Evolve IT has always had a wide spread of ages. It has workers as young as 22, the oldest is around 60 and there are plenty in between in their mid 20s and 30s. There are no 40 year olds yet but if they come, they will be fitted into the firm’s unique culture.
As a small reseller, Evolve IT has picked up numerous awards as a Microsoft partner and has been named CRN’s Regional Reseller of the Year.
Evolve IT has always had a wide spread of ages because it is a family company. Nick Moran is managing director, his father Ges is the financial officer and his mother Chris comes in two to three days a week to work on administration.
Raymond Farrugia, Evolve IT’s purchasing manager, says that despite the wide mix of generations at the workplace, generational differences have never been an issue at the firm. Much of that, he says, is because of the company’s culture. Having just a staff of 20 makes it much easier for the managers to accommodate differences. In the end, he says, it is all about respect.
“Being a small company of 20 employees, everyone is in everyone else’s pockets anyway. We are all on the same floor and there are no barriers,’’ says Farugia, a baby boomer.
“We all speak to each other, we all hear each other.
“It certainly isn’t a politically correct environment. There are some very aggressive comments and activities that take place. No one is backward in coming forward, you say what you think. There is not too much dancing around unless someone is in a particularly sensitive situation.”
Are there generational differences when everyone is in each other’s face? Do the younger ones cope with that? Do the older ones back off? “The older ones tend to respond in kind to the opportunity,’’ Faruggia says. “We tend to be a bit more subtle but we have our baseball bats as well.
“There are no barriers in anything which is one of the ways you handle multi-generational environments rather than building walls of politeness. We tend to be pretty much brutal about everything.”
He says generational differences rarely come up, apart from the time the younger ones start talking about music and what they got up to on the weekend.
But when it gets down to issues about work, it’s just not there. Much of that has to do with the IT industry itself. The technology sector is different.
“The oldies have to be techies anyway to be working here,’’ he says. “You’re not going to bamboozle us with any technology or anything like that because we are familiar with whatever we have to be familiar with. So the generational difference, which is usually technological, isn’t really an issue in this environment.“
The only time generational differences might come up is when people start having a go at the older ones about their physical capabilities. But then the older employees know how to serve it right back.
Fast Facts
• Recognise that different generations have different needs, aspirations and capabilities.
• Accommodate employee differences, work to meet their specific needs and preferences.
• Accommodate personal scheduling needs, work-life balance issues and non-traditional lifestyles.
• Focus on workplace learning but recognise that different generations have different learning styles and needs. A classroom might suit older employees. It’s less likely to work for younger ones.
• Working with a multi-generational workforce requires respect, from all parties.
“Being old bastards, we can’t move as quickly or do the same things as the young blokes and they will hold it over you, but we are smarter and we can do things in other ways,’’ he says.
“Generally you can sway young people around with a rational argument, that’s their weakness.”
He says individual needs are carefully attended to. Some of those different needs might be generational but managers work around them and accommodate them as much as possible.
“It tends to be unwritten rather than documented,’’ he says.
“As long as there is a quid pro quo. More often than not, it’s time in lieu or if you want to take a day off here and there, you can.
“So if for example they have cricket training on a Wednesday night, they can get out early on Wednesdays. But you don’t specifically ask for something in lieu, it just happens.
“It works better as an honour system. It’s not written down and recorded minute for minute and noted that you took an extra 10 minutes here and have to give that back at the end of the day. It doesn’t work like that here.”
Farugia says that can only work in a small company. “You can make your own rules because you are not overlaying on 70 people. You are overlaying them on a much smaller number and there is a lot of quid pro quo.
“In a small environment, everyone works towards a common goal. Here, if you want a private conversation, you go somewhere else.
“In a smaller business where you have to manage a smaller number of people, you don’t have rules that separate because everyone knows what everyone else is doing, they’re all trying to achieve the same thing and that’s basically to keep the clients happy and to keep the money rolling in through the door.”
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