Managing people means managing generations. Today's workplace can find up to four generations working side by side.

There are benefits and challenges to managing not only individual diversity, but generational differences. As long as supervisors and managers understand and embrace the differences of the four generations, it can be a smooth operating workplace.

The four generations are:

3 Traditionalists, born around 1923: They built many of the systems we now work with.

3 Baby boomers, born around 1943-44 to the early '60s: They tend to identify themselves by their job.

3 Generation X, born in the early 1960s to 1980: They want to move up, or move into a better situation.

3 Millennials or Generation Y, born since 1980: they tend to work in a way That's meaningful to them.

Today, Tribune reporter Crystal R. Reid explores how generational diversity works and sometimes doesn't work. Her story and column appear on Page 1B of the Tribune.