Good day, I recently joined a new companny as a Team Leader. The team i manage consists of older people (average 45 years old. I come from a call centre that consisted of relatively younger generation and it was easy to manage
I have just discovered that I'm the youngest Team Leader that the team has ever had and I'm the youngers as well in the team.
I am not sure how to go about managing these type of people.
I sometimes face this issue when I'm training or coaching people. I find the best way to deal with it is to treat people with respect and they'll respect you in return.
You've been chosen to lead them because of your abilities as a manger. I'm sure they'll respect that fact and will respect you for it. Once there's mutual respect, age doesn't matter.
here here DaddyM
Older people are just the same as young people - they have just been a few more times round the block!
Well there's no doubt you can lead. But treat this as an oppotunity to learn as well. A good manager knows when to take advice from others, even when its from one of their subordinates. Your staff will have many years of experience and it might be a good opportunity to conduct sessions where they can all share their experience and thoughts to help improve things... asking for their ideas isnt a weakness. In fact, it will make you a more knowledgable manager and you will have more loyal workers to boot.
I agree DaddyM treat them as you would wish to be treated yourself
An older person in the team can be a stabilising factor and loyal and also someone that can be a font of knowledge with much to give a team and I feel the best approach is to treat them as a colleague
One of my teams average age is 50, and agree, treat with respect as you should everyone young or more mature teams. You may find that with a higher age group they are less computer literate in excel / word and may take longer to manage changes you wish to implement so you may need to spend a little longer training and coaching them so patience a must!
There may be some older members of your team who resent having a younger Team Leader, as they may believe they have more experience. However, you have obtained the position of Team Leader due to your abilities, so try to overlook any negativity you face and concentrate on doing your job as well as you can - once people see your capabilities for themselves they will realise that age is just a number!
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