Managing a Multigenerational Workforce with Scott De Long

Hi, I'm Susan Drummond. Welcome to the Enlightened Executive where your personal evolution sparks your leadership evolution. Each episode we feature groundbreaking techniques and strategies to help you get the edge in personal and leadership effectiveness. This episode is brought to you by Meritage Leadership. At Meritage, we help strengthen leaders and empower teams to achieve high performance. Go to Meritage Leadership to learn more. I'm excited to welcome my guest, Dr. Scott DeLong, who is a serial entrepreneur known for his ability to build strong companies from the ground up. His insights on the multigenerational workforce and the communication style adjustments we need to make are topics we're going to delve into today. All three of his entrepreneurial ventures culminated in successful exits, and Scott's thirst for knowledge and experience led him back to the educational system, where he earned a doctorate in leadership and and is now a professor, teaching courses in communication and entrepreneurship. Scott's first book, I Thought I Was a Leader, chronicles his transformational journey, which we're going to get into today. So welcome, Scott.

Thank you, Susan. I really appreciate you having me on.

Well, it was great to be on your podcast as well. So now you get to be on mine. Always fun to continue the conversation. So let's start off right away with I. I've heard a lot of leaders struggling and scratching their heads going, I don't know how to work with these different workforce. Like I'm in Gen Y, how am I supposed to work with these different leader Gen Z's? Like, what do I do right? Or I'm Gen X, how do I work with them? Or I'm a millennial and I don't even know how to work. So what are you seeing out there from your perspective and what advice do you give leaders in working across these generations?

Yeah, well, thank you for that question. I appreciate it. So the first thing to recognize, I think is that if you combine and these are 20, 23 numbers, if you combine the Gen Z and the millennials, they are more than 52% of our current workforce and growing as more Gen Zs enter into the workforce and more baby boomers like me are exiting. In fact, about 10,000 baby boomers a day are turning 65.

Right?

So they're exiting. So these younger generations are going to be dominating the workforce in the future. So the first thing to recognize is that there are difference between the generations. But don't get too caught up in it because we're dealing with people and individuals, right? So if we say, if we, if we bias it by saying all Gen Z's are this, or all millennials are that, or all boomers are this, then we're going to get caught up into things. We do need to treat people as individuals. But let's talk a little bit about the generalization. So the Gen Z folks, the first thing that I try to tell my clients and my clients are generally older white guys like me, right? That who's still running businesses today, although that's getting better, they're still dominant. And we grew up in a command and control leadership style. All of my coaches, all my early bosses, everyone I ever dealt with was the smartest person in the room and we did what they said. That's just the way it was. And it was very efficient. So the boss says do this, you do that and it gets it done quickly, but it's not really effective. So when I'm. What I mean by efficient is that if I'm the boss and I tell you what to do, you will comply. I can get compliance from you if you want to keep your job. Right. And get braces and things like that. But to get commitment is much better than just getting compliance. And to get commitment, I need to involve you in the decisions that we're making. So my first step is to recognize not only the power of these two younger generations and especially the Gen Zs as they're going to be growing and growing, is to recognize our need for them. One is a labor force, certainly, but two is a customer base. If they're 52% of our employees, don't you think they're 52% of our clients as well? And would you rather have me, a 64 year old man, making decisions on what my younger customers want to buy, or would you rather get the information directly from the source?

So it also assumes too that like you have all the answers. Yes, there's wisdom that comes with age, sure. But if I'm always direct, I mean, that's a lot of. That's exhausting leadership in a way. Like I have to direct everyone's actions and that's my role.

Yeah, not a great exhausting. Not a great role. Well, and it's not very effective. So if you take a look. So let's say I have six direct reports and none of the direct reports are as good as I am at whatever. Right. They're only 80% as good as me at whatever. The thing, it's a multiplying effect. 4 times 80% is 480% of what I can get done myself anyway. Right. So why wouldn't I want to take Advantage of the. The people that are there to assist me and do the work. Now my job becomes getting those people to raise from an 80% level of efficiency to 90, 95, 105, 110% as good as me. That's my job as a leader. As a CEO, I only have a few jobs. One is I need to provide the resources, the tools. Two, I need to provide the vision. And three, I need to create new leaders by developing people. And I'm suggesting that that's what we need to do with this. With the younger generations in particular. It is great. I tell people all the time, always hang out with someone with a little more white hair than you. That's just good advice. Right. So one of the things that we do when we get older is we love mentoring people. So let's do that. Right. So let's take some of this wisdom that we might have and pass that down to the generations below us and at the same time, be open to what they can teach us. These young people are digital natives. Right. I'm a digital immigrant. I know. I know much less about how to handle this new technology. The technology is going to move us forward than these young people. Why not take advantage of their knowledge as well, rather than me directing them on what they should be doing, rather than listening to them on how they can make us better, make the organization better.

