Generational Genius
When Marcie and I began to plan our collaboration and to consider ideas for the name of our consulting business, we had fun chatting with friends and colleagues from the non- and for-profit sectors. One such person, Michael Delman, founder and CEO of Beyond Booksmart, said to me, “Jane, it’s all about the wisdom you bring to the relationships.” Later when Marcie and I began the work on our branding—still without a name—she and I talked a lot about shared wisdom. Marcie and I pool our wisdom with each other frequently, as a good partnership should. Most clients that we work with have amazing and deep wisdom; working with another smart person always brings out that wise (and smart) thinking. Hence, beginning with Michael, through all of our individual and joint conversations, Marcie came to the name SmarterWisdom Consulting. And, as it says on our website, SW gets ideas to you—while leveraging your knowledge and wisdom.
Cross-fertilization of ideas consistently happens in good working relationships; openness to new thoughts from all sources tends to set effective leaders apart. For all of us, our arenas of work and ideas have necessarily expanded rapidly during the recent pandemic experience—there are so many external influences that we are responding to, and again good leaders see all of this as opportunity and pivot as quickly as they can from a reactive to an active, look-ahead stance. Internal influences are equally very present in our lives—they always have been of course, but right now might be the time to take advantage of what already exists internally. Opening up our thinking as widely as possible will enable us to take advantage of our strengths in different and imaginative ways. This is a time to be ready for completely new ways of doing things, using a growth mindset.
For example, within your organization right now, there are likely five generations of people (the Silent Generation, Baby Boomers, Gen.X, millennials, and Gen Z.). That might be an untapped wealth of wisdom! Wisdom that we would do well to take advantage of. In other Words of Wisdom blogs, we have written about building strong teams, teams that are inclusive. And while we are often comfortable with “other people like us,” consider the loss of real diversity and change that an attitude like that will bring to you. Here we are talking about a smart, yet inexpensive, tool of the trade: leveraging the wisdom around you. How might you capture the genius within the generations at your office or school? How would creating value and respect across these generations build a more sustainable future for your business?
People from different generations, in general, see the world and approach problem-solving differently. For example, as a member of the Baby Boomer generation, I might pick the movie, “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” as a favorite, whereas a person 25 years younger than I (Gen.Z) might pick “Avatar.” A movie I have seen and like much less, but I see its value and I love the way it imagines a beautiful world with great respect for nature. Both are good movies of a similar genre, science fiction. The Spielberg movie almost seems possible, grounded in sightings of UFO’s and working-class families, whereas James Cameron’s uses technology to create an entirely unimagined world. Conversations between the two generations who love these movies would be wide-ranging and each representative would bring a lot to the table. Stanford professor, Robert Sutton, author of the book Weird Ideas That Work describes the tension between “massive knowledge and intense thinking” and how it “…can spark a fundamental breakthrough.” With five generations present in the workplace, what range of breakthroughs might occur, in how many areas and with what kinds of results?
The Chinese word for crisis has often been quoted as combining Chinese characters signifying “danger” and “opportunity,” (a concept originally invoked by John F. Kennedy in speeches during the late 50s and early 60s). It is a helpful and wonderful concept for our times, for sure. As we grapple with the pandemic, how might we create new structures, innovative approaches that allow us to take advantage of the crisis? In March, at the beginning of this new time of ours, in the blog All Bets Are Off, we wrote about this very topic, urging leaders to stay aware of changing processes during the pandemic, perhaps by appointing someone within the team to take on this particular responsibility. Perhaps this informal captain of change awareness might also become expert in how to propose ways in which to leverage generational genius within your organization—capitalize on the wisdom already present. In doing so, you will open the minds and hearts of your whole team, perhaps allowing not only a new respect for each generation, but bringing ideas for new successes and increased sustainability during a very difficult time.