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The massive variations in opinion over whether or not a Paul Hastings affiliate’s slide of “nonnegotiable expectations” was problematic has underscored this actuality: Managing as we speak’s multi-generational workforce is mind-bogglingly tough. If you’re a GC, I’m not telling you something you haven’t already seen. In a latest column for Company Counsel, enterprise strategist Scott Steinberg summed up the challenges. “In impact, for the primary time in historical past, we now have 5 generations within the office—all of which study, work, talk and eat data in vastly totally different fashions, which begs the query: How can we higher talk with, interact, and encourage all these audiences.” Maybe there’s been at the least a smidgen of enchancment since 2017, when Thomson Reuters surveyed 135 authorized division employees for “The Generational Shift in Authorized Departments,” a report that concluded authorized division leaders had been flat-out overwhelmed. “Capturing child boomers’ intensive expertise whereas taking advantage of millennials’ traits and abilities is a fragile stability, however the overwhelming majority of authorized departments are usually not hanging the appropriate stability, or worse, not even acknowledging the challenges dealing with them,” the report concluded. It’s simple—however misguided—for authorized division leaders to fall again on cliches about how generations differ once they attempt to set the tone for his or her departments, Law.com’s Trudy Knockless reported last week.
