5 Tips to Successfully Manage Older Team Members

When you manage older team members it can be pretty nerve racking and intimidating especially if there is a large age gap. You might be a new manager or have a new team to manage when you first manage older workers.  Your confidence in yourself and your ability to treat older employees in exactly the same way as you treat younger team members is really important. Confidence makes a huge difference to you and to older team members. When managing anyone – younger or older – relationships matter. When the age gap is large, building trusting relationships is harder so you have to put a little more effort in.  Get to know your older workers. Find out what they like, what challenges they have with their job, what their ambitions are – just like you would with all the other team members. Build good trusting relationships.  Secondly, it is so important to treat everyone equally. Make consistent decisions and take consistent actions. Do this and the older team members won’t worry that they are being treated differently or worse.  Third, when leading older employees, remind yourself of the value you bring to the team. Managing older employees is great because they have depth and possible breadth of experience that you can draw on. Don’t forget that you have different skills and experience that they do. You are manager of the team for a reason. Demonstrate what you bring in a natural and relaxed way. Be confident of the value you bring.  Fourth, keep an open mind and respect the differences. Don’t assume when managing older employees that they don’t have good energy levels or they don’t have a desire to learn. Find out what each individual wants by asking lots of questions and paying attention to what they tell you. Keep an open mind.  Also be respectful that everyone is at a different point in their lives, with different ambitions, interests, and motivations. Work with the team members you have so that you can get the best out of the team. Fifth, when you manage older employees than you, look to leverage older team members’ experience and knowledge. They should have depth and / or breadth to their experience. The old employees should have seen plenty – what has been tried and not worked for instance. Use this knowledge and experience in how to manage older employees. The workforce is continuing to age. The fastest growing age group in the workplace is the over 65s. When you manage older team members you have access to great knowledge and experience – make the absolute best use of this.  Enjoy having older team members in your team!

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