I participated in a Twitter chat about generations this week, and I will say that I was pleased with the level of the conversation. There wasn’t a lot of hype or “kids these days” statements thrown around, and while people were sensitive to the dangers of stereotyping, they didn’t throw the baby out with the bath water and adopt the “this generations stuff is useless” position either.

But I will say that in this conversation (as there is in so many like them), there is still a sense that the Millennials are a generation that “we” are going to have to deal with. We will deal with them. In this case, the “we” is a combination of Boomers and Xers. After all, Boomers and Xers have been the bulk of the workforce for a long time now. The Millennials have been getting our attention, but the Boomers and Xers have still been  80% or more of the workforce for a long time  now. We have to deal with them.

But what if the “we” in that sentence is actually the Millennials, and the “them” are the Boomers and Xers? In 2020, according to BLS projections, there will be more Millennials than either Boomers or Xers in the workforce. They’ll be the largest AND the youngest. By most accounts, the Millennials are the biggest generation in U.S. history–bigger than the boomers. They may not be as loud and confrontational as the Boomers were at that age, but there is just as much potential for revolution (more, if you ask me, in fact).

Boomers and Xers have been the “we” for several decades. We Xers may get cranky now and then that we don’t get as much voice in the “we” as we’d like (read this beautiful X rant by Laurence Hart), and we certainly remember the early 90s when we were the “them” full on, but now that we can stand along side the Boomers (where we are all managers) and look at these confounding Millennials, we are part of the “we.”

I think “we” may be at a choice point. The Boomers are now shrinking in numbers in the workforce. There is much debate about when (or whether) they will retire, but the fact remains, their numbers are not growing. Generation X is at its largest (we have been the largest generation in the workforce for some time, actually; yeah, we get it…nobody noticed), but will never enjoy the dominance that the Boomers had simply because of our numbers, not to mention our approach. And now the Millennials are going to “quietly storm” this party. They are going to become the “we” more quickly than I think the rest of us are realizing.

I think the new “we” is going to be a partnership across the three generations. I think both Boomers and Xers are going to have to adjust their expectations. Xers are never going to be “in charge” like the Boomers were, and the Boomers are going to have to come up with a much different version of what “mentoring” looks like, because they won’t be able to take on the traditional “wise elder protector of the realm” role. Do you REALLY want to manage generational differences in the workplace? Then you’d better move quickly past the “we need to communicate better” advice, and get serious about creating real partnerships.