Stop Labeling Coworkers And Start Leading People

The fastest way to misunderstand your team is to label them first. We start with a story about a legendary English teacher who used to mark “WBG” for Wild Blatant Generalization, then we bring that same red pen to one of the most common workplace shortcuts: “Boomers are like this,” “Millennials want that,” “Gen Z won’t do this.”

From there, we dig into what’s actually useful when you’re managing multigenerational teams. Yes, formative events and technology shifts can shape how people see the world, but we argue that “generation” is a messy proxy for something more real: personal experience, life stage, and the environment you grew up in. Scott compares generational talk to the Predictive Index and other personality assessments, where preferences can be helpful data but become harmful the moment we treat them as destiny or an excuse not to grow.

We also get into the nature versus nurture debate, why stereotypes can quietly diminish individuality, and how leaders can build a healthier workplace culture by staying curious about the person in front of them. If you care about leadership, employee engagement, inclusion, and reducing bias at work, this one will sharpen how you think and how you talk.

Transcript

Karman 0:30

Good morning, Tammy and Scott.

Speaker 2 0:34

Good morning, Karman.

Scott 0:36

Yo, yo, yo, Karman. What's up? Scott's back.

Karman 0:44

What's up, dog? I remember we teased Scott last week for being a little flat as we got started, but clearly he's had me.

Scott 0:52

I I was just acting like the world.

Tammy 0:55

Flat?

Scott 0:57

The world is flat.

Tammy 1:00

Yeah. Little conspiracy theory there.

Scott 1:02

Yeah, yeah. Like my singing, it's a little flat.

Karman 1:09

I don't know. I've never heard you sing, Scott.

Scott 1:13

Nor probably will you.

Karman 1:15

Now I'm curious.

Tammy 1:17

Me too. Yeah. What what would Beth say?

Scott 1:22

And Ben, we are the singers in our family.

Tammy 1:25

So Beth does sing, right? And Beth. Okay. And Ben sings. Okay. So they would they would be like, Dad?

Scott 1:33

I don't know. I don't. I'm trying to remember if I don't know that I've ever really sung in front of anyone. Wow. So you don't really know if you can. Oh, I'm sure I can.

Karman 1:44

Well, did we just find someone that is the thing? Things he's not good at.

Scott 1:49

Everyone can sing. Everyone can. It's just whether or not they're any good.

Karman 1:54

Okay, so like, why don't you sing for us?

Scott 1:57

What's the topic today Karman?

Karman 1:59

Uh, wild blatant generalizations. Oh wow, Scott.

Tammy 2:07

This is something Scott's saying he he is not good at.

Scott 2:10

I honestly don't know if I'm good at. I just, I just don't.

Speaker 3 2:14

Well, you know, I went to college as a vocal major, so like let us hear it and I'll tell you.

Karman 2:19

Just sing on on May 6th. It'll be just past my birthday. So sing me a little happy birthday moment.

Scott 2:27

You know, how about when we podcast on your birthday? I'll sing happy birthday to you. When we podcast, we have podcast, we have podcasts scheduled on your birthday because you said.

Karman 2:36

Oh, yeah. I said I'm willing to do that.

Scott 2:40

And then I said a time, and you said, You want me to get up at what time on my birthday?

Tammy 2:46

Okay, he made a promise. So he's going to sing on that particular day. And if I know Scott, he's going to start practicing.

Karman 2:57

Not this, because it it doesn't bring him any joy, apparently. But we'll maybe, maybe once you try it, it'll bring you some joy.

Scott 3:08

Yeah. I'm going to sing it.

Karman 3:09

Really talented.

Scott 3:11

And you know what? I'm going to sing happy birthday like Marilyn Monroe.

Tammy 3:15

Oh. A sexy one?

Karman 3:18

Remind you not to eat before podcast day that day.

Tammy 3:21

Because I've never seen Scott in any way, shape, or form like put on a sexy persona. So I just can't even imagine it.

Scott 3:29

Well, and here's the thing: I have so much aura, I don't need to.

Tammy 3:33

Oh, million aura points taken away right there. When you brag about your aura, it's all gone. That's it. No aura points for Scott.

