Generational stereotypes persist in companies: young people are said to be less committed and seniors resistant to change, yet these myths do not reflect the reality on the ground.
The challenge for companies is to organise cooperation between generations by valuing the working methods that each brings.
Age alone is not enough to define employees' expectations: background, experience or personal culture also influence the way people work.
Young people no longer want to work, seniors are overwhelmed by new technologies... These preconceived ideas make their way into Luxembourg companies, often creating a divide between generations. This was the subject of a conference recently organised by PwC Luxembourg.
Entitled "Bridging generations at work: myths, realities, and what really works", the event aimed to highlight the links between the multiple age groups in the workplace. "Getting to know the different generations better is essential to building trust within a team," says Christelle Crépin, head of the Seeking Age and Generational Empathy (SAGE) programme at PwC. She advocates a "respectful and inclusive" working environment for all employees: "The question is not which generation is right or wrong. The aim is above all to understand how to work together in the best possible way."
This question is all the more important in Luxembourg, where more than 170 nationalities coexist, along with four or even five generations. And the clichés about each of them fly around in open-plan offices.
For example, the myth that seniors are resistant to change wrongly persists. "They have experienced many digital transitions, such as the shift from fax to email, or the arrival of the internet," illustrate Cristina Ioana Olariu and Caroline Smolinski, HR managers at PwC. Generation Z, which includes employees born between 1997 and 2012, is sometimes described as impatient. "A more accurate way of putting it would be to say that these workers test, adjust, fail, and try again. This directly refers to rapid and adaptive learning, which is a strength."
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Founder of the Institut Citoyen in Paris, Anaïs Abchar has long studied this generational gap in the professional sphere. According to her and her colleague Sara Camacho, young people are not less engaged. "They are simply engaged differently," they insist.
According to a study by Deloitte published in 2025, 89% of Generation Z and 92% of millennials consider meaning at work as an essential factor in professional satisfaction and well-being. "The challenge for companies is no longer to attract talent. On the contrary, the challenge is knowing how to retain them and make them feel useful." Beyond the search for meaning, intergenerational cohabitation also implies knowledge transfer. A subject raised by Alexa Fauth, Digital Learning Officer at Foyer, during the round table: "Within our group, more experienced people share their knowledge with younger ones, namely interns and student workers. This transfer is central to us," she explains.
"Who is junior in your organisation? Is it a recent graduate entering the job market or a 30-year-old? Everything is relative."
Beyond skills transfer, the challenge is also to overcome certain age-related stereotypes. For Alexa Fauth, misunderstandings between generations often stem more from form than substance. "We often hear this statement: 'We don't share the same values.' But this sentence is not really about values. It refers more to the way in which they are expressed."
Expectations are actually similar from one generation to the next, even if the codes differ. Some people favour direct communication, while others adopt a more diplomatic approach: "When we put everyone's requests down on paper, we realise that generations all think the same thing; we are not so different." "Moreover, a generation covers a set of criteria and goes beyond age alone," adds Ann De Jonghe, Human Resources Director at Sodexo. "Who is junior in your organisation? Is it a recent graduate entering the job market or a 30-year-old? Everything is relative."
Ultimately, for Christelle Crépin at PwC, every company faces the same generational challenges. "Our event revealed that there are different ways of finding solutions. It is about hearing them and adapting them to your company."
Beyond age differences, companies must above all create spaces for dialogue and adapt their management practices. In a job market as international and diverse as Luxembourg's, intergenerational cooperation appears less as a challenge to be solved than as an opportunity to be structured. Provided stereotypes are overcome, this diversity can become a genuine lever for knowledge transfer, innovation and team cohesion.
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