews with a
dozen emerging business figures
born between 1981 and 1999,
found Gen-Y employees believed
the Gen-Y-Gen-X divide could be
attributed to different interpretations of situations.
Respondents claimed any perceived disrespect for authority
was actually down to younger
workers pushing boundaries to
highlight their abilities.
The perceived sense of entitle-
ment was really workers pushing
for the best possible work deal to
offset the cost of education.
“We now have a situation
where the development of our
next crop of business leaders and
managers is potentially at
threat,” Professor Martin said.
“The approach that many organisations are taking to develop
Ex-Moly backer’s death sentence
■ Neale Prior
The former boss of the Chinese
company behind cash-rich
Moly Mines has been sentenced to death for leading a
crime gang that killed rivals,
state news agency Xinhua has
reported.
In a case mapping ties between organised crime and politicians, former Sichuan Hanlong chairman Liu Han and his
brother Liu Wei were reportedly given the death sentence in
the first trials of their 36-member gang.
Liu Han’s arrest disrupted a
deal to finance mine development in Nevada and further
jeopardised a long-delayed $1.4
billion takeover proposal for
Perth-based Sundance Resources. Sundance terminated
the takeover deal a month later.
The Chinese group already
had a majority stake in Perthbased Moly. Moly’s shares were
suspended from trading by the
Australian
Securities
Exchange
last
month.
Gang leader: Liu Han
There is uncertainty about
what Moly will do with a
$78 million cash pile after
striking a deal last year to offload its only revenue-generating asset — iron ore produced
by its mothballed Spinifex
Ridge
molybdenum
project.
The Toronto Stock Exchange
is also reviewing the listing of
Moly, which is 54 per cent
owned by Sichuan Hanlong.
Chinese President Xi Jinping is the driving force behind
the anti-corruption crackdown
that has ensnared senior
politicians and influential
businessmen.
Many of the Sichuan cases
are believed to be linked to
Zhou Yongkang, a former member of the Communist Party’s
Standing Committee, the country’s ruling inner circle. He is
believed to be a target of the
wide-ranging investigations.
The Liu brothers and their
associates have been charged
with 15 crimes, including
murder, assault, illegal detention, blackmail and operating
casinos.
Prosecutors say their criminal activities, dating to 1993,
helped them amass 40 billion
yuan ($7 billion) in assets with
businesses in finance, energy,
real estate and mining, official
Chinese newsagency Xinhua
has said.
with Associated Press
Cynical, pessimistic and
individualistic
Comfortable with change
and diversity
Don’t display loyalty
Unimpressed with authority
Keen to receive immediate
feedback
Personal goals as important
as work goals
GENERATION Y
Beholden to technology
Value skills development
Enjoy new opportunities
Confident
Enjoy collective action
Highly socialised
Value having input into
decisions
Open-minded
Prefer non-monetary perks
and flexible hours
future business leaders and managers focuses on how to fix the
inadequacies of Gen-Ys.
“What this research shows is
that leadership and management
programs ought to transition
from ‘fixing’ Gen-Y employees to
tackling the repertoire of professional knowledge and skills required to accelerate careers.”
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The much-maligned work ethic
and career expectations of Generation Y have been put under the
microscope in a new study confirming a generational divide in
Australian workplaces.
The report, Beyond Belief: The
Management Reality of Generational Thinking, warned that
unflattering stereotypes of Generation Y risked neutering the
next cohort of business leaders.
Author Malcolm Johnson,
from the Australian Institute of
Management, found that baby
boomers (those born between
1946 and 1964) and Generation X
(born between 1965 and 1980) had
preconceived ideas about the intent and abilities of Generation Y,
which is defined as being born
between 1981 and 1999.
Stereotypes
attributed
to
Gen-Y included an overconfident
sense of entitlement, a slavish dependency on technology, disrespect, lack of self-awareness and
a need for instant gratification.
Dr Johnson canvassed a number of attributes of Gen-Y that
excited modern managers, including their skill with technology, creativity, tolerance and
adaptability. He juxtaposed these
with those characteristics that
were concerning, such as the
sense of entitlement, inability to
communicate face-to-face and
lack of a strong work ethic.
The often-criticised pre-occupation with “work-life balance”
drew special attention in the
report, with respondents largely
unapologetic for their stance.
“I don’t want to be at my desk
all day living to work,” one 28year-old man working in the public sector said.
“I want work to supplement my
life. I don’t want work to get in the
way of my private life.”
But others stressed that balance was more about flexibility.
“My work and life are one,” one
30-year-old woman said. “I work
on weekends, nights and will take
some flexibility if it is required
during the working week.”
AIM WA chief executive Gary
Martin said the generational differences between Gen-X and
Gen-Y
were
“exceptionally
pronounced”.
“It’s likely that social media
has fuelled the divide that exists