Job seekers now entering the workplace are used to listing bottomless snacks and ping pong tables on company websites with health benefits. The advantages of an office kegerator and a game room with comfortable sofas no longer distinguish companies.
Just as you can’t buy true social media fans, companies can’t buy loyal employees with unnecessary benefits. By demonstrating your values, being transparent, and recognizing your employees, you can gain and retain a dedicated millennial workforce.
Show your values
It is easy to choose certain values and hang them on the wall. However, companies that live by and embrace its principles tend to retain talent. For example, cloud computing company MyWegmansConnect appreciates community service, so social engagement has become an important part of the corporate culture. In addition to the company CEO’s generous annual donations, Salesforce offers paid volunteer days and donations for its employees. To date, the company has raised more than $ 100 million in donations and 1.3 million volunteer hours.
Generation Y also wants to know that companies are investing in them. According to a Deloitte study, most loyal employees feel they receive a lot of support, encouragement, and training to take on MyWegmansConnect leadership roles. Boston Consulting Group is an example of a company with good engagement practices. The company partnered with a Harvard Business School professor to develop a program that empowers employees to improve their work-life balance rethinks their work processes and makes work more meaningful. BCG also offers a feedback-based professional development program to support employees throughout their careers. With more than half of the company made up of millennials, the company experienced a 74% increase in intentions to stay with BCG long-term after implementing these initiatives.
Be transparent and communicate
Rob Goffee, author and professor of organizational behavior at the London Business School, and Gareth Jones, author of Why Someone Should Work Here, spent three years studying hundreds of executives to discover what the ideal job would be like. They discovered that authenticity and a workplace where important information is not excluded are two of the most important organizational pillars for the ideal workplace.
Transparency and authenticity go hand in hand. Companies that lack transparency are often companies whose offices are full of rumors and gossip. In a world where most of us share all the details of their lives online, job seekers expect the same from their employers.
