If you do not mention the myth connected with "senior" or "elder engineers" as a group of more or less "difficult" human beings the question remains: What should I do as a leader of a project with older employees to manage a project team successfully? What do they (the older ones) have what we (the young ones) don't have? The situation can be described in one word: paradoxical! The same company looking desperately for young engineers is trying to get rid of the older ones aged over 55. What does not sound very funny looking at the demographic development, still turns out to be a personal disaster for those over 50, for the companies a perhaps dangerous, expensive loss of know how...and even well known as a phenomena throughout Germany. You should think that this is producing an enormous counter-movement, but far from it! The reality looks sobering! The praises of the "older ones" turn out to be drivelling speeches of those who by themselves will stay in the job until they are 65, 70 years old or even older. And the young ones?! They are beginning to move (to Great Britain or India for example). This article is a plea for getting back to normality mana-ging projects with older ones by younger project leaders and vice versa.
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