Scott 3:44

I'm an aura black hole. When I walk into a room, it sucks all the aura points out.

A Teacher’s Red Pen Warning

Speaker 2 3:49

Right now, that is true. All right. All right. Down to business.

Scott 3:55

And 90% of our listeners are like, what the hell are they talking about?

Karman 4:00

Last week I saw in the paper that my high school English teacher, Mrs. Bazard, has left this world. And there are many gifts that I got from Mrs. Bazard. One of them being her willingness to call out in essays and in writing when somebody would make a wild blatant generalization. And one of the worst things you could get on your paper back from her was a big red WBG next to something that you had written, standing for wild blatant generalization.

Scott 4:40

Wow. And this was a fourth grade teacher?

Karman 4:43

No, high school.

Scott 4:45

Okay, sorry. I I don't know why I was like, I was thinking those are really big words for fourth graders.

Karman 4:50

How the hell do they know that was super advanced elementary school, Scott?

Scott 4:55

Okay, and I believe Karman, I absolutely believe that.

Tammy 4:59

You know, no, here's here's the weird thing. My husband and Karman went to the same school. Same school. So that was something we found out after Karman and I started working together. I didn't actually know that when Karman came and was started to be part of our family, right? Second thing, Mrs. Bazaar was Michael's favorite teacher of all time. He's told me Mrs. Bazaar's stories since we met. And like he had this, like she had this huge impact on him too. So isn't that like right? And and I think sometimes people don't know the impacts that we've had. Michael took the time to write her a letter within the last two years to let her know because we talked about like sometimes we don't tell these people how important that they were in my life. But how cool that you brought her name up today and that you're using this as an example. And I I, of course, I'm gonna have to like go tell Michael as soon as I'm like, well, honey, the coolest thing happened today. So, all right, so Mrs. Bazaar, why generalizations keep going?

Scott 6:00

And it's very bizarre that the two of you have the same favorite teacher.

Tammy 6:04

Bizarre, Bizarre, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's dropping the mic because he thinks he's really witty. Oh, it's clever, yeah. He's over there clever, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 3 6:14

And well, it was a small back to Scott's ego again. Genius, but it's a small school, right?

Tammy 6:20

Yeah, yeah. But you guys had really like had the opportunity to really get to know your teachers too, which is kind of a cool thing in a small school. So, but anyway, keep going.

Karman 6:31

So a second ago, uh one of you used the word generation instead of generalization, and that is literally what I what I'm bringing here this morning. Whenever somebody talks to me about generational problems in the workplace, my WBG alert goes off. And and I think, are we generalizing about whole groups of people here in a way that is not true? So, my my real question for you guys today is Is that bigotry? What whole kind of sorry keep going? What's your question? My question, like, what are the facts and fiction behind generational work, uh, working with multiple generations in in the workplace? Facts and fiction. What's true and what's not true about those differences?

Scott 7:29

So you know what? I'll I'll just say it. I have believed for many years that this whole generational thing is a little bit of bullshit.

Karman 7:41

WBG. Um blatant generalization.

Scott 7:44

Well, and and again, do I think do I think when you look at it and you say, hey, I've always appreciated the stuff before when we say, oh, this generation believes this, this, this, and you and you map it backwards to like what went on in that generation.

Speaker 3 8:00

Yeah. So to feed that.

Scott 8:01

Like, I think some of those are fair, reasonable. And to me, what it reminds me of is PI. So when we look at predictive index, you take that assessment, you get a profile. And that profile, how I've been talking about it, and especially recently, is those are your preferences. If the world revolved around you and the world succumbed to your you know, preference behaviors and your needs, like the world would be easy for you. The reality is that isn't the world, and so we all have to flux a little bit. And for me to say, oh, because you're a maverick, a guardian, a captain, or whatever your pattern is, therefore you're locked in and never shall vow, is unreasonable and unfair, and frankly, kind of shitty.

