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Friday, December 14, 2007

Law - "Dealing With the Legal Profession's Generation Gaps"

Here are some quotes from an enlightening article by Douglas B. Richardson of the Law Firm Partnership & Benefits Report newsletter:

The generation gap is nothing new. In a pattern as old as time, the successor generation has always viewed its forebears as stodgy and unduly authoritarian, while the "old folks" have tended to view the energy and impulsiveness of youth with suspicion, if not derision.

It now appears, however, as if the accelerated rate of social change has also wrought profound and fundamental changes in how members of different generations relate, collaborate (or don't) and communicate (or not). Not only are we not in Kansas, Toto, but there may not even be a Kansas once today's emerging young leaders take the controls.

In the lingo of the social scientists, folks born between 1925 and 1945 are often called the "matures," "traditionalists," "builders," "seniors" or "veterans." They comprise about 20 percent of the U.S. population but less than 10 percent of practicing lawyers. They are in or entering their emeritus years, and to young lawyers they embody "the old days."

The "boomers" born during the baby boom of 1946 to 1964 make up about 30 percent of the U.S. population and a little under half of today's lawyers. Their careers are now peaking, and a lot of them will be retiring in the next decade. They drive the power structure of most firms, and although they think of themselves as more individualistic, more optimistic and more committed to personal integrity than their predecessors, younger associates tend to view them as defenders of the power structure and status quo.

The Gen-X'ers, originally labeled the "slackers," were born between 1965 and 1979 and now sometimes are called the "busters" or the "e-generation." They presently represent about 25 percent of this country's population, but almost half of its lawyers. Temperamentally, they are probably not all that different from the boomers, except that they tend to be more skeptical of authority, less self-centered and more inclusive and collaborative.

The Gen-Y'ers, born after 1980, are sometimes called the "nexters," "whys" or "echoes." The youngest subset of the Gen-Y'ers, the "millenials," is becoming a dominant force in reshaping how our society buys, sells, learns and works. Their worldview is so different from the boomers that many wonder if productive communication will be possible once the younger Y'ers (the Kaiser Family Foundation has dubbed them "Generation M," and soon they will be going to law school) come of age. "They revere youth and change, and our age and experience are of little practical use to them," says one senior partner in her 60s. "I suspect that like Inuits, when their time comes they will simply put their elders outside the igloo to freeze. In fact, it's getting chilly already."

Some social researchers claim differences among generations are illusory and that every generation becomes more conservative and more resistant to change as it ages. Others, myself included, see generational differences -- particularly between the X'ers and Y'ers -- as very pronounced and very fundamental.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on December 14, 2007 06:14 AM
Posted to General Law Related