Intergenerational leadership

Executive Summary

Leading a multigenerational team presents unique challenges. Differing values, work styles, and expectations can create tensions that manifest as cliques, conflicts, or even resistance to leadership. Younger leaders in particular are often confronted with critical questions regarding their experience and competence.

At the same time, diversity offers significant opportunities: older employees contribute expertise, experience, and loyalty, while younger generations foster digital skills, flexibility, and a sense of purpose. A successful leader recognizes these differences, actively moderates them, and creates learning spaces where both sides can benefit from one another.

It is crucial to build understanding for generational perspectives early on, to communicate processes with patience and structure, and to deliberately promote mutual learning. Only on this foundation can team-building measures have a lasting impact.

Introduction

For new leaders, stepping into an existing team is often bumpy, accompanied by both curiosity and restraint. Older generations may harbor doubts toward younger leaders, asking questions such as “Do they have enough experience?” or “Do they really know what they’re doing?” This can affect employees’ sense of well-being and should be addressed in a timely manner. This article therefore explores how to approach leading a team across multiple generations.

Challenges

Challenges are similar in many companies. Generational tensions often surface when the youngest and oldest generations form groups and avoid one another whenever possible. Younger employees may mock the limited IT knowledge of their older colleagues, while the older generation criticizes the younger ones’ lack of expertise. Such behavior, if left unchecked, can escalate over time, leading to declining morale and suboptimal teamwork. Another possible outcome is resistance against the leader.

Analysis & Insights

Such resistance may become evident when tasks are not properly completed or processes are disregarded. These situations generate frustration among colleagues, undermining both trust and team spirit. It can also be observed that generations who fall between the youngest and oldest often feel caught in the middle, which can lead to a general sense of exclusion. Over time, this dynamic weakens team cohesion. Additionally, younger generations tend to push back more strongly against authoritarian leadership styles.

Solution approaches

An important first step is to acknowledge the differences in generational work cultures.

While Baby Boomers and Gen X are characterized by performance and duty, security and loyalty, acceptance of hierarchy, and a presence-based work culture, younger generations such as Gen Z are more focused on purpose-driven work, work-life integration, self-determination, digitalization, efficiency, and boundary-setting. Millennials, shaped strongly by their predecessors, also share many of these values while increasingly aligning with the priorities of Gen Z.

These demographic groups differ in their work ethic and development paths, creating opportunities for cross-generational learning when guided by effective leadership. The leader’s task is first to understand the underlying concerns of each group. This provides the foundation for highlighting the mutual benefits. For example, while remote work was initially a priority mainly for younger generations, more and more Gen X employees now make use of home office days.

When introducing process changes, leaders should remember that they often hold a knowledge advantage. It is therefore essential to onboard older generations with patience and structure. Younger employees, being more IT-savvy, can serve as a bridge in facilitating these changes. Conversely, Gen Z can benefit greatly from the expertise and experience of their older colleagues. With skillful handling, leaders can use this dynamic to foster broad-based learning.

At a later stage—once tensions have eased and a foundation of trust has been built—team-building measures such as team events can be introduced. However, such steps should be taken only after trust has been established.

Conclusion

Leading across generations can be challenging. Yet, expertise and perspectives often complement each other in surprising ways. With tact and finesse, leaders can set this process in motion—creating value not only for the different generations involved but also for the company as a whole.