Question

In Cultures and Organizations, Chapter 5, the following assertion is made: "[Y]oung men and women foster more technical interests (which could be considered masculine), and older men and women foster more social interests. In terms of values (but not necessarily in terms of energy and vitality), older persons are more suitable as people managers and younger persons as technical managers." Do you agree with this interpretation of the study? In one page, explain your reasons for agreeing or disagreeing. To make your point, make sure you utilize the data and findings detailed in the reading.

Answer 1

In Cultures and Organizations, the assertion made is

• Young men and women foster more technical interests (which could be considered masculine), and older men and women foster more social interests.
• In terms of values (but not necessarily in terms of energy and vitality), older persons are more suitable as people managers and younger persons as technical managers."

Yes, we do agree with this interpretation of the study.

The reasons for agreeing on the above statements are as below

• Young people are new to the world and more interest towards technology: The young people are new in their profession and they sees the great thing for them is the learning of technology or exposure to new technologies, so in order to have better career aspects, they feels technology is the best approach to explore career advancement. Hence the younger people have more interest towards the technology. Technology is the factor which attracts the new people due to high energy level and commitment on doing something special in their life.

• Old people have lot of exposure on technology and looking towards social interactions: The older people do have lot of exposure in technology and application of technology, so now with the age advancement, they had completed their interest and they now want to explore social interaction so that they can execute their family needs especially for their children social connections. Generally in old age, most of the people have lost their parents or their parents are unable to have easy travel so they need to completes their family role and responsibility in relationship management.

• Due to larger exposure and age factor, older people are more suitable for people management: Older people are suitable for people management mainly due to their larger exposure in their career and age factor which helps in easy influence of the younger people. Old people can easily influence young people due to their larger experience of life and general respect of younger people towards the old people. The older people can explore their experience can give proper direction to young people for better performance and for their career guidance.

• Young people learn new and latest technology, so better choice for technical manager: The young people have learnt new technology and have high interest towards technology so they can better execute the role for technical manager and they can extend high energy level for meeting the requirements of technical leadership.