You Are Not Too Old for Social Media

I became a student of generational differences about five years ago while working for a Chicago advertising agency. I partnered up with a director of research who worked in Louisville and asked her to come to Chicago to conduct a workshop on the subject for prospective clients as part of a new business outreach.

Since that time, I have studied anything and everything related to how the four generations interact with each other in the workplace. The Mature workers are the traditionalists who entered the workforce with such loyalty to country, family, employer — you name it. The Boomers, like me, who originally thought they would stay with a company for life and get the gold watch their parents earned. Boy, were we disappointed. Gen Xers, the latchkey kids who have a serious mistrust for authority and Gen Yers, the entitlement generation.

Human resources executives get it. They understand that hiring managers and front line managers have to know how to manage and motivate all four generations. And it’s particularly challenging when the supervisor is a Gen Xer and the subordinate is a Boomer or Traditionalist.

Gen Xers and Gen Yers are the tech geniuses in a company. Gen Yers, especially because they grew up with computers. They were using computers in pre-school. As a Boomer, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve given up on trying to manipulate an excel spreadsheet and handed it over to a younger office cohort to “fix it” for me.

Fast forward to the new economy with a new paradigm where technology, especially social networking, is all the rage. How are Boomers and the Mature generation embracing sites like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and more? If I were to survey my own small little world of friends in these two generations, I would have to say fairly well. I have maybe one or two friends who want no part of Facebook but will send a text message on a Blackberry. Or another friend who will send email (so old school nowadays) but could care less about sending a text message much less take a picture with a camera phone.  And then there’s Sandy, my 70-something friend who has a Facebook page and plans her trips to Italy on Expedia.com.

It has been well documented that the phenemonal growth in profiles on Facebook is largely due to the Boomer and Mature generations. If nothing else, we get our Gen Y children to help us upload photos one or two times until we get the hang of it.

That’s the recreational side of social media. What about the professional side? How many Boomers are willing to embrace social networking tools in a job search or to conduct business? I’m raising my hand, nice and high!

In this new economy, where the world is flat, where innovation and technology make it easier to communicate globally, not embracing these tools is — well not good. It’s essential to managing your brand or reputation online. How you develop your profile on LinkedIn, for instance, can say a lot about the way you want to be perceived by a prospective employer or a new business partner. And as the saying goes, if you don’t look out for you, who will? In other words, you can control how you are presented online. It has become just as important as managing your personal appearance. 

Managing your brand through social networking comes down to balancing the science of the technology with the art of human interaction. As one panelist said during a recent Social Media Club of Chicago event, “Social media has put people back in business.” She was absolutely right. There seems to be an innate desire on the part of people who hook up online to want to meet face-to-face to discuss their commonalities.

However, there’s still a contingent of senior executives who think social networking is just a fad that will someday go away. They don’t see any longevity in sending short bursts of information to a bunch of followers. They certainly don’t see the need to provide status updates about every aspect of a person’s life. And while they won’t admit it, they think online videos are for their kids, unless of course, it’s video from a news organization.

The problem with that thinking is the world around them is changing. CEO’s and senior execs who are leading and managing in the 21st Century with 20th Century thinking will soon find themselves and their policies irrelevant. And if they’re leading a company through this tough economic period, failing to embrace new thinking and engaging their customers through social media is like looking in the mirror and seeing nothing.

Note to the die-hard old schoolers: Social media is not going away. It’s only going to get better. Now is the time to integrate a well-planned social media strategy into your marketing and communications plan.