By Dominique Nally, HR Consultant
My son, who is 17, recently commented that a 35-year-old was ‘ancient’. Do you remember thinking the same when you were his age? I might not have known what I wanted to do then, but I thought I’d have my career sorted by the time I reached 30. I entered the world of HR at 28, after my first career trajectory had me recruiting and line managing a large team in a 4-star hotel. I enjoyed training staff and working to help them develop their skills.
Fast forward a few years (ok, many) and it has me pondering the differences between the generations and what motivates them.
Millennials and Gen Z will represent about 58% of the global workforce by 2030; and Gen Z specifically will represent 27% of the global workforce by 2025*. The future of work is Gen Z.
We need to understand their priorities when it comes to the world of work, and their aspirations if businesses are to attract and retain this pool of talent.
* https://www.deloitte.com/global/en/issues/work/content/genzmillennialsurvey.html
1 – Meet the generations
Even within each generation, personalities, preferences and motivations will differ. Below are some examples of potential traits you might consider when devising or reviewing a recruitment or reward strategy, but it is always a cautionary tale. The best way to know what would work is to ask your workforce!
2 – Recruiting across the generations
The key is to keep it varied and remember what all generations aspire to. Here are examples of what would work well.
3. Attracting Gen Z talent
- If you want to attract Gen Z, offer video interviews, to show that you are remote-friendly.
- Candidates are far more aware of culture now and of what they don’t want. They are far more likely to search your organisation online to seek reviews from customers (B2C) as well as from past and present employees. Google reviews and Glassdoor are such platforms – do you know what people are saying about your company online?
- Learning isn’t a perk to Gen Z; it’s a given that you will offer personal development opportunities, that will in turn enable them to acquire knowledge, get promoted and earn more.
- Live and breathe your equality, diversity and inclusion commitments in everything you do – Gen Z will expect this to be part of your culture. They want to work for an organisation that celebrates individuality and differences for what they bring to the team. They want to see skills rewarded, not just university degrees.
- Gen Z can shift from communication channel to communication channel at speed. This may make them less inclined to wait. Your recruitment process should be swift if you want to maintain their interest. Don’t wait weeks to let them know where they are at in the selection process; keep them informed every few days.
- Customise your messaging to fit the people you seek to attract. If you are not sure, find out who they are. They value empathy and responsiveness. It’s a two-way search: you want to reach the next wave of great talent and they are looking for the equivalent in their employer.
- Gen Z also values transparency and integrity. Regularly review your recruitment and selection processes to ensure they are as unbiased as possible and remain a well-considered approach to recruiting. Get feedback from your new joiners on how they experienced the recruitment and onboarding phase.
4 – Motivating a multi-generational workforce
Incentivising a varied workforce requires a cross-generational approach that captures what motivates each person; motivations are personal and will vary even within the same group. We are not advocating that you can absolutely capture everybody’s wishes in your reward & recognition strategy, but by understanding why people leave and what would have made them stay, you can narrow down the choices for your employee demographics and budget.
- Flexible benefits: think of it as an ‘A la carte’ menu that allows employees to choose from a range of benefits that suit their individual needs. This could include health and wellness programmes, tuition reimbursement schemes, additional holidays as a reward, or paid time off to volunteer in the community once or twice each year.
- If you offer a generous holiday allowance, buying or selling holiday can be very attractive to staff. Gen Z, and to some extent Millennials, are more likely to change jobs as often as it takes for them to find the best environment for them; offering additional benefits based on length of service may not work for these employees.
- Life time achievement awards and a gradual phased out support programme towards a ‘retirement’ date (volunteered by the individual) will be much appreciated by Baby Boomers and Gen X. But younger generations won’t wait 10 years to get an extra day’s holiday. It’s worth understanding your demographics to adjust future compensation & benefits offerings.
- Offering enhanced pay where statutory only exists can also incentivise people. For example, paid parental leave instead of unpaid or enhanced maternity/adoption/paternity leave instead of statutory rate.
- Offering additional time off for career break or study leave is also another way to fulfil the younger generations’ needs for personal development.
