Generational conflict in the office

Gen Xers and Baby Boomers work in, and view, the office in very different ways.
Here's a true story submitted from a Gen Xer about Gen Xers and their Boomer bosses.
Withholding his name for now, but thanks NineShifter for the story!

"Yesterday, our team (marketing, operations, programming managers) were called into ANOTHER meeting. However, this time we were in trouble for not being at our desks enough. We roam the halls too much, apparently (actually this is quite true, we do walk the halls a lot). 

"The bosses were really mad at us, and now of course, we are mad at them too. Funny thing is, nobody mentioned the record gross and net revenue we're generating this year, our business award, or the special projects award we won this year.  Just imagine what we could have done if we stayed in our seats!  So now I'm not supposed to leave my cage, I mean cubicle, for more than 10 minutes unless I'm at a meeting (very important to attend, you know) or taking my 30-minute lunch (no longer!)."

Your thoughts on generational conflict in the office. Going to get better, or worse?

Comments

[Terry Newman]

Not sure this is an entirely generational issue. It is also an institutional issue, fear of loss of control, keeping those darned employees from "stealing time" from the organization. I'm a huge proponent of working from home whenever possible but the looks I've gotten in the past when I've allowed it (actually encouraged it) were surprising given our current technology. Educational institutions are pretty behind the times when it comes to this kind of activity.

[Rich]

In a previous job in the early 1990s, another team leader and I were appointed to the task of over seeing our department after our manager had departed and the new manager hadn't arrived. Irv and I spent more that half of our days working with other members of our department assiting them - as our department members were scattered across a large cubilce farm, we were constantly walking from one cubicle to the next, talking with our department members and doing whatever we needed to do to help them do their jobs and thus were away from our desks much of the day. When the new manager arrived our department had the loweest level of open tasks since before Irv or I had arrived, with no high priority tasks. All of our development efforts were on or ahead of schedule. However, in my first meeting with my new manager, he told me that he had heard I was wasting much of my time "talking" to other team members and distracting them and I was never at my desk. He went on to say that I should consider myself on notice since I was, his term, a "disgruntled employee." Within a month, the depatment task backlog had climbed back to its historicly high levels... this is not a new issue and if we continue to use the old metrics of time in the office and "lloking" busy" the best and brightest will leave of other opportunities. Itv and I both left the department within 6 weeks and the company within a year. Today, that company is a mere shadow of its former self has it has suffered massive layouts and "down sizings."