Have you ever been reminded of your age, the youngness of it in particular, more often than you would like to be, at the workplace?
I have been, consistently so. It was literally the first impression people wanted to puke out on me every time I walked into a meeting room, till the front of my head took pity and sprouted some strands of grey hair. That it went overboard with the greys too soon is a story for another day.
“You must be just out of college”, said my first client. I had no defence. I literally was just out of college. It took many iterations of the P&L, a model I could eventually rattle off in my sleep, that got them convinced age doesn’t matter.
“You are what? Early 20s? This bunch of stakeholders is going to be hard to manage,” went another a few months down the line. No defence again.
It happened lesser and lesser, as time went by, till age caught up to a respectable number.
I was reminded of the age conundrum a few weeks back in an unrelated discussion on leadership.
What kind of leaders have you taken inspiration from, what kind of leader are you etc. Regular stuff.
It got me thinking.
The trickiest kind of leadership situations I have been in are ones where I have had to lead and align stakeholders older than me, more senior to me, more deeply entrenched in their subject matters vs me.
It’s the holy trinity of negatives. Of age, grade, and experience. Layered with a liberal dose of the wrong gender.
So what do you do, you ask me. I don’t have this all mapped out but let me give it a go.
The “We know better, we have always done it this way” leaders: I ask first principle questions blaming my lack of subject matter understanding for the naivety. “What will we do new that we didn’t do for two years?”, “Where are we going to execute this lovely plan?”, “By when can we close this discussion out?” Sometimes, it’s just about the right questions, that makes people think harder, introspect, reflect.. fill up with all those fancy words you hear in leadership talk.
The “We are going to be hostile only because you are young” leaders: I invest time, trying to learn what they know, what’s the legacy they carry. It is intense but it works. Everyone likes sharing their story, if we push a bit, a bit harder. It helps establish connection. But sometimes, the sunk cost is too high before I realise it won’t go anywhere. Some relationships just don’t work, personal or professional.
The “We will remind you at every turn that you are under qualified for the job” leaders: This category is tricky. It used to irk me. I would be up in arms, trying to prove a point, prove that I am good enough. It’s a waste of time. They will work it out eventually. Oh, I am no Zen. It irks me still, I just don’t react impulsively anymore.
The “Who are you but just a chit of a female in our august presence” leaders: My voice is shrill, thin even. It sometimes softens too much when I want to make an impactful point. It gets lost, drowns in the voices around. I used to give up, rationalising to myself that perhaps my point wasn’t important enough, not value adding enough. It has taken me years, to finish my thought, to make my point, to ask my question, however tiring it is to make myself get heard.
What are your “age” experiences from the workplace? More importantly, how do you treat people younger than you at the workplace? Good? Bad? Ugly?
P. S. Views strictly personal. Post doesn’t refer to any organisation that I am currently associated with.
Love the topics you bring here, always.
In my work with groups, I have always insisted on equality around age/ gender. Truly believe the young bring in new ideas and energy, in any organisation.
I do have a point about age the other way round too — I find the young often slotting someone older as ‘old in their views’ just because of number of years.
Superb as usual. Have had more gender than age experiences. Now I use my age to advantage :-).
How do you treat people younger than you had me stop in my tracks and reflect. I mentor, don’t condescend. I can get impatient but that’s not age related.