Millennials, usually represented as people born between 1980 and 1996, are currently the most populous American workforce. As administrators and business owners everywhere have probably gained, millennials have critical aspects towards work that conflict with older generations.
It affects some employers to consider millennials are lazy, but that’s not valid. They can be exceptional and hard workers, but you might have to modify your approach to make the most benefit. With a touch of extra effort, you can create the ideal methods to accomplish your millennial staffers.
Motivating Millennial Employees
- Offer Millenials fair and competitive pay. Do your best to offer a competitive salary and benefits package based on industry standards. Avoid making your employees feel unappreciated and ripped off. Instead, be transparent about pay rates and willing to explain why an employee is being paid a certain amount.
- Encourage millennials to maintain an excellent work-life balance. Millennials tend to value ratio in their professional lives, which is why many prefer remote work or flexible hours.
- Try to think about results rather than time spent in the actual office. You might even motivate them to be more productive by letting them go home if they finish everything they had to do for the day. On the other hand, expecting unpaid overtime is a good way to get employees to resent you and look for another job.
- Give millennials more freedom to lead at work. Try to take advantage of this by giving your employees some leadership opportunities. For example, you could let them show projects or working groups, or give presentations to the office.
- Asking your employees for their feedback or suggestions is a great way to involve them, even if this isn’t a lot of responsibility. Always choose the exemplary character for the job.
- Assign tasks based on their strengths. Playing to their strengths and letting them work on things that they’re good at is a great way to get more effort out of your employees. Remember that not all millennials have the same skills.
- Offer a chance for promotions and advancement for good work. Keep your employees’ loyalty by helping them advance quickly if they do good work. Try to give millennials opportunities to grow their skills and experience. Including them on new projects or teams.
Building a Millennial-Friendly Work Environment
- Offer flex or remote work options. In general, millennials prefer more flexibility from their jobs, and most state that they would choose remote-work options at least part of the time. In addition, many studies increasingly show that remote work results in higher productivity, so it might benefit your company overall to offer more remote options. If you can’t deliver remote work, try to provide more flex time options.
- Encourage employees to use technology and social media at work. Millennials, especially younger ones, are the first generation that grew up with the internet and other new technologies, and it’s a big part of their lives. Millennials are used to multitasking with technology, so you only have to address it if they’re not paying attention or are being rude. Millennials’ tech must teach some older employees about new programs, apps, or social media sites.
- Build a cooperative and collaborative workplace. Try to design group tasks and let employees work together on their assignments to get happy results, and your employees will feel more connected to the workplace. You could also have daily or weekly brainstorming sessions to get everyone involved in the work process. Millennials also enjoy a strong company culture outside of work.
- Try to provide perks for employees. Occasionally ordering lunch, building a rec room, or updating the office technology can boost morale and make millennials feel more at home. Your business might not have a lot of money to spare for outside activities, but if you can sponsor a simple, monthly event, that can make a big difference in the company culture. No one will be mad about getting more money!
Communicating Effectively
- Give precise instructions for projects and tasks. Do your best to be concise and include all the necessary details in your communications with your employees. Try to put a number on your goals or expected outcome. Make it clear that you want them to ask questions and are happy to provide more detail.
- Provide consistent feedback, so employees know where they stand. Make your millennial employees feel engaged by giving them consistently and encouraging feedback on their work.
- You could set up a regular date for reviews, like a monthly basis.
- Ask for feedback and help them avoid mistakes. Be open and willing to give feedback if they ask for it.
- Recognize and credit their contributions. Always be sure to thank your employees for their work and give them credit where it’s due. You might have to take some extra time to explain why specific tasks or jobs are essential.
- Include some in-person communication to build relationships. It’s less isolating and helps build camaraderie in your workplace. When possible, in-person schedule meetings or workshops to discuss projects, brainstorm, assign tasks or give reviews and feedback.
- Please encourage them to take breaks from email and work communications. Please enable them to stop working once they’re done for the day and not feel obligated to answer communications until the following day.
- You could try to encourage a good work-life balance by only sending emails during regular work hours.
Reconsidering Management Approach
- Work toward being a mentor instead of a boss. Try to be more like a mentor. Encourage and guide your employees to do the best job that they can. It would help if you also were approachable to your employees. Show that you’re always willing to talk or provide guidance. Try to lead by example. Earn their respect by working as hard as they do.
- Focus on achieving successful results. They’re much more focused on the results. By focusing on the results, you can also relax some regulations like dress codes or strict office schedules. It is why flex time and remote work tend to work well with millennials.
- Try to be yourself. Forget about trying to instill respect or fear in your employees. Instead, be yourself and show them that you care about the work that they’re doing. Making small talk with your employees is an excellent way to show them that you’re a natural, authentic person. In addition, it can help to share some doubts or uncertainties with your employees.
- Please get to know your employees to understand what motivates them. By learning about your employees, you’ll get a feel for what they want and what motivates them.
- Getting to know your employees also creates a strong work culture and makes them feel cared for. Be willing to adjust your approach for different individuals.
Wrap Up
Stay adaptable and be available to change your approach for different employees. It should give you much better results. Getting to know your employees is a big help, and you’ll get a clearer picture of what motivates individual employees.