Harnessing the Potential of Gen Z and Millennial Employees: Strategies for Retention and Engagement (Episode 141)

Do you often find yourself wondering how to retain the bright young minds in your organization? What if you could not only retain your Gen Z and Millennial employees, but also harness their full potential? Your host, Dr. Jason Wiggins, guides you on this journey, decoding the generational shifts in employment, the costs and consequences of employee attrition, and effective ways to engage and motivate younger employees. This episode is brimming with tips you don't want to miss, whether you're a CEO, hiring manager, HR professional, or a Gen Z or Millennial employee yourself, there's something for everyone. 

We dive headfirst into the age-old discussion of work-life balance, its importance, and the role it plays in employee engagement. But that's not it, we also decipher the true value of comprehensive compensation packages that go beyond just monetary compensation. Listen in as we also espouse the significance of mental health, diversity, inclusion, and social responsibility in today's workspace. The episode winds up with a call to action from Dr. Jason Wiggins, who is available for company consultations, helping organizations maximize their return on investment in their Gen Z and Millennial workforce. Join us as we navigate through these pivotal topics and more.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:08

Welcome, friends, to the your Motivational Gen Z and Millennial Expert podcast. My name is Dr Jason Wiggins and I am your host. First and foremost, it is great to be here today on our weekly podcast. Unfortunately, last week, I was unable to publish a podcast due to being near Cancun, mexico, on a little family vacation, but it brought me the opportunity to be able to conversate with some of the local individuals in town, either at the place where we're staying, and really learn more about them Specifically those that were Gen Z and Millennials, as that is usually my target group just to be able to talk to them and really continue to be educated by what they want, what they're looking for, and I learned a lot of things. So I'm glad to be back and I look forward to presenting today. So, again, thank you for being here, and today's topic is going to be really crucial, and it has been crucial. It's how do you manage Gen Z and Millennials to get the best return on your investment? Now we can flip this from two different sides. One side of the coin is this can be relevant to CEOs, executive of organizations, hiring managers, hr, but at the same time, it is also extremely relevant to Gen Z and Millennials, and that's what our focus is going to be on today is talking about the certain aspects of attrition, job hopping and things of that nature.

Speaker 1: 1:58

But for those that are new to the podcast, I think it's really important to understand the sequence of years for generations. So generation starts with the baby boomers, at least in our current work field. Prior to that, there were different generations, from the silent generation to the traditionalist, but currently, right now in the workforce, we have four hardworking, individual generations in the workforce. It starts with the baby boomers. The baby boomers were born from 1945 to 1965, while Gen X were born between 1966 and 1980. And generation Y was born 1981 to 1996. And our current workforce generation, that is, the newest, is Gen Z and they are between the years of 1997 to 2010. And currently not in the workforce from 2011 to current is generation alpha, and the reason why I bring up all of those different generations. It's important to understand the differentiation between baby boomers, some maybe a Gen X, and the start of really the attrition of Gen Zs and millennials in the workforce. What I'd like to talk about today is what can we do to solve the issue when it comes to why there's such a significant attrition within Gen Z and millennials in the workforce and then we can kind of talk about what things can be done to help and that will really get us to the point where we have an understanding and, as employers, what we can do about it and, as Gen Z and millennials, how we can react and say this is what we want, this is what's going to make us happy within the workforce.

Speaker 1: 4:15

It is extremely important to recognize that the baby boomers were a generation, as I mentioned, they were born from the 1945 to 1965. And this generation they were dedicated to the workforce, they were dedicated to the organization they worked for. They saw it as lifetime employment. The employer even identified it as lifetime employment. However, the economy began to fall and when the economy began to fall, then Gen X saw that their long hardworking parents' tenureship within an organization was no longer valid and Gen X started to see that well, maybe the dedication to the organization is not the most important. So it kind of started the effect, the signal effect of now you have Gen Y and now Gen Z following those same footsteps, where long-term employment seems like only up to one year employment. So on resumes now it's not uncommon to see a millennial in the last seven years have seven different jobs.