I found it's really helpful to set leaders up for. Rather than getting out of the directive space to set them up for key questions that they should be asking. And one of the things that I just don't see leaders asking enough of younger generation or really anyone they lead is a very simple question, which is, what motivates you?

Yeah, that's important.

What motivates you?

So I like to even change that a little bit. The. The word motivation implies that I can do something to get something out of you. I would prefer to inspire them rather than motivate them. So the inspiration comes from within. What inspires you? Right. Then I don't need to motivate people anymore.

Oh, yeah. I don't assume that I'm taking the role of motivation. I'm more like, what makes you want to jump out of the bed in the morning and get to work?

Yeah.

And what makes you want to press the snooze button and just go back, like, what aspects? It's kind of eye opening to ask those questions of your team members to know, like, what do they love doing and what do they not love doing? Right.

So. So I like your concept of Asking and specifically for that question is great, but I use that across the board and a method that I use to ask, not method. So when I tell people what to do, they'll do it. When I ask them, they get involved in the discussion. Back to the commitment versus compliance concept. When I get into dialogue on, on whatever it is that we're talking about, right? How to make something better, it doesn't mean their ideas are going to be any better, but they're going to be newer and fresher and they might stimulate something in, in me or other people within the room so that we can get some dialogue, we can improve as opposed to just doing what we used to do because the boss said so, right? This worked in the 1960s and it worked in the 1970s, and we're not growing nearly as fast because we're staying with old, stale systems. And these young people have new ideas, but they have to create. They have to be in a space where they not only feel welcome, but they're encouraged to share their knowledge. And they have some. They have knowledge that I don't have. They have skills that I don't have. And if I create the space for them to be able to express themselves, a few things are going to happen. One, I'm going to get smarter. I'm going to learn something great. That's wonderful. I love that. I'm a lifelong learner and I love learning and help. Help me learn something that's great. But more than that, it makes them feel welcome. Now, feelings aren't a word we use in business a lot, but I think we should because they're real and everybody has them. I want my people to feel as though they belong, to feel as though they make a difference. I want them to feel good about the work that they're producing because then they won't hit the snooze button.

And. Well, let's address the main sore spot that I hear from older leaders working with newer leaders, which is the world entitlement, right? The feeling that, my gosh, you know, I had, I came into the workforce, I gotta earn it, right? Like, and I gotta pay, pay my dues, earn it. I'm. I'm not gonna, it's not gonna be handed to me. And there's a feeling now that I've heard so many times over, it's like, oh, my God, I'm there for three months and the person wants a promotion already. Like what?

Right?

And so how do you suggest leaders address this dynamic or at least their perception of the dynamic?

So I Think it's a. It's a change in framing, reframing the thing. Let me ask you a different question. So in the military and sports world, there used to. And even in the Greek world, in colleges, Right. There used to be this thing called hazing. Well, it happened to me, so I'm going to do it to you. Right. And we've all found out in the past 10, 15 years that hazing is not a really great practice to do. So therefore, just because it happened to me doesn't mean I need to pass that down and make it happen to them. One of the things we also have to recognize is that these young people have choices. One of the things that people say all the time is that there's no loyalty. Right. That they're just going to take off for the next job and the next job and the next job. What I'm suggesting is that if you, if you organize your leadership and your organization and then the management as well, around the principles that I'm talking about, there's no reason to leave. Right. If they get up feeling good about where they're going in the morning, they get to go see their people. They're not switching jobs. It's not that these young people don't want to work, they just don't want to work for us the way that we had to be treated when we were younger. Right.

Yeah.

So we need to make some adjustments if we want to keep this workforce happy. Again, don't kowtow under the entitlement, but to make people feel welcome, make them feel feel valuable, and then to mentor them, to show them what it takes to earn that promotion.

Yeah. And I think there's another. A way to view that, which is to celebrate the ambition. Yeah. So awesome that you're looking for that promotion and that you're hungry for that and want to move up.

Yeah. Here's your pathway.

Celebrate that. That's like, great.

Yeah.

Now let's look at what it takes to get there.

That's right.

