Is your company having difficulties attracting and retaining millennial talent? Apply these tactics to avoid the turnover trap.
“Millennials don’t want to be managed, they like to be led, coached and mentored. This generation is on fire and ready to go. Are you ready to change the world?”
Millennials now make up the majority of the workforce. They’re the most sought-after target market and companies worldwide are investing in attracting and retaining their talent. Although there are countless stereotypes about this generation of tech-savvy individuals, their desirable traits make them incredibly hirable.
But why are they so in-demand? To start, they’re the most educated generation to enter the workforce. They can open the door to innovative thinking, can work side by side with others, and can be a company’s social media megaphone.
Surveys show that millennials value various other things besides money and will not sacrifice their quality of life for a company that doesn’t meet their needs. The companies that wish to attract millennial talent must stop barking up the wrong tree and start keeping up with the evolving workplace. Here’s how:
1. A Positive Company Culture
“You can have all the right strategy in the world; if you don’t have the right culture, you’re dead.”
You may wonder, what is positive company culture? It’s when your employees wake up in the morning looking forward to coming to work. They’re having a great time at the workplace, love spending time with their colleagues, and enjoy the overall ambiance. A company with a positive culture engages and motivates its employees, adds challenges to their existing roles, enables open communication, and is interested in employee feedback.
The Best Places to Work see so much success because they have incorporated a positive company culture into their brand. This is what millennials place a great value on and are looking for when searching for a job. Apart from attracting and retaining millennial talent, positive company culture will give your company a competitive edge, increase employee satisfaction, and lead to higher rates of productivity.
So when you see your employees laughing, going out with workplace friends for lunch, and helping plan the next company event, know that you have created a positive company culture where everyone flourishes and thrives.
2. Corporate Social Responsibility
Does your company have a social conscience? Does it give back to the community? If you wish to attract millennial talent, you should be socially responsible. While volunteering is the most common way to make a change to society, social responsibility can take many other forms:
- Fundraising
- Sustainability
- Employee resource groups and inclusion initiatives
According to this report, the following issues are on top of millennials’ minds nowadays:
- Civil Rights/Racial Discrimination: 29%
- Employment/Job Creation: 26%
- Healthcare Reform: 26%
- Climate Change: 21%
If you wish to build a company any millennial can feel proud working for, you should start advertising the many ways you give back, either by helping those less fortunate or by minimizing environmental impact. It’s important for a company to show sincere support rather than stay indifferent or use social responsibility as a ploy. This is key to capturing and maintaining interest and building a long-term relationship with millennials.
3. Work/Life Balanced Workplace
“You can’t do a good job if your job is all you do.”
Millennials’ lives are filled with diverse activities. From staying active and going to the movies to enjoying time with family, their schedules are packed. Millennials are not fond of working 60 hours a week like the Baby Boomers, nor they are lazy. Their ideal workplace is the one that allows them to grow professionally and to have time for their other passions in life.
The policies, values, and expectations of your workplace should support employees in their work/life balance. You can achieve this by offering a flexible work schedule as this is a cornerstone of work/life balance. What’s more, you should offer paid time off in addition to paid sick leave, paid personal days, and paid vacation. Your employees can use this time as a vacation, personal or family illness, doctor appointments, school, volunteerism, and other activities of their choice.
Every company should promote a healthy work/life balance as studies have shown that employees who have a positive work/life balance do a better job at work. Once your company becomes reputable for encouraging work/life balance, it will draw a valuable pool of millennial talent.
4. Professional Growth Opportunities
Although the desire to grow professionally is not exclusive to millennials, it’s a high priority when it comes to their career. According to Gallup’s report in 2016, millennials value development more than other generations do. This is a top factor in retaining this workforce with 87% of them rating professional or career growth and development opportunities as extremely important when applying for a job.
They have a strong desire to enhance their skills and further their careers and want their work to have meaning. From mentorship programs and online courses to managing a project or planning an event, professional development can take many forms. Millennials don’t like it when their careers stagnate and are not afraid to leave their jobs.
The key to attracting and retaining millennial talent is finding ways to invest in their futures, advancing their skills, and mentoring them to become the best workers they can be, starting today.
5. Creative Work Benefits
According to JobVite, many companies today offer benefits that go beyond the normal health and financial benefit products that are standard in workplaces. There are many non-traditional benefits that attract millennials, including cooking classes, wine-tasting classes, tickets to a local theatre production, or mentoring and development programs. Many companies today also offer on-site wellness services like chair massages, meditation sessions, and yoga instruction, as well as free healthy snacks, de-stress zones, and fitness rooms.
Millennials enjoy being part of a company that cares for their wellbeing and respond well to these benefits. Companies who will provide these benefits will fare much better than those who will stick to the traditional 40-hour workweeks with strict schedules and no option to work from home.
Start Attracting and Retaining Millennial Talent Today
As the millennial workforce grows to dominate the workplace of the future, it’s essential that companies worldwide apply these strategies and tactics. Even if your company doesn’t currently have a culture of social responsibility or professional growth opportunities, the good news is that this is easy to create. Only those companies that will understand what millennials crave will avoid the turnover trap. Will you be one of them?
Do you have any other tips for attracting and retaining millennial talent? If so, please tell us in the comments below. We would love to hear your thoughts on the matter.
