Gen Xers Overlooked for Job Promotions

By:

Peter Urban,

At a time when members of Generation X should be in the peak stage of their careers and advancing rapidly, new data show they are being overlooked for promotions at higher rates than their

counterparts in other generations.

In the past five years, 66 percent of Gen X leaders received only one promotion or none at all. But 58 percent of boomers, by contrast, were likely to have received two or more promotions

during the same period.

Gen Xers, on average, received only 1.2 promotions in the past five years with their company, compared with an average of 1.6 for millennials and 1.4 promotions for boomers, according to

data from 25,000 leaders across industries and regions collected by Development Dimensions International (DDI), the Conference Board and Ernst & Young.

Stephanie Neal, director of the Center for Analytics and Behavioral Research at leadership consulting firm DDI, suggested that Gen Xers’ “unambitious reputation may be holding them back in

the workplace” — making them the “leapfrog” generation — although, like other generations before them, they have adopted a stronger affiliation for stability and tradition as they’ve aged

and had children.

In 2018, about a half million more baby boomers were alive than millennials, but because baby boomers are older and dying at greater rates, millennials are expected to become the dominant

generation sometime in 2019.

Writing in the Harvard Business Review, Neal observed that Gen Xers may also be getting short shrift because boomers are delaying retirement due to money concerns and the ever-increasing

cost of health care.

Older workers are not only holding onto their jobs for longer but are still trying to advance themselves into higher-paying positions, she said.