Embrace the differences
Portnoy says Ernst & Young was one of the first businesses to use Facebook as a way to connect with students. It may not be something that a lot of the people in the firm understood or wanted, but she embraced it because she recognized that most college students were using the tool, so it’d be a valuable way to connect with them for recruiting purposes. Technology and communication is just one way to embrace generational differences.
“It’s being open and willing to learn something new,” she says. “There’s a lot of people we talk to and we say, ‘What mode of communication do you use?’ and they get too rooted into saying, ‘I only want my e-mail this way and communicate that,’ and then you interact with someone else who only texts, and that’s really their fastest way of communicating. If you’re not open to that just because you’re not a texter, you may be missing out on an opportunity to connect the most efficient way possible with that colleague or professional or client, so being open to different things, being willing to try different things and open to new ideas is critical.”
She says to communicate with your employees to learn ways you could do things differently.
“Ask them the questions,” Portnoy says. “I actually will routinely sit down with some of our younger professionals and members of my own team and ask them the question about, ‘This is what we’re trying to achieve; how can I better communicate with your peers?’ And I look to the younger colleagues as really great sources of information. They’ll be really honest with you, and you have to be willing to talk and listen and take some of those ideas.
“It’s critical to be flexible about different approaches and not be rooted in the old ways of doing things. Technology really has taught us that we can be effective in working in lots of different ways and by being open to those that, in particular, we more senior professionals may not be aware of. I think that provides us with great new opportunities.”
