Generation Blend: Managing Across the Technology Age Gap [Hardcover]

Generation Blend

Technology and demographics are on a collision course. Digital Natives, Boomerang Boomers, and Generation X-ecutives are all grappling with the transformative implications of Web 2.0 technologies, and organizations are scrambling for the best ways to unlock the talents of a multigenerational workforce in a connected world. Generation Blend ventures deep into the technology age gap and provides real-world solutions to combine the best that younger and older workers have to offer.

Generation Blend explores how generational attitudes toward technology affect issues as diverse as recruitment and retention, employee training, management decision-making, collab-oration, knowledge sharing, work/life balance, and ordinary workday activities. How can your organization promote the continuity of knowl-edge and culture in the face of the coming demographic transition? What hidden factors put new technology deployments at risk? How can IT departments manage the growing demand for social and collaborative software while maintaining governance and security? What initiatives can you launch to bridge the divide in work styles and tech-savvy that separates veterans and newcomers in the workforce?

In Generation Blend, author Rob Salkowitz builds on the groundbreaking work of Don Tapscott (Wikinomics, Growing Up Digital), William Strauss and Neil Howe (Generations, Millennials Rising), and many others to connect the dots of sociology, technology, and management, and trace a roadmap for decision-makers. Generation Blend is rich with research and includes two original in-depth case studies from organizations that have developed unique approaches to bridging the technology age gap: Microsoft's Board of the Future project, which assembles college-age students from around the world to discuss a wide range of workplace issues, and Older Adults Technology Services, a New York-based nonprofit dedicated to intergenerational technology training and reciprocal mentoring programs. Organizations of all types and sizes can profit from their methods.

The retirement of the Baby Boomers, the arrival of the Millennials, and the impact of Web 2.0 technology in the enterprise create unprece-dented complexity for employers and workers in the 2010s and beyond. Organizations looking to solve the puzzle of productivity across the technology age gap should start with Generation Blend.

Praise for Generation Blend: Managing Across the Technology Age Gap

"There is no more important issue facing today's enterprise than the digital age gap. To avoid a generational clash and exploit the power of intergenerational collaboration and knowledge sharing, every organization needs to think differently. Generation Blend spells out clearly what your company needs to do to get it right."
—Don Tapscott, coauthor, Wikinomics and author, Growing Up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation

"Salkowitz usefully explains how generational attitudes shape workers' responses to technologies in the workplace and offers practical recommendations for how organizations can respond to increase the success of technological innovation. He opens a discussion that will only rise in importance as the rising generation of Millennials enters the workplace in full force in the decade ahead."
—William Strauss and Neil Howe, authors of Generations: A History of America's Future and Millennials Rising: The Next Great Generation

"The dirty little secret of essentially every company is that their most critical asset is their people. Generation Blend is a uniquely powerful tool for grasping the forces that are driving the tumultuous changes afoot in today's workforce, and for managing with and through them most effectively. Rooted in the concrete lessons of case study, it draws important lessons for managers and decision-makers who must understand the future of the workplace—and that, I believe, means all of us. Generation Blend is must-reading for managers who mean to succeed over the next decade."
—Lawrence Wilkinson, Chairman, Heminge and Condell, and cofounder of Global Business Network

"Generation Blend presents timely data and analysis about the generations from a wide range of sources and is sure to become essential reading for people who want to understand and bridge the generational divide at work. If you want to engage, motivate, and retain young workers without driving the veteran workers away, then this book can help you."
—Penelope Trunk, business columnist, The Boston Globe and author, Brazen Careerist

"Rob Salkowitz turns traditional thinking upside down for a witty and enlightening look at the unique technological challenges facing today's workforce."
—Paul Andrews, technology columnist and author, How the Web Was Won