Being a millennial in the present-day business world is not an easy thing, however, neither is managing a business full of millennials. The issue with this concept lies in the fact that the present-day workforce is predominantly made up of millennials, which is why this is an issue worth resolving. As a manager or a business owner, you have to know what your millennial employees are struggling with, as well as what they’re expecting of you in these fields. So here are the top five problems that millennials are known to face in the workplace.
1. Making a difference
While some just want to come to their workplace, do their shift and go home, for the majority of millennials, this is an outdated mentality. What millennials want is to make a difference, regardless of the industry they work in. The problem that comes from this is a lack of patience, seeing as how the majority of them can’t really wait until this is a real possibility. The majority of millennials would like to feel like they’re making a difference from day one and if this is not a possibility, they would like to see this happening within the first six months
2. Transparency and feedback
Another thing that millennials are desperate for is transparency in interpersonal relationships in the office and feedback. What they need is for their employers to praise them when they do something good and tell them when they’re doing something wrong. You see, self-assessment (at least a realistic self-assessment) is not the strongest of millennial traits. This is why they rely on an adequate feedback system in order to develop as professionals. Keep in mind that some of them might even approach their supervisor and directly ask for feedback.
3. Legal protection
The next thing you need to be aware of is the fact that millennials want to feel safe and secure in their workplace and we do not just mean that they should be free of bullying. In the event of an injury happening in the workplace, they need to know that they’ll be taken care of, and they might need help from a professional to achieve this. In this scenario, going for specialist superannuation lawyers would be the safest course of action to protect one from any eventual income loss due to the injury. Fortunately, adequate legal protection isn’t that hard to come by.
4. Flexible workplace
The concept of a flexible workplace can be interpreted in two separate ways. First, it can mean flexible work hours, which is a scenario where people can arrive at work whenever they want and go home whenever they want, as long as they work a set number of hours per day. Another concept is one of remote working, regardless of whether it means working from home or a shared office space. For the majority of modern startups, this kind of business model is expected.
5. Inclusivity
Finally, in a modern workplace, there needs to be a major emphasis on the inclusivity of everyone regardless of their skin color, nationality, religion, sex, gender or age. Keep in mind, nonetheless, that while the above-listed may be quite dangerous, they’re still not the most common causes for discrimination. The most common cause is retaliation for something that has happened in the past, which is a lot harder for employers and supervisors to predict. Still, the millennial workforce expects to be protected from this behavior (and rightfully so).
The best thing about all of this is just how easy it is to introduce and enforce some of these rules. Think about it, you don’t have to restructure your business model or massively invest in any of the above-listed five fields. All you have to do is make an effort to meet their demands by being more flexible and more involved in the way your company runs. Chances are that apart from their satisfaction, your corporate efficiency will grow this way as well.