And where, what things that we'll need to put in place to make it happen. And if it's sort of an educational training around how does it really work in business? Right. What, what really matters? And ultimately, at the end of the day, it's the difference that you're making and the results you're producing. So at different levels, we have to produce different results. And let's start looking at how to start getting you there.

So let's, let's go back to that entitlement piece and everyone's Saying that the Gen Z wants things immediately and they want it right now. If we create that pathway and show them that these, these milestones are possible and how to get to those milestones, it doesn't have to be immediate, nor does it have to take as long as you and I had to go through to make it take. Because there were some unwritten rules that you had to be X amount of years old or X amount of years with the company in order to get that promotion. Those things aren't valid anymore. It's earning it. And, and in creating the system that they see a pathway to growth, providing them the tools. Sometimes those tools are financial, sometimes they're mentorship, sometimes they're educational. Providing the tools so that they can reach those milestones and hit those goals. They can see that that pathway is not only possible, but they're working towards it at the same time. And this is really important for this Gen Z and being recognized for what they do. This generation more than any other needs recognition and we all need recognition. But this generation a little bit more. So change that entitlement, everyone gets a trophy kind of thing, but everyone needs recognition. People need to feel as though they matter. That's leadership.

Yeah.

Make people do the things that it takes to, to allow people to feel as though they matter.

And so tell me a little bit about the way you're approaching leadership. You have mentioned three core principles that you teach on. Can you share those with us?

So we call it principled leadership and it is a, is a progressive leadership style that is very transformational leadership, authentic leadership, servant leadership are all, all progressive leadership styles. But recognize that Those are also 50 year old theories and we just started getting to them about 10 years ago. It's really strange that it took so long to even start talking about servant leadership. Right. So the principled leadership takes all those things into account. Right. You have to still set the vision, you still have to be inspirational, you still have to be charismatic from time to time. You have to be all those things that a leader did, you see from a leader. But adding these three principles changes the game, changes the principles of humility, empathy and vulnerability. And that one may be the most controversial of the three, but Brene Brown's helped break that one down a little bit. But that vulnerability thing, but vulnerability, all that means to me is to, to look at, look at Susan and say I could use a little help on this one. Right.

What's the difference between and vulnerability in your mind? Why do you call those out as two separate principles levels?

Well, they're, they're, they're overlapping and different at the same time. So humility. Let's start with humility. Humility in my mind is the recognition that every human being has value and that I can learn something from anybody. It doesn't mean the def, the, the textbook definition of oh, please don't put that praise on me. I'm not talking about that. And that's false anyway. I, that when people, when you see people doing that, that's not real. Humility in this case is to recognize that every human being has value and I can learn something from everybody. Much as we are talking about with the Gen Zs. They have something to teach me. Being humble enough to ask the questions ask, not tell. Empathy differs from sympathy. And empathy simply means trying to understand where the person is coming from, from their point of view, not just mine. Leading in without judgment. When somebody's telling me the story about whatever they're telling me to try to understand where that's coming from. Now I'll never fully understand. I don't have your experience, I don't have your background, I don't have the walls that you've built up. I don't have the consequences for, for the action. So I'm never going to fully understand, but I'm going to do the best I can to understand as much as possible what you're telling me from your point of view, rather than placing the judgments in my point of view on top of it.

Yeah. And I would add to that one. There's distinctions within empathy that I think are really important for people to understand. One is empathy accuracy. How well am I able to get a sense of what you're feeling, thinking and wanting?

Yeah.

But then there's also empathy, compassion, which is. And how much do I care?

Oh, my favorite.

How what you are thinking, feeling and wanting. Because a psychopath scores high and we've got some instruments that are actually scoring empathy. Now a psychopath will score high on empathy accuracy, but very low on empathy and compassion, which basically says, I know exactly what you're thinking, feeling and wanting, but I don't care. Right. That's.

I'm going to use it to manipulate you.

Yeah, Right. But so we want to have both. Right. We want to be both caring and accurate to the best of our ability of understanding and walking in your shoes.

Yeah. So the word care, I love it. I love that you brought that up. So there's a couple, there's a couple ways that I use care in my work. The first is to recognize that the difference between a team and you can go through the definition of what a team it takes, it takes complementary group of people all with the same mission. Right. Having a unified purpose, that they have a way of working together and a communication standard in which they operate and that they trust each other. That's what makes a group a team. Having all those components to get to a high functioning team. Opposed to just a team. Care. I care for and about you. When you find teams that care for and about each other, they become high performing teams as well. So I use care in that context, but I use it in a different context as well. And this is more of a people centric. I tell people this, you know, how to love something, how to learn to love something, care for it. I don't care if it's a plant, a dog, an employee, a neighbor. So care, that is a critical component in the work that I do.

