Challenges and Opportunities of Leading Different Generations – the Case of Slovenia

Abstract Leadership, as the most important function of management, involves dealing with people and interpersonal aspects through motivating, achieving better productivity, people’s satisfaction, a favourable working climate and a balance of effectiveness and efficiency, with the aim of achieving the organization’s goals in a changing environment. Now that in modern management the focus is on soft variables and people, their needs and desires, the question arises what are the challenges and opportunities of leading different generations in a business environment that differ from each other in their values, attitudes and behaviours? The authors will analyse the above through three components of leadership, motivation, leadership styles and communication. There are currently four generations in the working population: Baby Boomers, Generation X, Generation Y and Generation Z. If the consideration is extended to top management at the national level and to political leadership, it is expected that the challenges and opportunities of leading different generations are even more complex, because the working population is joined by the Traditionalist generation, which is retired, but also by the Alpha generation, whose entry into the working population expected in a few years. Additionally, political leadership encompasses a nation’s entire populace as well as all of its social issues in an indirect manner. In addition to generational differences, leadership is also faced with the challenge of a changing environment, which is quite unstable nowadays and thus poses an even greater challenge to leadership.