How to Create a Millennial Friendly Culture

As recently reported in the 2016 Deloitte Millennial survey, Millennials express little loyalty to their current employers and plan to change jobs four times before the ripe old age of 32.  Being that Millennials represent an increasing share of the workforce, and a growing number now occupy senior positions, companies must deploy a strategy to engage this generation and attempt to keep them on payroll longer than a Nano-second.

In my new book, If Not You, Who? Cracking the Code of Employee Disengagement, I speak about the fact that far more vocal than Traditionalists, Baby Boomers, and Generation X, Millennials communicate their hopes, dreams, and wishes openly and honestly.  They say that they refuse to be another cog in the wheel and unlike generations before them, if you don’t give them what they need, they’ll quit.  Some people may not appreciate this honesty, but I do because you know exactly where you stand with Millennials.

So, what do they want?  Millennials want businesses to be more ethical and society-focused, and they also want to work for a company whose values are aligned with their personal values.  Notice they didn’t say they want an office dog or a ping pong table.  Therefore, companies must take this valuable feedback into account when creating their Values and Employee Engagement Strategy.

Do you conduct business with integrity, choosing right over wrong?  Are your company’s Values ones that prospective employees can align around and feel proud to call their own?  Do you have a Corporate Social Responsibility or Volunteer Program where you give back, and help the communities where your employees work and live?  If not, you have work to do.

Let’s partner, senior leaders and HR professionals, to look at your current work environment and develop a plan to create a Millennial Friendly Culture.  One where your 20-year-olds and your 60-year-olds give you a boatload of discretionary effort – the magic dust to extraordinary business results – and employee retention is your competitor’s problem.