Yeah.

Care for and about you.

And how about the last pill, the last principle that you mentioned since we covered the first two.

Vulnerability.

Yeah. Share a little bit more about your take on that.

Yeah. It's just a matter of, of, of saying I need a little help. Now trust me when I, when I say this, it is not a hundred percent foolproof and you can't be vulnerable, completely vulnerable with everybody about everything. You just, that's just, that's just crazy. Right. You got to have some boundaries around it. And when I say it doesn't work 100% of the time. The research suggests that about 4 to 5% of the Earth have antisocial personality disorder. Psychopaths, sociopaths, narcissist, this stuff doesn't work with them. They don't care. I, they're going to use it to their advantage and they don't care. But for everybody else, 96% of the workforce, these principles and showing that you care for them, about them make a difference. And there's some risk in that. And this is where vulnerability comes in. Right. By being vulnerable, there's some risk. It's actually in the definition of vulnerability, taking risk to the actions of another. And you know what? I like those odds. 94% success rate. I like those odds I'm going to get burnt once in a while. But very little.

Right, Right. I think what people don't recognize, recognize is that there is such strength in vulnerability because you have to be strong to be willing to be vulnerable. It's easy to cover up, it doesn't require, I mean you try being vulnerable and see how much courage it takes and strength. So to me, it's really flipping it on its head. It's actually the strong leader that can be vulnerable and share where they're having trouble. Yeah, but it doesn't mean that you are. I think sometimes people confuse vulnerability with like, you know, sharing everything or, you know, I'm really doubting myself as a leader and my imposter system. I think it's at the same time it sort of serves a purpose at times where it brings people closer in and you don't have to share every single piece of vulnerability all the time either.

Well, and the safer the space is, the more vulnerable you can be. Certainly. I'll tell you where I learned this. I believe being vulnerable is the most attractive quality I can have. It's not about make me of any better looking or richer or anything, but more attractive. It attracts people to me. If I just said, Susan, I could use a little help, you lean in, you come towards me. How can I help? And if you can do it, you will, right? And the risk, yeah, there's some risk in being vulnerable. People can take advantage of you, but honestly, not that many people. They will lean in to this, they will lean into that. And, and I'm telling you that this principled leadership, the humility, empathy and vulnerability, you think you're giving away your power. You're actually increasing your power not to positional power as much as the personal power that you have. Because when I act like this, my following will follow. They will come with me, they will support me, they will build me up. And it's, and it's happened time after time after time in my life. The thing that it's, that it's done for me is that it is not only improved my business, but it improved the relationships in my life. So the stuff I'm talking about doesn't work just at work, it works at.

Home too, with all human beings. Yeah, exactly. What's, what's one thing. I like to get practical, you know, and, and, and really focus in on what's one piece of advice or one thing you would suggest to the listeners that they could do tomorrow that would have a big impact on their leadership effectiveness.

So I think the easiest for me to suggest, and I think I can go on and on and on about this, we're going to run out of time, but is go back to this ask not tell method. So people come to me in my office and they say, hey Scott, we got a problem. And tell me what the problem is. What do you think we ought to do? My first response and only response is, what do you think we ought to do? I don't know. That's why I came to you. Because when you come up with something, let me know and we can talk about it. That piece right there, it's the teaching Amanda Fish instead of giving him a Fish concept by asking for their input. Now, they might not have a great answer, but you got to come to me with an answer, a potential solution. So that's my, my short answer on the one piece of advice is to not tell people what to do, but to ask them what they think.

Fantastic. Well, thank you so much for being on the show today, Scott. What is where can people learn more about you and your work?

So my, my website is lead2goals l e a d the number2goals.com and you can always get a hold of me@scotteadtogolds.com I answer everything. I mean, I love people having questions. If they're really good questions, I'm going to say let's get on the phone, let's chat. Because I love getting in these discussions with folks and hearing what the issues are and then finding out what they think solutions are.

Great. All right. Well, thank you so much. And if you like this episode, you're not going to want to miss my interview with Bo and Luke, who have one clear message to all leaders. Achieving work life harmony is not only possible, it's essential. And it's very different than work life balance. Let's all lead the way. Hope you enjoyed today's episode and I'd like to point you to the next important step. Hit the subscribe button to get notified when we release new content. I'll see you on the next episode of the Enlightened Executive.

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