Effective Leadership-Talk Does Not Include Like Um Ya Know…

You’ve started your career. You’re scoping out the workplace terrain, looking for the ladders to climb up the hierarchy. But it’s not only where you walk but, also, how you talk that will propel you upwards.

Every generation, during its adolescence, creates its own jargon, its own new phrases and ways of saying things. Its how each new generation separates itself from the older generations, creating a separate identity. These phrases and inflections creep into speech and become habits. They’re as faddish as yesterday’s hairstyles. Fads have their place, but it’s not in the workplace—where four generations come together to work cooperatively. The workplace requires you to adopt a new set of language norms that make your work group seem more alike than different. Adolescent speech habits can isolate you and deprive you of opportunities for advancement.

Here are a few phrases that can deprive you of acceptance as an adult in the workplace:

1. Like. Inserting the word “like” into your sentences when it’s not a simile is not only bad grammar, but it distracts people from your message. Use it more than once in every sentence and you’ll be tuned out.

2. You guys. Referring to every cluster of people as “you guys” offends some people—especially females from previous generations who think of “guys” as males, and who struggled for acceptance as women in the workplace. And, if you work in customer service, this is the quickest way to drive customers away and ensure you’ll receive low or no gratuities.

3. Coo-ull. This variation of Boomer use of the word “cool” labels you as someone too young to have a vocabulary of adjectives to effectively describe your employer’s products and services. You won’t be offered the best opportunities until you can describe things in qualifiable terms.

4. Ya know. This is the equivalent of sneezing in someone’s face at the end of every sentence you speak. It won’t be long before people of previous generations avoid you altogether.

5. Sing-songy inflections. Talking like a jumper on a merry go round, alternating high and low tones in your voice with every other word or syllable, makes you sound like a Dr. Seuss character—especially to bosses and co-workers of earlier generations. It’s SO anNOYing that YOU’RE unLIKEly to GET a proMOtion IF you TALK this way.

So tuck your cohort talk away if you want to be seen as a leader, rather than as a blind follower.

Which Comes First: Family or Work?

Watch out—this is a trick question.

If you answered, “Family,” you could miss out on important opportunities to improve your family’s quality of life—and isn’t that a big part of the reason you’re working? There are times when a situation at work is legitimately urgent and needs your attention more than your family needs you. I remember seeing on TV news that coal miners were trapped and emergency-service personnel worked through the night to save them. That is truly a matter of life. A family would not only understand, but be proud. But these events aren’t routine—fortunately.

If you answered, “Work,” you could be alienating your family or putting them at risk of influence by questionable people who don’t have your family’s best interests in mind. There are times when matters at home are more urgent than matters at work and require you to put family first. I remember cringing when American Idol contestants missed the birth of a child and the marriage of a sister. Imagine, for the rest of your life, not being in those pictures—not having those memories—and having your family forever remind you about choosing work over them. These events don’t happen every week.

The leadership answer to the question, “Which comes first: work or family?” is, “It depends.” If you always choose one over the other, then the other will always know that you can’t be relied upon. But if you let the situation determine the priority, then everyone in your life will know that they have a chance of getting your attention when the situation requires you to make exceptions in their favor. This is one way to earn respect—and a big step in becoming a leader.

You Cannot See Leadership

If I say *apple* you get a picture in your mind’s eye. Likewise, if I say *desk* you get a picture. But when I say *leadership* there is no concrete image for your brain to conjure up from its image data base.

Leadership is just a label for a set of behaviors that are observable. That means you can see or hear a person performing them. For example, you can see a person smiling; shaking your hand; giving you direction; showing you a *thumbs-up;* demonstrating a task; showing you reports. You can hear a person saying “thank you;” “good job;” “good morning;” asking for your suggestions; explaining the potential consequences of different courses of action.

Wrap a bunch of these kinds positive, consistent observations up in a bundle, and you might put a label on them and call them *leadership.* Try to define leadership? Well, that’s a different story, but it can be done. You can read about how Millenials define leadership in Kissing the Corporate Frog. Read Chapter 1 here.

What Do Your Kids Learn about Work and Money from Watching You? Take this quiz! Follow these tips!

"‘How do people understand the work world? Mainly from the images and snippets of conversations their parents have either shared with them, or by the behaviour of the parents themselves. This affects how people think about work, what they expect of work, and how they organize their work and personal lives. It might even make a difference to what people choose to do for a living’ says career expert Barbara Moses, author of What Next? Find the Work That's Right for You” in the Globe and Mail today.

“Love their jobs or hate them, parents are constantly sending signals about work and the workplace to their children, career experts say.”

What to do? Start by taking the 25-question quiz beginning on page 2 of the linked article. Then read the tips on page 3.

While you're at it, think about the messages your parents left you with regarding work and money and how those messages might be affecting your career today. Sometimes we don’t know why we do the things we do; a look back in time might offer helpful insight.

Gen Y Wants the Same Kind of Government-Sector Leadership that Gen X and Boomers Want—Will They Get It?

An article at GovernmentExecutive.com states:

“Despite some well-documented generational differences, baby boomers and millennials essentially need the same thing from their federal jobs: strong leadership and flexible pay…”

Recruiting is a big problem in government agencies, but retention is an even bigger one. In one department, “…Nearly 50 percent of the workforce has five years or less of service.”

Quoting a propoent of a public service academy, the article goes on to say:

“If [other generations] think about what they want now and what they wanted when they started working, it's the same kinds of things. The only difference is we have the technology now to do those things.”

Technology and programs? Okay. But what about people and leadership? I don’t think we’re able to program them yet.

College Women Create Blog to Discuss Millenial Transitions

Wondering how to get from school to work? Wondering what line of work suits you and how to find it? You’re not alone.

Five college seniors at James Madison University (JMU), in Harrisonburg, Va., have started a dialogue about the trials and tribulations of this major life transition at their blog, Life Before Noon: A Millenial’s Manual. Read about their ideas and contribute you own.

It’s heart-warming to see young women using the power of the Internet to start a significant network. I can’t help but wonder how different the world would have been for Boomer Women had we had this kind of access to each other back in the ‘70s. It’s pleasing to see the results, two generations later, of our pioneering in the days when there were men’s jobs and women’s jobs—and we tore down the wall.

Brazen Careerist: A Generation Y Professional Career Community

Just launched on March 3, 2008, BrazenCareerist.com is an online community of young professionals. It taps into the rich and diverse knowledge of “a network of fifty bloggers who have agreed to participate in a community of people helping each other with careers.”

Check out the “Twenty Set” section, on the home page. Click on topics like Personal Branding; Technology; Politics; and Money (among many more). You won’t just be talked at; you’re invited to join the conversation! Glean some great Gen Y advice from their articles.

Not young enough? There’s another good reason to check out Brazen Careerist—especially if you’re an employer. Lead founder, Penelope Trunk, and her associates offer consulting services to help companies learn how to attract and retain Generation Y employees (and almost everything in between!).

So get rid of all that old-generation career-advice and head on over to this online career center tailored to “young professionals who want to design and define their careers using the new rules for success.”

Visit this resource often. This new generation is the largest yet—and they’re bound to make the world a better place!