How to Attract, Keep and Grow Millennials in your Organisation.

Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

Millennials are the foundation of future businesses, as most of the workforce forms part of this group. Many things stand out about this group, making them the most sought-after group by successful businesses.

Here are some of my thoughts on training Millennials in a company.

Millennials offer the following:

• innovative and fresh ideas
• unique skills
• high-quality education
• adaptability
• quick learning skills
• technology savvy
• good attitude

However, managers and HR responsible for hiring personnel quickly realise that finding talented millennials is easier than retaining them.

If you’re struggling to retain Millennials in your organisation, here are some business tips and approaches to help you attract, keep, and grow them.

5 Tips for Retaining Millennials

1. Create a Millennial culture.  Studies show that creating a millennial culture helps businesses save the money they would have used to replace millennials. A millennial culture in the business is a culture that aligns with the wants and needs of millennials. That may be hard to swallow for some leaders, but they should restructure their companies to create and sustain a good environment that supports the millennial mindset. With the right culture, you will not have to follow through on people’s tasks. They will automatically feel obligated and motivated to take up roles within the business. Thus, try to incorporate automation, globalisation, and new technologies.
2. Encourage internal motivation.  The beauty of employing millennials is their drive to make an impact in society and the world in general. Encouraging this drive will directly benefit your business’ influence and growth for the company. Millennials have a growing need to create, develop, contribute, and innovate. This means that they appreciate companies that offer them such opportunities and will definitely set up camp in such situations. Make your business unique by encouraging an atmosphere that provides your employees with a different environment and approach to work life. This will play a huge part in helping your business retain your millennial employees.
3. Focus on flexibility and freedom.  Let’s face the fact; Millennials are different. They crave so much more than what average employees do. They seek spontaneity, flexibility, freedom, and even instant responses in the workplace. Millennials do not appreciate restrictions and value opportunities and experiences more than assets. Thus, changing the entire dynamic of the workplace. Create opportunities that allow them to travel. This will feed into their independence, creativity or adaptability. This will also help them explore their potential.
4. Grow in Leadership, congruence, and integrity.  Most companies tend to oversell their brand to talented millennials during interviews, only for them to secure employment and become disappointed. This is the leading cause of most companies’ inability to retain millennials. Make sure that you meet the expectations of each member of the team. As you hire, you should visualise and treat millennials like business investors. Managers who fail to meet the standards they set end up losing the respect and trust of the new members because of disappointment and frustration. Lack of authenticity does not impress millennials, regardless of the position held by the person in the company.
5. Value networking and community opportunities.  Millennials really value networking because they value purpose more than they do money. They seek to use the connections to be part of a more dynamic community. Retaining such people in the organization creates a strong bond since they will value the relationships in the organization. Thus, you should consider offering events that focus on the young professionals in the work community. In his book, ”The seventeen undisputed laws of teamwork”, John Maxwell quotes a Chinese proverb: “Individuals play the game. But teams win championships”. This goes to show how important bonding and teamwork can uplift an enterprise. These events will help them think up innovation and ideas, which empowers and helps them to grow and contribute more.

“Individuals play the game. But teams win championships” Chinese Proverb

Conclusion

Solve the problems that hinder seamless teamwork. Make everyone work toward the common goals, instead of holding back ideas or trying to work separately from others. When people truly appreciate each other as members of the same team, they share more ideas and support each other. One way to accomplish this is through our teamwork assessment tool, “The Leadership Game“.

To discover more about the topics mentioned in this blog:

• Leadership Development
• Communication
• Leadership Game – Corporate Edition
• Leadership Game – Communication Edition