Demographic influence on leadership style: A study among gen Y and gen X employees at cocoa research centre and development Sarawak/Nur Hassanah Hipni

For the first time in history, three different generations have to work together under one roof and they are known as Baby Boomers, Generation X (Gen X) and Generation Y (Gen Y). According to Tanika, (2012), the demographics of the workforce are changing, and leaders might manage up to three different generations at once, each with drastically different characteristics. Each of them has different attitude, behaviour and work-related belief. Since there is many Gen Y entering the work place, the leaders are likely to be required to deal with different generational cohort that appear to exist among the employees in the organization. Based on the research topic, core objective in doing this research paper is to identify what kind of leadership style preferred by Generation Y and Generation X in order to have an effective leadership in the organization. There are numbers of leadership traits such as honest, inspiring, forward looking, competent, intelligent, charismatic and etc. that will later ‘influence’ to the leadership style of the leader. Therefore, this study will be conduct at Cocoa Research Centre and Development Sarawak in order to know what do Gen Y’ers & Gen X’ers employees like or dislike with regard to their leader in the organization.