Accommodate younger workers in your IT strategy

Many in their 20s and 30s have grown up with interactive technologies such as instant messaging, blogs, and online video. Even if your company is in a nontechnical industry, you need to understand how to make the most of these tech-savvy employees — and how to adapt your IT strategy accordingly.

In Summary:

Jim Faxon and Katie Sorohan, each in their first post-university jobs, are prime examples of next-generation employees. Faxon, 24, is an associate producer for a health-information Web site. Sorohan, also 24, manages the front office at a video post-production firm. Although they work in different industries and have never met, their attitudes about technology are identical: They consider interactive tools almost as basic and necessary as a telephone.

Faxon rarely makes a phone call when he can send an e-mail instead. Sorohan says her employer not only accepts but encourages instant messaging at the office. Both acknowledge that they use technology during the workday for both professional and personal reasons, and they insist they would never work for a company that limited their ability to do so. "Everybody knows that you use IM to talk to friends as well as colleagues, but there's no reason not to have it as long as it doesn't interfere with productivity," Sorohan says.

That point of view is almost universal among younger workers, according to Dan Rasmus, director of information worker vision at Microsoft. With less interest in rules than results, they are voracious users of e-mail and IM, blogs, and social networking sites such as MySpace (United States), Friends Reunited (United Kingdom), and Mixi (Japan). Their tendency to blur the boundaries between work and the rest of their lives can give IT managers nightmares about breached network security and compromised intellectual property.

But don't despair. You can turn their tech-savvy traits into opportunities.

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Ask them what they want, tell them what you need

When young employees evaluate potential employers, they consider freedom to communicate even more important than pay, says Samir Khan, project manager at D-Code, a Toronto-based research and strategy firm focusing on "the information age generation." This is true across industries, from high tech to finance to real estate.

At the same time, freedom to communicate can create justifiable concerns about information security. While most "information age" workers understand the need to guard against viruses and hackers, they can be careless about intellectual property. "They don't necessarily understand that while someone they trust in their social network may be able to help them solve a problem, it might not be wise to share corporate information with that person," Rasmus says.

Ultimately, employers need to establish explicit policies about the appropriate use of technology and business data, says Gregg Lemley, an employment litigation lawyer in the St. Louis office of international law firm Bryan Cave LLP. Lemley advises organizations to bar employees from using any form of interactive technology to disclose confidential information, both the company's and any third party's, or to harass anyone, sexually or otherwise, even on their own time in online spaces unrelated to work.

Beyond that, he says, the limits depend on your company's needs. Here are some possible guidelines:

Whatever restrictions you choose, make them clear and reasonable, and make sure employees know about them when they are hired, Khan says.

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Acknowledge that there are many ways to work

People who know from experience that they can chat with a friend, shop online, and listen to music at the same time apply that know-how in the workplace by juggling multiple tasks, Khan says. Other employees, on the other hand, may still believe in the adage, "Do one thing at a time and do it well." This can lead to a painful culture clash between managers who think Web 2.0 tools and IM clients are a distraction — and employees who feel they are unproductive without them.

Khan's advice: If your employees meet their responsibilities on time, on budget, and within the limits of IT policy, avoid the temptation to restrict their online use simply because it conflicts with your idea of how people should work.

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Utilize their familiarity with interactive technologies

Rasmus says he has heard too many stories of young employees who volunteered to use their technological skills to improve a process, only to be told, "That is not your job." It makes no sense to squelch initiative that could lead to competitive advantage, he points out. Instead, capture those smart ideas and put them into practice. Two places he suggests companies start:

People who spend a lot of time online eventually develop strong opinions about what technology does and doesn't work well. Encourage employees to suggest a better way to capture customer feedback, a more efficient online ordering system, or a new way to track shipping. More importantly, accept that bright ideas are not linked to seniority.

"The new generation of employees is different because they really do have new skills and ideas about global interactivity and ways to build and maintain community," Rasmus says. "Companies need to think of ways to leverage [them], and IT needs to take the lead in convincing the business side how important it is to accommodate them."

Fawn Fitter is a freelance writer in San Francisco, specializing in business and technology. She has written for publications including Fortune Small Business, Knowledge Management, and Computerworld.

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