The business world is all about fighting for top talent. The more you work on securing top talent, the more the organization’s chances of thriving increase. In the contemporary world, organizations have discovered a secret in millennials, aka Gen Y. These are people born between 1981 and 1946. Unlike the baby boomers and their counterparts, millennials are seen to be the future. Precisely, they are innovative, energetic, more educated, and willing to walk the extra mile to make a difference.
As per the 2021 stats from the World Economic Forum, 23% of the global population is made up of millennials which is also 1.8 billion people worldwide. That means that the rate at which millennials enter the workforce is increasing and tapping into their potential is essential for employers.
Other stats by TeamStage indicate that millennials will represent 75% of the global workforce by 2025. But as other generations phase out in the workforce sector globally, what have you done to secure and retain the ideal millennial talent in your organization?
If you have managed to secure the best talent, then there comes another battle of retaining it to take the business forward. Whether you’re planning to recruit millennials or facing a high millennial turnover, here are the most effective ways to put an end to it.
The 7 Crucial Methods to Retain Top Millennial Talent
- Provide the Best Onboarding Experience
As an employer or HR, you must know the difference between orientation and onboarding. Unlike orientation, employee onboarding involves activities that follow the orientation process. They are mainly undertaken to help new hires properly understand or fit in their new roles. It may include assigning a senior to the new hire for guidance, a short video tour in the case of hybrid workplaces, or inviting the new hire for lunch.
An amazing onboarding experience is like the first impression. What the new hire sees or how they feel on their first day of reporting matters a lot. It can either offer a sense of belongingness, increase interest in the job or trigger an immediate resignation. Generally, companies that invest their time in improving their onboarding process reap better in terms of employee engagement, productivity, and reduced employee turnover.
2. Provide Career Development Opportunities
Technological advancement manifests itself in every aspect of life and no one is willing to lag behind. When you show a willingness to help millennials advance career-wise, that can be a game-changer for the organization. Despite the job description or the terms of the contract, a new hire expects an employer to add value to his/her career. That can be through additional digital skillsets or mentoring.
Stats from Monster indicate that 72% of millennials value career advancement opportunities and if you focus on providing the necessary employee training, this can help you retain your top millennia talent. Precisely, discover skillset gaps to plan an effective development program or create new positions to grow employee leadership skills.
3. Offer Competitive Perks & Compensation
A good package was previously seen as the backbone of retaining the best talent, but things have quite changed. Apart from seeking remote good-paying jobs, more employees are choosing additional benefits over a pay raise, or a vibrant work environment over a good salary to stay on a job.
It’s because more things now matter to employees such as their welfare, mental health, and work flexibility among others.
With all that, look into your employee benefits program and see whether it’s attractive and convincing to your employees. Also, if you don’t have an employee benefits program, consider creating one. There are many different types of employee benefits plans that an employer can take into consideration.
By the way, these plans are affordable and will surely benefit your employees. Choose the right benefits plan and conduct a survey to understand what your employees want you to include in the program. In this way, you would have taken a reliable move to retain your top millennial talent.
4. Create a Positive Work Environment
A work environment that’s filled with trust, cooperation, and excellent interpersonal communication skills is what millennials want. They prefer to air out their opinions and instead of scrutiny that may cause mental stress among them, they expect genuine feedback that can help them grow. More so, modern workplaces are becoming more diverse in many aspects. With that, promoting inclusivity, and belongingness, and, ensuring effective communication, can provide a friendly work environment to millennials.
On the other hand, millennials believe that a good employer should be concerned about their professional and personal life as well. Precisely, they want to feel that you care beyond their office work, so focusing on employees' welfare can also help you retain top millennial talent.
5. Provide greater flexibility
Flexibility is key to tapping into a pool of millennial talent today. If your organization isn’t fully remote, a hybrid work model may be the answer to retaining top millennial talent. 2021 stats by “What To Become” indicate that 62% of millennials are considering switching to freelancing. Also, Global Talent Trends indicates that 51% of employees wish their employers offer a more flexible work option.
Precisely, millennials are looking for jobs where they are able to balance their professional and personal life. Therefore, look into your company culture to provide the necessary flexibility if you’re to retain the best talent, combat employee turnover, or lower absenteeism
6. Prioritize employee engagement
When employees are fully engaged in what they do, they tend to work wholeheartedly and may even require no supervision. But a disengaged workforce will stress the employer to the extent of questioning the company policies. Besides, the exorbitant cost of hiring new employees to set things right can’t be taken out of the picture.
As per “What To Become” 44% of millennials say that they can increase their work engagement if their managers met with them regularly. The mental and emotional connection that employees have towards their jobs is very crucial. Therefore, assess your employee engagement strategies in order to retain the best millennials.
7. Recognize & Appreciate
There is nothing more motivating to an employee than a “job well done”. It just feels like the efforts are valuable and making a positive impact on the organization. Additionally, when you recognize improvement through performance review, this can increase morale, and engagement and works best for better productivity.
Depending on the workplace culture, you can recognize millennials through a word of mouth, an employee of the month reward, or through other incentives. It can foster friendly competition in an organization and increase job satisfaction. Besides, we all love being appreciated!
Comments / 0