Growing pains or gains?

Kelli Rodda

Last year, the leading edge of the Baby Boomers turned 65 and will be leaving the workforce during the next few years. Yep, that means you, the silver-haired nursery owner reading this issue. Whether retirement age has taken you by surprise or you’ve been marking the calendar daily with a giant red X, do you know who’s ready to take over your business? Is the industry ready for this transformation?

In this month’s cover story (see page 18), we talked to eight next-generation leaders — a mix of Gen X and Y (heavy on the Y) — about how they view the industry and their plans to improve it.

There’s been countless hours spent researching the generational differences, including their attitudes toward life and work. Matthew Chase, a professor at Eastern Washington University, called the Boomers a live-to-work generation who adheres to the chain of command and values loyalty to the organization. He called the Xers cynical, resourceful and self-reliant. Chase says Xers challenge authority, have loyalty to the team rather than the organization and they work to live instead of live to work. He called Gen Y high maintenance yet high performing. He noted, “They want to be challenged, they’re competitive with coworkers and work/lifestyle balance is important.”

From observations and first-hand experience, I can agree with some of those points. But don’t get hung up on the generalizations of the generations. Most of us have heard ad nauseam about how Gen Y has a huge sense of entitlement or how Gen X is full of whiners that feel like the proverbial middle child. I’m sure there are many in each generation that could “wear the shoe,” but it’s silly to lump everyone in a category that some researcher labeled. For the generation categories, age makes up a demographic, not a personality.

One characteristic we shouldn't ignore is that Gen Y is the most green-centric group of the three generations, said Charlie Hall, professor and Ellison Chair in the department of horticultural sciences at Texas A&M University. When Gen Y takes over, they’ll enact more sweeping changes of sustainability in terms of managing the businesses and consuming the products, he said. An interesting question is whether Gen Y will maintain that environmental consciousness.

But for anyone hiring or working with Gen Y representatives, it’s imperative to make the job challenging — they have a job enrichment quotient, Hall said — and include some aspect of social media and technology they can relate to.

Will there be enough young people available to take over the green industry? Hall said in terms of numbers, there are plenty. But are enough of them interested in the green industry? He said money won’t necessarily draw them in, but more likely the sustainability aspects will make them interested.

No matter which generation you belong to, we all have to work together to make the green industry an important and rewarding part of society.