- On the spot rewards: quick recognition of a job well done is a way to celebrate success, achievement and keep the momentum going. Provide real-time feedback and recognition, and encourage peer-to-peer recognition (kudos).
- Encourage improvement suggestions from staff through easy-and-quick-to-use tech (the Breathe HR system is a good example) and embrace reviewing suggestions at regular times, such as monthly or quarterly; if implemented and successful, don’t forget to acknowledge in some way the person who made the suggestion.
- Flexibility and career advancement: the assumption is that career advancement is always about salary increase, but this is not always the case. Job satisfaction has evolved over the years and the emphasis in today’s workplace focuses on lateral, rapid career progression and the opportunity to explore different roles with the same organisation. Secondments are a good way to offer this. Let’s take a digital agency example: could you hire someone more junior, on the understanding that they will rotate every 3 months between backend, frontend, design, etc. (4 rotations over the first year), with a view that at the end, you agree with the individual where they would add the best value. If you buddy this junior person with more experienced staff in each rotation, it will give the latter a personal development opportunity too, especially if their career trajectory is to line manage one day.
- Mentoring and coaching: after years in the same industry, it is common to plateau. The employee might not want to leave the organisation but they feel stuck and need a new incentive to enhance their learning. By offering mentoring, internally or externally within your network, the individual can learn new approaches and offer innovative ideas again. It can also bridge the gaps between their role and the next one up. If you use external connections to help mentor, you can return the favour with their staff.
- Bonus schemes: based on individual or team input, as well as company profits, bonuses are a good way to motivate a competitive spirit. Rewarding the value that is added by an individual is going to be the way forward for many organisations who are stepping away from rewarding in a linear way.
As more companies work flexibly, in a hybrid fashion or trial a 4-day week, they are consciously moving away from rewarding presenteeism. The question at the forefront of Leadership teams now is how to measure (input) value and how to incentivise it.
5 – How to incentivise Millennials and Gen Z
- Millennials and Gen Z are well aware of the market rates for their sector and paying less than your competitors could leave you unable to recruit – don’t be the outlier.
- Support individuals at different life stages and interests with a variety of resources around budgeting and spending.
- Encourage flexible working and set clear expectations and measures for delivering value.
- Enhance parental-related entitlements if you can – return to work from maternity bonuses work well.
- Support flexible working for employees who suffer from women’s health-related conditions – think of it as rewarding loyalty.
- Budget for technology (secured of course but better and faster access from anywhere, at any time).
- Cut down on admin time by investing in CRMs and HRIS that integrate with your existing systems.
- Offer access to planning, organising and scheduling tools – such as Trello, Asana, Calendly, Goblin Tools and ClickUp (some are free, some are at a small cost).
- Offer AI training and embrace using it to generate ideas and a base to work from to deliver the finish document or presentation – free time for strategic, client-focused delivery to add value to what your business supplies.
- Promote wellbeing in a way that is flexible – it’s not just about gyms these days; it needs to include access to yoga classes, pool-based classes, arts, crafts, therapy, meditation, etc. – let the individuals choose how they want to use their wellbeing time.
- Offer employees more autonomy over how and when they work, where possible, so they have the time to do any of the above!
- If your staff work set hours, ensure they take their break times seriously – so much burnout is generated from never taking a meaningful break during the day, especially for those who work from home. Remind your staff to step away from their desk by setting calendar reminders and schedule at least one midday break into their working day.
- We’ve mentioned that Millennials and Gen Z are more likely to change employment a lot more frequently, on average, as much as every 2 to 3 years. Employers need to make more effort to make them feel valued and motivated so that they stay longer.
- Review your onboarding scheme: how do you welcome new joiners? Do you celebrate their first 30 days? How do you mark the first 90 days and successfully passing their probationary period?
6 – Vary means of communications
Use multi-channel communication methods to communicate with all generations – Teams; office posters; interactive screens work well on the floor in a sales environment; internal newsletter.
Use your comms channels to highlight reward schemes and what’s going on within your organisation. Highlight your company culture and use TikTok and Instagram to advertise careers to Gen Z.
YouTube videos are the most watched online channels – use it to promote your company, what you do, what a career with your organisation means, future pipeline and prospects, etc.
