Why your business should put younger and older workers on the same team

Whether you’re a traditionalist, boomer, Gen X, millennial, or Gen Z, things move pretty fast these days.

At Accenture, Karalee Close and her colleagues have been exploring how organizations can build trust at a time when AI and other tech is helping drive radical change. They’ve found a trust gap between workers and the C-suite, says Close, the firm’s global talent and organization lead.

Fewer than three out of 10 employees trust that their company’s leaders have their best interests at heart, an Accenture survey shows. At first glance, the rank and file are more bullish on generative AI, with 95% seeing value in working with it. But 60% fret that the technology could add to their stress and burnout, and roughly the same number feel insecure about their job. By contrast, only about a third of executives regard those things as problems.

To help create a company culture that narrows the trust gap, Close has a suggestion. Get all those generations working together.

Oh, and don’t make too much of the generation gap. “A lot of the research that we’ve seen shows that the generation thing is not as important as most think,” Close says. “Most of the issues and attitudes are not really about generational things, but about aging.”

In other words, it’s less about boomers versus Gen Z than about older, more experienced workers and younger, less experienced ones, Close explains. “To what extent are we actually helping people to work across the different cohorts?”

Whether systematically or by chance, Close sees companies putting people from different age groups together on teams, with good results. “Using that strength of bringing younger, fresh employees together with older, more experienced employees into a new way of working, into a team setting, is actually quite productive,” she says. 

That’s especially important as businesses and their workers grapple with generative AI, Close reckons. Because it’s fairly new for everyone, there’s an opportunity to put the best minds on the case and test its strengths and limits.

“I think you’re going to have to throw out the old and create new if you’re going to take advantage of some of those newer technologies,” Close says. “You need a way of working that looks across multiple disciplines. And that’s where, I think, if you can find ways to cocreate the future across generations, you have a real opportunity to build trust.”

Leaders should avoid the “negative narrative” around AI, Close maintains. Hint: Harping on about productivity and cost savings will only backfire.

“I would be thinking about how I use responsible AI and innovation around AI,” Close says, “to create a positive outcome and create more trust by building teams that are multigenerational and committed to breakthrough results that maybe take away some of the frustrations and issues in an organization.”

That includes the chance to replace routine tasks with more elevated ones, she adds. “If you talk about unlocking potential, if you talk about amplifying human performance, that’s a very different narrative, and people will come to the table in a different way.”

Maybe they’ll even have lunch together.

Nick Rockel
nick.rockel@consultant.fortune.com

IN OTHER NEWS

Open season
Boards and executives don’t always see eye-to-eye, but this takes things to another level. In a tell-all interview, former OpenAI director Helen Toner said she and her fellow board members briefly ousted CEO Sam Altman for dishonest behavior that eroded their trust. They learned about ChatGPT’s launch not from Altman but from Twitter, Toner claimed. For the folks charged with governing it, OpenAI seems to have been a closed book.

Slack attack
Sound like anyone you know? More than a third of U.S. workers say they’re less productive during the summer, a new survey by Dayforce has found. Amy Cappellanti-Wolf, chief people officer with the HR software provider, blames poor management for all this slacking around. Her reasoning: With strong accountability and metrics, employees should be able to do their job anywhere. But when companies do offer flexibility, many people are too busy to take time off. This is hard work!

Short-changed?
Jim Chanos grew rich and famous by shorting fraud-ridden Enron. Now a partner has accused the hedge fund manager of using his firm as a “piggy bank,” with his girlfriend taking a cut. Chanos, who called the lawsuit by Conlon Holdings “puzzling and baseless,” said a $10 million loan in question was paid back years ago. Either way, it’s a fraction of the billions in losses on his ill-fated Tesla short.  

Stress test
Have I told you how incredibly busy I am? That kind of “stress bragging” could reduce colleagues’ trust, according to a recent study. Not only is someone who talks that way regarded as less likable and competent, but their boasts can induce more stress and burnout among coworkers. Yes, people literally get sick of hearing them speak.

TRUST EXERCISE

“The U.S. economy is the most powerful and formidable in the world—and lots can be done to improve it. While economists focus on inflation and interest rates and politicians consider options through the lens of an election year, there’s a worrying trend that needs reversing if we are to maintain U.S. dominance and continue enjoying the benefits of our economy: There are fewer public companies in the U.S. than ever before.

JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon raised this issue in his annual letter a couple of weeks ago. In the mid-1990s, there were nearly 8,000 public companies listed in the U.S. Today, there are half as many, and at the current rate, we’ll see that number halved again by 2044. ‘The total should have grown dramatically, not shrunk,’ Dimon wrote.”

America loves free enterprise, but its public markets are on the ropes. Eric Hippeau, managing partner at venture capital firm Lerer Hippeau, thinks that’s bad for private markets and for the economy at large. Fewer public companies means fewer exit opportunities, a key driver of innovation.

Hippeau points to several factors behind the decline, including mergers and acquisitions, higher regulatory hurdles and compliance costs, and access to capital that lets companies stay private longer. Essentially, many businesses no longer trust that going public is worthwhile.

For Hippeau, turning things around is a matter of democratic principle. Strong public markets give everyone with money to invest a stake in that shared economy, he argues. Hippeau suggests making it easier for companies to IPO, plus offering tax benefits or other financial incentives. He calls for educating investors about the benefits of long-term value creation, too. In his view, private investors like him should also spread the word that business innovation is crucial to America’s economic edge. Happy to help him take that message public.