Tammy 8:52

Well, it's also limiting, like you're limiting yourself and saying, I can't grow, I can't change, I can't adapt, I can't learn. And you know, we're in the the come more business. So, you know, when someone tries that thing that says, I can't because this is who I am, and I'm I'm stuck, I'm like, get over yourself. This is, you know, a baseline, but you've come a long ways. And if we go back to that generational thing, yeah, it's true. You know, if if a formative year for you was when the towers came down in New York, there are certain things that happened in that time period that helped form the way you see the world, right? If you were someone who, in your formative years, you know, watched uh a man land on the moon, right? For the very first time, that forms some of the things in the world that you believed, right? So, yes, there are things that happen in and around you that help form you, but it comes back to nature versus nurture kind of conversations, which we've been debating nature and nurture for years. And the fact of the matter is we're probably formed by both those things. Who we who like, you know, the human being that is born, and then what happens in the world that they get put into ends up helping form that human being. And so, yes, different generations have different skill sets, different generations have different experiences that formed the way that they see things.

Nature Versus Nurture And The Clone Test

Scott 10:26

However, and and uh here's what to me, I would just move it out of generations and just say people. So to me, it has nothing to do with generations, gender, right, uh sexual preference, race, religion. It just is all of those are different experiences that we have that form a perspective of how you think, operate, and behave. Period. And as a side note, if anyone I can like I have an experiment that can put this nature versus nurture to rest, period, period, period. So you know, if anyone wants to know that we mean we can do a whole podcast, like we can have a whole conversation about this. I know how to solve this question and just put it to rest, period.

Tammy 11:14

We've been talking about it for generations, and now Scott has a has a solution.

Scott 11:18

I've had the solution for years. We are back to Scott's ego. Very, very simple.

Tammy 11:26

Do you want to share it or do we need a whole nother podcast for that?

Scott 11:29

No, it's actually really simple. We just clone 20 babies and we put them at different places across the planet, and then we bring them back together when they're about 18 years old, and we just see, and we're gonna know right away.

Life Stage Shapes Confidence Over Time

Tammy 11:45

Well, actually, I will say what's interesting about that is that we have cloned animals and the animals don't have the same personalities, correct? Right, so that that piece is in that spot, so yeah, that's in that place right now. Set that aside for just because that's not what we're here to talk about. You know, this thing, I'm gonna go back to this word experiences, our experiences shape us, and there are some interesting trends that we can look at that do have something to do with age. Okay. So when I was 16, I pretty much knew everything. True, right? I mean, what it was like somebody would do something, I'm like, here's the answer. And I continued to kind of have that perspective for a while into my 20s, where I really felt like I'd watch my bosses, I'm like, they're doing that wrong. All they have to do is fill in the blank. Okay. Well, now let's kind of fast forward through the years. In my teens and my 20s, I thought I knew everything. In my 30s, I started to recognize that other people knew stuff and that I should maybe pay attention. And as I have gone through, you know, decades of my life, you start to really understand how little you actually know for a fact. How little you are, you know, like I'm skilled over maybe in this area, but look at all of these other areas that I am not skilled at, and I shouldn't really have an opinion in that space because I don't know enough. And that is not generational between baby boomers and millennials. That's generational in terms of personal growth over time. Because those millennials, which that was the big one, the first one when we started to call millennials names. You know, they don't have a work ethic, they want everything now. I hate to tell you that. That's probably what my bosses were saying about me when I was 20.

Karman 13:54

Because it's life stage, not generation.

Tammy 13:59

I think that's true. I mean, I thought I knew everything when I came into the workforce, right? And I did not work as hard as my the executives who ran those businesses at that particular time period, right? And I mean, I was like, hey, I put in my time, you know, eight hours, it's time for me to go, right? I mean, and and I'm a very driven human being. So the that drive didn't come later in life, it was even there, but I didn't understand as much. So, yeah, it's like a time of life, it's not the year that I was born, right? And I think that's one of the things. If if we just look at just those two examples alone, I think every new generation coming into the workforce is going to be judged by an older generation that's in the workforce, and they're gonna say, they're not doing it right. And they're gonna say, you're not doing it right because you're not doing it the way that I am doing it at 60. And that young generation is gonna look at that older generation and say, gosh, those guys are set in their ways. Gosh, they won't try new things. Gosh, they're not willing to learn uh, you know, new technology, because reality is that there are some lessons that we've learned that we think we shouldn't try that because we've tried that before. And by the way, I am 65 and I'm not sure I want to learn all the new technology. And is that generational? No, I think it's because I'm 65. So I mean, I do, Scott, I think your first statement. I'm not sure that this whole thing about boomers, Gen X, millennials, I I'm not, I think it's BS.

