Integration of millennial employees at work is inevitable, is your workplace ‘millennial ready’?
Fast food eating, tech loving, and slang speaking generation – these are the Millennials and in less than 5 years, millennials would be making up more than 50% of the workforce.
So what would happen when these millennials have to co-exist with their older, more conservative counterparts at workplaces? There is an obvious generational gap which may lead to challenges ranging from misinterpreted pop culture references to incoherent working styles and cultures. As the integration of opposing mind sets at workplace is inevitable, it is important to understand how to cohesively bring them together and understand how millennials work differently and how to adapt the organisations to create ‘millennial friendly’ work environments. In the last few years, businesses slowly but surely began to recognise the factors that drive millennials and make them stick around for longer.
THEY ARE WILLING TO WORK HARD AND SMART BUT WOULD GET DEMOTIVATED IF THEY DO NOT SEE THE IMPACT AND RESULT OF THEIR EFFORTS.
Some of the make or break elements of a workplace for millennials include:
Growth Opportunities
Career progression is of high priority to millennials. Being the fast paced generation, with need for instant gratification, they also expect to climb the corporate ladder rapidly and not to remain stagnant. They are willing to work hard and smart but would get demotivated if they do not see the impact and result of their efforts. Neither job security nor large salary package can drive millennial employees as much as career growth and personal development. They want to feel valued and have their efforts appreciated as well as know that their time is not being wasted in a restricted job.
Flexibility
Millennials really value flexibility, they do not work well with constraints and restrictions. Millennials appreciate being trusted and given space to be creative. They are also tend to resist restrictions or regulations that do not make sense to them, telling them “this is just how it has always been done” is not going to be taken well. A healthy work-life balance that would enable them to invest time in things they are passionate about is also an important criteria. This is why many millennials in creative fields prefer to be self-employed or freelance as it allows them to work on their terms rather than having their creative process limited.
BUT VERY FEW TEND TO REALISE THAT THESE YOUNG PEOPLE ARE NOT ONLY A GROWING CUSTOMER SEGMENT BUT ALSO THEIR POTENTIAL TALENT POOL.
Employer Branding
“You are what you do” highly resonates with millennials when it comes to career and employment choices. They want to feel pride and ownership in what they do and who they work for and tend to gravitate towards organisations that match their own personal values. But with a lot of companies focusing on ‘what’ it is that they are providing their customers, they forget to pay attention to ‘why’ they do so and why someone else should join in on their efforts. Contrary to popular belief of millennials being individualistic, want their work to have a purpose, to contribute something to their societies.
Autonomy
Micromanaging is not something you’d want to do to your millennial employees. Despite, being young and relatively less experienced, millennials want to be treated as equals and valued at a workplace. They want to feel like they are valuable to the team rather than an accessory. This is not say that they are ‘know it alls’’, however, they tend to learn by doing and want to be engaged in the bigger picture and direction that organisation is going towards. They also tend to be more productive in autonomous environments.
Though lately many major brands have discovered a rather ‘young’ market segment to target their products and services towards, saturating every social media platform available and hoping on viral trends all in efforts to get in with the youth. But very few tend to realise that these young people are not only a growing customer segment but also their potential talent pool. Hence, it is now more than ever that businesses need to be able to attract and retain young talent.
