Mike Richards, Joel, and Lee-Ann explore whether hybrid work preferences differ by generation. They discuss Gen Z and Gen X attitudes toward the office, leadership challenges treasurers face adapting to post-COVID work cultures, and what generational shifts mean for how teams work now.
So I definitely agree that we're in that great new role. I wonder how much of this is generational. And what I mean by that is I think I'll look around the room. I'm going to make a guess that so we're probably all senior practitioners and we're probably interdidiaries in some degree between senior executive management to some of whom might be very set in their ways and very reluctant to embrace the world of work, versus our staff, many of whom dead, alive, and many of them may be younger and then far more fluid in new ways of working. So how much of this you think at our level? So let's say the treasurers of the world are gritty. Those two gas.
I'm going to throw that to Joel first. I will answer my version of the answer in a minute.
But Joel well, I would say when we first started in a hybrid environment, I don't think we did it very well, to be completely honest. I think over time we've gotten better at it. But I've said we've had this kind of debate internally at my company is that I think there has to be a kind of a meeting, a consensus point somewhere in the middle, right? I can't expect Gen Z to come in the office five days a week and work 12 hours a day. That's not how they think. That's not what they value, quite frankly. They value impact and other things that I didn't value when I was their age. By the same token, there are a number of senior people that are coming in day in and day out that they can have really rich interactions with that could be really important for them if they're working on a project or if they're looking for career advancement. And so I think they need to recognize that I may not be able to get some of that richness if I don't kind of come and meet it halfway. So I think the approach I've always tried to take is I'm willing to give and be flexible and be super reasonable on all sorts of things. But there are, there has to be a meeting of the minds. We can't have, we can't, everybody can't just flip to one way or another. There has to be somewhere in the middle. And I think that's that for me, at least in the way I lead and the way I lead my team. I think that's been pretty successful so far.
Leon I agree. I mean, you know, we can't pander to every single person's individual needs, but we do have to. We have to find consensus. I mean, it's a changing world. You know, my generation won't be here for much longer. In the workforce, people are coming up underneath us who want to do things differently. As Joel said, they value their, their life and their careers differently to the way do we do. So we have to be agile. We. I don't think there's any point in just putting a stick in the sand and saying this is the way we do it forever. Because prior to Covid, that's what we did. And then we saw Covid changed everything and it has to change from the top downwards, otherwise we're going to struggle to find and keep people in our companies because we're being, you know, rigid and not flexible for what people want. And you mentioned earlier, Joel, at the end of the day, as long as the work is being done and it's to the right standards and the right quality and you're, you're giving the shareholder the value they need, then I think we, we have to, like you said, find the middle ground.
I was talking to someone earlier. I do the week, the podcast I do is weekly, so I talk to a treasurer each and every week as they grow their careers. And this is now one of the major topics that we end the show with each week. I said, look, what are the big things for you? And, you know, earlier on in the show, three, four years ago, wasn't actually the people aspect so much. It was like some of the other more solid topics about cyber, about this, about that. Now it's it. It comes up probably 50 of the time and they're saying, what do we do with our people? How do we do this? And one of the other things that I've talked about is that a lot of treasurers have risen through the ranks and I say, look, you know, now you are in charge of your treasury and it might be anywhere from 20 to maybe 50 staff. And I'll go, right, how much leadership training have you had? None. And I'm like, yeah, that's the issue. You know, go and knock on the CFO's door and say, I need some training. I need to you to help me manage these people. If you're in the army, and you were saying, right, you need to, you know, coach, lead 50 people. You'd have done years of coaching and training. A lot of you treasurers have just got there the by accident, you know, you've done well in your careers. But that's one of the key things as well. Just on the second point as well, we recently had a client who said, oh, we, we have five days a week in the office. We're a bit traditional like that. I was like, well, good luck with that. Oh, and. And we're a bit more paper based. I went, we can't help you. I'm like, you know, I was already out of five days a week. I was like. But we were generally said, look, I just don't think it's going to be something we can help with. And they were like. And again, we go back to the figures because for the UK figures it was. It literally it's a hard 5% are happy to be in. They said, oh, 5%. I said, so you want me to get 100 people, five of them say maybe? And you put the thought, yeah, yeah. I went, no, we're out. You know, that's not the kind of client because the world has moved on, you know, it's the.
