Generational Clash at Work: How Can We Address Promotion Barriers for Young Professionals?

Dear all, in your point of view, how can we solve a problem in the organization where older generation employees are blocking promotions for young professionals, leading to a serious issue of demotivation among the professionals?

Every career progression is based on merit. If an organization still follows a time-based limit or natural progression, the best solution is to learn as much as you can as you move up the career ladder. A higher role brings far greater responsibilities than expected. One requires operational experience and in-depth knowledge to manage higher dissonances. This always requires time and effort.

Stretch beyond learning the current processes to newer technologies. That way, you remain more competitive in dealing with higher responsibilities.

However, please share more details on this situation.

Regards

Like (Cite Contribution) mentioned, please give more details, including your role/responsibilities in the whole scenario. A lot of what you 'can' or 'ought to' do depends on your position in the chain. If you are asking this query from the HR angle (meaning if you are from HR), there's a lot you can do (whether you are 'allowed' to do is a different matter). And if you are among those who got hit from any functional department, then, maybe, your options would be limited - the worst-case scenario being to follow what (Cite Contribution) mentioned: learn as much as you can in this role/company and move on.

Regards,
TS

Apart from what (Cite Contribution) suggested to remain competitive, if your organization is following a promotion policy based on seniority and if that is hurting the younger employees' careers, the promotion policy needs to be amended to secure a win-win situation for both the seniors and the younger employees. The policy can have two channels of promotion: one may be called the seniority channel and the other may be called the merit channel, each with different eligibility criteria. This way, the younger employees can stand to gain promotions based on merit without denying the same to seniors, and the organization can have a harmonious mix of youth and experience at the operational levels.

Regards,
B. Saikumar
HR & Labour Law Advisor
Mumbai

I am studying for CIPD, and they have given us a case study of MaeRae Bank on how to implement total rewards. One part mentions that based on the survey of the corporate department employees, there have been complaints that the older generation employees are blocking promotions for young professionals. I am attempting to address this issue within the total rewards framework. Also, if anyone has ideas about this case study, it would be helpful.

I am sure that some of the quick responders do not approve of my approach of raising questions to get details of the scenario and the motive behind questions raised (without giving details) in this forum. The exchanges here are an example of students raising queries without clarifying and the time wasted. My immediate reaction, when I saw the post, was to link the question with the comments by bloggers elsewhere about how Sachin Tendulkar is blocking the progress of younger players by continuing to play and not retire. When he is playing as well as (or even better than) younger players, should he retire just because youngsters get demotivated? Does not the same argument apply in organizations where an older person is delivering the goods? Should such seniors just retire to make way for youngsters? Should the organization just create positions to keep the youngsters?

Finally, an appeal to students. Please, like TS has requested, give details of the scenario and the reason for raising a query at the outset to save time and effort of all the respondents.

You rode roughshod over the feelings of the members who responded to your query with all the sincerity of addressing a problem in real time, and at the end of the whole exercise, you say it will be only of academic importance. Mr. Tajsateesh and Mr. Simhan are right in their comments.

Regards,
B. Saikumar
HR & Labour Law Advisor
Mumbai