Speaker 1: 5:37

This is a problem. Why is it a problem? If you're an owner, an executive, hr, hiring manager, whatever it may be, you're spending thousands, thousands and thousands of dollars to be able to retain these individuals. But if you lose them, you'll spend even more. I'd like to share this example. I was recruited for company and being able to see the P&L after I was hired, I was kind of floored that there was a $40,000 fee from the recruiter for finding me and eventually being hired by that organization, and that's not uncommon. The higher you get up within an organization and looking for that specific, perfect fit for the organization, you can run into a hundred to $300,000 for a retaining fee or a service fee or whatever you want to call it, from the recruiters to get you on board. This is insane, but this is the reality of the marketplace we're in. Why? Because it's very hard to find those certain people for those certain positions, and that's why we're going to discuss job hopping versus the stability of those looking for it, stable employment.

Speaker 1: 7:07

And there's actually a little bit of a differentiation between millennials and Gen Y versus Gen Z. Gen Z has grown up in the recession 2008. They've seen September 11, 2011 and they started looking at things. I want stability in the workforce. I want to be able to work for an organization that values what I had, that values my input. But don't don't mistake in that, for right now, I can guarantee one thing that a Gen Z and a millennial is likely updating their resume if you, as an employer, are not doing your due diligence for employee engagement feedback, having those 60, 90, 30-day check-ins with your employee, getting the pulse of your employee and being realistic about what they want, what they need and remember they want to be a participant within the management cycle. They want to be able to know what's going on. That's where effective communication is a driver.

Speaker 1: 8:31

Future growth, opportunities, work-life balance these things are a necessity for Gen Z and millennials that are employed by your organization. So if you're a Gen Z and millennial out there, you're probably not in your head. Yes, yes, yes. And why is that? Because you realize that Gen Z and millennials are the backbone of your organization. It's not Gen X, it's not the Baby Boomers. Gen X was the smallest generation out of the four that are currently in the workforce. Baby Boomers was the largest, but then they continue to retire and fall out of the market. And now Gen Z and millennials are overtaking, taking the marketplace with employment, which means they're going to be the next managers.

Speaker 1: 9:33

So let's talk about what can we do to minimize the attrition. Going back to the topic of the discussion how do you manage Gen Z and millennials to get the best return on your investment? Simple, simple. Well, it's not that simple, but what I can tell you is it will help. It will help reduce the attrition, save the company thousands of dollars by doing a couple simple things.

Speaker 1: 10:09

One, work-life balance. Work-life balance we're talking hybrid, remote. It doesn't have to be a nine-to-five job unless you have a brick-and-mortar location that specifies you have employees at certain times. I understand that. Gen Z and millennials understand that. But if you have the opportunity to be flexible, you know you can work. If it's morning, afternoon, night, you'll find out that your employee, your Gen Z and millennial, is likely going to produce more within that 24 hours than if they were sitting at their desk watching the clock, fidgeting, surfing social media sites, brushing up their resumes. What you can do now is give them the opportunity to feel empowered and then maybe, if it's a hybrid situation, they come into the office twice a week, work from home, from three days a week, that will make a significant difference. And when it comes to you and another organization that states that they need to be in the office, they need to be in that brick-and-mortar location. That will give you a leg up on the workforce competition.

Speaker 1: 11:32

So, number one work-life balance. Number two is the ability to have employee engagement, have a culture that really, really stimulates the growth within the organization. And what does that mean? Culture is not just something the organization writes up and says this is our culture. I've been a part of those organizations where they preach that they have a great culture, but as an employee, as a manager, you go in and you see that that is not the reality of it. The reality is they don't care about you as an employee. So if that's the culture that you're a part of, my guess is you're probably likely brushing up your resume, if you haven't already, or you're just doing it right now as we speak, and that is the reality. So if you're an employer out there, then think about this. You have to have a culture that provides team engagement where it doesn't look like it's just a facade. So, work-life balance, employee engagement, slash culture and being able to really look at what you can do to improve work-life balance and culture.

