Millennials in the Workplace: They’re Here to Stay, What Do They Want?

The Millennials are taking over the workforce.

But what do the millennials in the workforce want?

Studies indicate there’s a wealth of professional needs Millennials desire that speak to deeper values than wanting to wear jeans at work. Millennials are also:

• Looking for work/life integration, according to a study by the Intelligence Group.
• Searching for support, appreciation and professional flexibility from their managers, according to PwC’s most recent global generational study.
• Seeking managers who serve as mentors, empower them, and provide them with leadership opportunities, according to INSEAD’s Emerging Markets annual global study of Millennials.
• And while high earnings remains the primary attraction for recruiting Millennials, this desire is very tightly followed by a desire to influence their organization and to work hands-on with strategic challenges and decisions.

As a manager looking to attract, retain and engage this new workforce, you can’t just put a ping-pong table in the break room. You also have to address these deeper desires.

Instead of just adapting your perks to a generation who considers BYOD an inalienable right, you also have to adapt the deeper structures of how you operate the workplace to reflect Millennials’ deeper values.

Do Young IT Pros Want the Same Things as Millennials in the Workplace?

The above studies have a lot to say about the broader emerging workplace, across industries, but they don’t speak directly to the IT workplace.

This is a shame, because as combined data from the employment firm Payscale and the U.S. Bureau of Labor point out—“Technology Workers are Young (Really Young)”. And the more innovative and technology-oriented the work, the younger the workforce.

If any industry needs a clear understanding about what its emerging workplace values—and fast—it’s the IT industry.

To help fill this shortfall in the data, we regularly host a survey that asks IT professionals “What do you most want from your career?”

We recently completed our most recent survey, and have published the results and analysis. (Check below for your free copy.)

Here are a few data points highlighting this change of guard:

• Individual Contributors and Project Managers (most likely to be Millenials) cared the most about improving their Quality of Life, especially compared to CIOs (most likely to be Boomers/Gen Xers).
  • Individual Contributors / Project Managers: 24.01% /24.1%
    CIOs: 8.3%
  • Specifically, Individual Contributors and Project Managers cared about reducing professional stress and increasing free time away from work.
• Individual Contributors and Project Managers cared the least about gaining increased Recognition and Influence.

Are you in step with what the IT community needs, wants and values?

Click here to find out.

 

If you want to jump-start your engagement efforts, grab our new report “What IT Pros Most Want”. It goes deep into this question of what your people really want from their careers. Give them that, and they’ll never leave.

Click here for your free copy of “What IT Pros Most Want”