One workforce. Three generations. Approaching your talent and engagement strategies through the limiting generational lens may be costing you. These insights can help you determine what the biggest shared drivers are across your entire workforce.
Controversial opinion: generational stereotypes have no place at work.
That statement isn’t meant to raise your blood pressure. Instead, it’s meant to free you from the burden of approaching employee experience initiatives through the (albeit limiting) lens of age groups.
Counterintuitive? Maybe. Critical mindset shift for performance? Absolutely.
In an age where the majority of workers span three generations, all working together in one space and time, it’s the natural instinct of HR and employee experience professionals to use a matrixed approach—one that categorizes talent strategies into organized boxes of initiatives based on generational norms.
This has historically been a safe approach. Though convenient, it’s not the most effective tactic anymore.
2025 is teaching us that good employee experiences start outside of our comfort zones. While analyzing insights from more than 1,000,000 employees across the globe, we formed a new perspective on generations and their role in the workplace.
People are dynamic, and generational characteristics don’t determine who they are, how they learn, and what they need to help them thrive at work.
We had a hunch that there was more to the generational story, so we looked at our Peakon Employee Voice data to get a more accurate picture. Here are our three key takeaways.
Despite the growing narrative around generational differences at work, our analysis shows that what actually drives employee engagement does not differ meaningfully between Gen X, Y (Millenials), and Z.
In fact, when measuring the 14 engagement drivers and their sub drivers, only one driver had a statistically meaningful difference between generations: Gen X engagement was slightly more driven by whether they believed the strategy, set by senior leadership, was taking their organization in the right direction.
With Gen X employees typically being more senior in the workforce compared to Gen Y and Z, the hypothesis is that it has to do with proximity to leadership, senior positions, and retirement.
Companies should interpret this not as Gen X caring more about strategy than other generations. Rather, Gen X employees often hold the majority share of shaping—or being accountable for—strategy. Inherently, they’re more affected by clarity and credibility around a company’s strategy.
On the other side of this, consider that Gen Y and Z cohorts may include some fast climbers that move up the corporate ladder at an accelerated pace, compared to the norm. Which begs the question, if proximity to leadership, senior positions, and retirement were held constant across generations, would strategic confidence and direction have a similarly strong impact on engagement for Gen Y and Z?
If so, that would provide strong evidence that life and career stage is the primary factor, rather than age.
We don’t have the answer to that question now. However, with advances in AI that democratize skills and knowledge that may help to decouple career-stage from age, we may see that answer sooner than later.
So we’ve identified the common ground among all three generations in 13 out of 14 drivers, and explained the one statistically meaningful difference.
Apart from that one key difference, our analysis supports long-standing research and debunks a key myth: that each generation needs a completely distinct engagement strategy.
In reality, the psychological needs underpinning engagement are universal, timeless, and deeply human. This doesn’t mean a one-size-fits-all is the answer, because one-size-fits-none when it comes to engagement.
But it does mean that HR teams and their workforces would benefit from a workforce-driven engagement strategy, versus a generational one that dilutes impact.
Ironically, removing age groups from the equation makes engagement efforts more targeted, efficient, and scalable. HR leaders should ask the hard questions that identify the unique drivers of engagement across age groups within their workforce to make the largest impact.
With the understanding that the value placed on key drivers of engagement are consistent across generations, another observation from the analysis stood out: The extent to which these engagement drivers are being met does differ across generations.
When comparing the Gen X and Gen Z scores around professional growth, we noticed that their experiences vary.
Though the differences between the generations seem small, they can be deceiving. Approximately 400 companies across the globe and industries were a part of this question set—so a small difference has a big impact.
From the data, we can see that Gen Z reports consistently higher scores on themes around growth, potentially reflecting targeted early-career support. Unfortunately for Gen X, even though they equally value a path for career advancement within the organization, they report lower scores in their professional growth.
In a recent discussion about these findings with Liz Pavese, Ph.D and principal business psychologist at Workday, she explained the opportunity presented by this dilemma well: “Knowing that growth matters to all, companies can use this to re-invent how growth and development happens to actually meet the needs of how adults learn in the workplace.”
This professional plateau is an output of generational talent engagement strategies, unintentionally causing an experience gap for Gen X employees. One central truth for all HR leaders to capitalize on: Growth is universally important.
“Knowing that growth matters to all, companies can use this to re-invent how growth and development happens to actually meet the needs of how adults learn in the workplace.”
Liz Pavese, Ph.D.
Principal Business Psychologist
Workday
When looking at Gen X, Gen Y, and Gen Z scores around meaningful work, accomplishment, and job significance, Gen X scores the highest.
This doesn’t mean Gen Z is less engaged by purpose; however, it does mean that their experiences with these drivers has been limited, likely due to lack of visibility or autonomy from being earlier in their career stage.
Again, this is about stage, not generation. More tenured employees are often better positioned to connect their work to broader impact, given their levels of experience, connections built across the organization, confidence in their professional identities, and skill sets.
The adage goes, life is the best teacher—it's actually lived experiences, and in this case it's employees' experiences that are the true teacher for HR and senior leaders.
The message is clear: Much of what’s called a “generational difference” is actually a life-stage or career-stage need.
A Gen Z employee today wants mentorship, purpose, and opportunity—just like a Gen X employee likely did when they were starting out. The key difference isn’t that one generation values something more than another, but rather, how those needs are experienced by each individual employee.
Much of what’s called a “generational difference” is actually a life-stage or career-stage need.
By anchoring engagement strategies in human-centered design and avoiding divisive generational narratives, companies can create more inclusive, effective, and future-ready workplaces. Not to mention, they can scale easier based on the drivers that are the most important to their workforce.
Goodbye generational stereotypes, hello data-backed drivers.
Top talent is at risk: 75% of industries currently show an increase in high-potential voluntary turnover. Understand the potential market impact and strategies to retain your strongest performers in this Workday report.
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