Speaker 1: 12:55

The third one is employees don't leave companies, they leave their bosses. This is an old saying that has been around for a long time. However, it is totally justified and reasonable and it's a factual because if you have a good relationship with your boss, you're able to come to them and state to them that this is my concern. This is what I think and feel like they're protected to tell you something that maybe if it was another boss they don't have a close relationship with, then they're not going to tell them that. They're going to feel like they don't have that open door policy. They don't have that ability to be able to come and have that one-on-one discussion that goes into when they were a new hire. Did you have that open communication? Did you have that 30, 60, 90-day check-in process to show that you valued their employment and they value use an organization? You could have that feedback back and forth and have those continual discussions over the course of your employment. If you're able to do that, then there's going to be a less likelihood that when it comes to deciding to move on, they don't have that communication with you first, because they trust you, they trust your organization. So that is the next step.

Speaker 1: 14:21

So right now we've went through work-life balance, we went through employees don't leave their bosses, they leave the company. And then we talked about culture. So those are the three things we've talked about so far, and the other important one is recognition. Recognition is vital. Yes, that can be part of that one-on-one feedback, but they truly want to be presented with the notion, the continued resources, the tools to improve the skill set, at the same time improve how they can perform in their job. But when they perform at a high level, they want to be recognized for that. It doesn't necessarily have to be in a public aspect, but they want to know that the company as a whole really believes that their contributions are vital and important to the organization. So that's number four.

Speaker 1: 15:22

And I think the last one that I personally feel is really important is salary. Salary is the most important aspect. That's false. Salary is not the most important aspect If you are an organization. Again, I've been part of organizations where they have high salaries but they don't care about you as an employee. What employees are really looking for is the ability to know that the organization has a compensation program that really looks after their well-being.

Speaker 1: 16:04

Yes, you have the normal health 401k, but let's talk about important aspects to Gen Z and millennials. That is, mental health. Mental health is an important part of our daily lives. It always has. But baby boomers, to some aspects, generation X this was kind of something you didn't talk about but Gen Z and millennials this is the forefront of the discussions within the workforce. You can look online and you look on LinkedIn and you can see where, specifically, millennials and Gen Zs have taking breaks from work due to mental health management. So if an organization really shows a care, they're going to talk about mental health, they're going to promote helping mental health. And the other thing is diversity, inclusion, social responsibility. These are also part of the compensation aspects that an accompanying needs to provide those tools to perform that. Again, it's one thing to talk about it, but it's one thing to ensure that you provide those with the most, I guess, forefront the reality of being true to your employees and they know that. If this is something that's real from the company. Let's go back to what we talked about. You have a great company culture. You have work-life balance, you have great benefits. Those are important and vital aspects. The company is real, they really believe in their employees and they show they care. Employees leave companies, not bosses. So again, these are the things we talked about in today's discussion.

Speaker 1: 18:03

I hope this helps you as a Gen Z in millennials, and I'm sure you're nodding your head going, yes, this is what I want. Where is that perfect company? And if you're on the employer side, you're stating, ok, some of this costs money. How can I afford it? You can't afford not to implement these five tools that I mentioned. Why? Because if you don't, you're going to have loss of knowledge, you're going to have recruiting costs, you're going to have continuing job placement ads. These things really add up over time. And then if you have a revolving door of employees that will show the culture doesn't work and the culture doesn't work, your organization will continue to have loss of knowledge. You will lose good Gen Z in millennials in the workforce.

Speaker 1: 19:00

Again, my name is Dr Jason Wiggins. I am your motivational Gen Z and Millennial expert. I am available to speak with your company organization to help any way I can. So please reach out to me. You can reach me at Jason at Gen Z and MillennialExpertcom. Again, that's Jason at Gen Z and Millennialcom. So thank you so much. I'm here to help and I'll talk to you soon. Take care, bye, bye.