Scott 15:45

And I think I think it's okay to look at like what are the what are the what are the formative years of a generation, what was happening in those years that might influence, but to me, that's all back to experience. What is that experience? And and then you just look at it and say, well, that might be true for this this class or this country, because you think about okay, I'm I'm a Gen X. I grew up, I would say we are pretty traditional middle class family. We were not wealthy by any means. We never went without food, clothing, shelter, right? So, and I think of yeah, I had all these different experiences growing up. Now, we had a rule at the house. If I wanted a car, I had to save enough money to buy my own car, and I had to prove to dad that I could do all the work on the car. Okay. And so, yes, I can tear down an engine and rebuild it if necessary.

Speaker 2 16:53

Thank God my dad didn't make me do that. I still wouldn't be driving to that.

Scott 16:57

I will also say my sisters didn't have to do that, which is bullshit, but that's a whole nother conversation. Okay. Now you fast forward, like, I didn't we didn't make our kids learn maintenance. I can remember when when our oldest called and said, Hey dad, I have a flat, and my response to him was cool, change it. And he said, Well, I don't know how.

Tammy 17:16

And I'm like, Shit, I forgot to teach him that.

Scott 17:20

I like, I like, and and so, right, and you just think of the all of those experiences now. Versus you think, oh, someone might there's probably someone born the same day, the same year that I am in a whole nother country. Yeah, yeah, or whole other country, a metropolitan area who hey, they struggled, they were food insecure, or what like all those things, the what shaped and molded them is super different, let alone another country, let alone. So you just I mean, to me, it is I think it's yeah, we can look at what formed. There's some generalities. We might think, oh, you experienced that, or if you were born 2013 to 2025, generation alpha, okay, they will grow up with AI as a baseline. Think about that. So just think music, okay. Just think music with the three of us. It was albums, eight tracks, cassettes, CDs, mp3s, and now everything basically is digital. Now we could say it's an MP3, but at the end of the day, who download? I mean, now, yeah, some people still listen to LPs, and like that's coming back because it's it's more tuned to your ear, etc. etc. But we've gone through six iterations of music in our lifetime. Generation alpha, what will change? Now I don't even know, but it will it will probably always be digital for them.

Tammy 18:51

Maybe a different digital delivery system for all of them.

Lead Individuals Not Stereotypes

Scott 18:54

Yeah, maybe a different delivery system, right? And so you think of all of these, all of these changes and things are gonna form how we see the world. And at the end of the day, I can never imagine myself saying, Oh, think Tammy, just think about in our team, how many generations do we have? Are we leading differently because so-and-so is in this generation? I'm not. I'm not. I'm gonna look at who is that person, what's their PI, what's their experience, and how do I work with them as an individual to maximize their performance and growth?

Tammy 19:29

See, I think what you just said is really important. When we generalize a group of people based upon some kind of commonality, we are actually diminishing their individuality. And when we diminish an in person as an individual, they don't see, they they don't feel seen and heard and appreciated. And we, for whatever reason, do this all the time. And by the way, we know why, it makes it easier for our brains, right? Brain, our brains like to categorize, our brains like to put things in groupings, and so that's it makes us easier for us to go from here to there in terms of understanding and and um you know, like coming to a conclusion about what we're experiencing, but that thing actually is ugly, right? And that is what we have had, that's what the entire civil rights movement in this country was about. It's like, wait a minute, I am a human and I'm a human individual. And we as a country continue to make these mistakes where we generalize human beings. Guys, I can't make a big difference at the national level, but I certainly can make a difference in my department, inside of my company, and with my teammates. And I don't have to look at these generalizations and say, yes, that's what these people are. I can look and say, this is who Scott is, this is who Karman is, this is who Marlene is, this is who Tori is. We can look at all the people that we are touching and get to know those individuals and then be part of the process of helping them understand how they add value to the world for us and to find other ways to continue to have them add value because that's what each of us wants to do, make a difference. And that's not done as a group, that is done one by one by one.