Gen Y is an impatient lot who doesn’t like staying in the same place doing the same things for a long time. With so many options in everything, such as songs, apps, and even devices, we usually hop back and forth between them while missing out on most of it.
Similarly, Gen Y’s short attention span has affected all parts of their lives, including jobs where it is not uncommon for a young generation to have experience working with many different employers in a short period. Every other day, there is a classmate, colleague, or friend who moves on to a new job to begin a new experience. While boomers have spent most of their lives at a single job, Gen Y doesn’t seem to mind this perspective, but it is just not for them.
According to Emily He, CMO of talent management solution Saba,
“For millennials, it is more a matter of career exploration than climbing the traditional ladder,” “Research suggests that today’s college graduates will have a dozen or more jobs by the time they hit their 30s. In an uncertain job environment, it has become culturally okay that they explore. The expectations and responsibilities have changed.”
Your 20s are used to figure out what you want to do, so the constant job hopping to explore multiple industries is expected.
While job-hopping was not an active part of the boomer lifestyle, Gen Y is always encouraged to explore as many careers as possible so that no one misses out on anything and lives a life of regret doing a job that they hate. Tom Turner, co-founder and president of electronic discovery and digital forensics company thinks that the Gen Y employees will stick around in places where the work culture is right.
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For millennials, their job is more than just their work, and they expect to be part of something bigger. Therefore, employers need to show constant appreciation for their work to encourage them to stick around and do their best instead of just working to make a living.
Similarly, Turner said that instilling trust and value in your employees through policies and benefits that will aid them in their work is crucial for millennial retention. Offering flexible schedules and unlimited vacation may keep Gen Y around for a few years longer than average, but is all that enough?
Furthermore, the job-hopping stigma is lifting, and more people are being accustomed to the idea of exploring their careers. If you are a company that a millennial has landed at, from the millennial perspective, the workplace needs to have a flexible working culture to make them stick around for longer. Job hopping is a great way to look for a more versatile range of experience. Once a millennial decides to settle down and finds the perfect job, they can do their best, keeping in mind that they have enough prior knowledge to cater to multiple things and find their groove.
However, even when one has found the perfect job, their interest might still shift, and they might take an entirely new road in their careers. Therefore, it is more important to value the quality and experiences of a job than the number of days spent there. Moreover, it is also essential to know when to stop in life. A journey without a destination is a lost cause, and no matter how many detours one takes, it is still essential to keep the goal in mind so that one can reach what they set out for.
It is essential for the employers on Generation Y to understand that the Companies must change the focus of millennial hires from ‘How long can I keep you?’ to ‘How much can we accomplish together?’, and then power that relationship with the connections, context, and technology that gives them a reason to bring their best game to their business,” Emily He said. An employee-employer relationship is as crucial to the business as anything else.
