Managing five age groups in one workplace

Generational disparity is a seductive idea, inspiring myriad studies and books in the last 30 years.

Today, we prefer to discuss cultural groupings around influential events or trends. The baby boom generation belongs to that post-World War II spike in the birthrate. It was followed by a baby bust, Generation X.

Tamara Erickson, a management writer who has published books looking at the age groups on either side of Gen X, now finds herself advising 30- to 45-year-olds in her new book, “What’s Next, Gen X? Keeping Up, Moving Ahead, and Getting the Career You Want.”

But why now is she addressing those graduates of the Reagan era?

Two reasons come to mind. First, this is the generation moving into positions of power. Second, five generational groups will soon be sharing the workplace: the traditionalists (born 1928 to 1945), boomers (born postwar to the early 1960s), Xers, Generation Y (born 1980 to 1995) and the Internet generation, still teenagers. Generation X will need to learn how to manage these very different cohorts.

As the book points out, generational cohorts, familiar in the U.S. and Europe, are not always represented similarly in other parts of the world. Members of the post-1980s urban generation in China, for example, are sometimes referred to as the “little emperors,” reflecting China’s one-child policy.

It also can be irritating to be pigeonholed, particularly for those on the cusp of a generation. Take President Obama, born in 1961: Some sociologists would call him a boomer, but there is a strong argument, as the author acknowledges, for aligning him with Generation X.

Everyone needs to work together to deal with the threats of our era. Erickson has written a book that is right for its time, full of insights and useful for anyone struggling with generational tension in management.

Richard Donkin is a columnist for the Financial Times of London, in which a longer version of this review first appeared.