Maximizing the potential of age-diverse work groups and their leaders in contemporary workplaces

Abstract

Age diversity has the potential to offer significant advantages in contemporary workplaces. However, surprisingly, many organizations fail to realize these benefits. This may partially be due to a lack of understanding of the underlying processes taking place in age-diverse work groups, as well as the role of leadership and leader’s age in this context. In this thesis, I shed light on these issues using an exploratory mixed method design comprising of a two-part qualitative study (Study 1A/1B) and two quantitative studies (Studies 2 & 3). The qualitative study involves an in-depth examination of semi-structured interviews with 16 older/younger workers about their experiences collaborating on work tasks with younger/older colleagues (Study 1A) and their perceptions of their younger/older managers’ leadership effectiveness (Study 1B). Using a blended grounded theory approach I found five key factors (information elaboration, trust, status incongruity, counterbalancing behaviors, and learning agility) and 15 leadership behaviors as being critical to the success of age-diverse work groups. In Study 2, I surveyed 197 work group members and 56 supervisors to test a subset of the factors identified in Study 1A (information elaboration, status congruity, and trust) for their impact on the performance of age-diverse work groups. In Study 3, I surveyed 214 work group members (half with a younger manager and the other half with an older manager) to assess the impact of the two most prominent leadership models from Study 1B, empowering leadership and transformational leadership, on the age-diversity-information elaboration-work group performance relationship. I also compared these effects across the two leader age groups. With the exception of those regarding transformational leadership, the results of Studies 2 and 3 generally supported my hypotheses regarding the positive effects of the selected factors/leadership behaviors in the context of age-diverse work groups. The results of Study 3 also supported my prediction of empowering leadership being a potentially more promising leadership approach than transformational leadership for younger managers. Collectively, my thesis makes contributions to the work group diversity, leadership, and age literatures. From a practical standpoint, my thesis provides organizations with useful strategies for more effectively navigating age diversity in their workplaces.