At the Confluence of Emerging and Professional California Collaborative Technical Assistance:

Morgan O’Brien

As we begin the return-to-the-office shuffle, we start to (once again) readjust how we balance it all; from commuting to packing lunches, to figuring out the careful balance of family time, exercising, and eating healthily. With the major change in how we work, paired with a lot more of the next generation in the workplace… it begs the question: What does the next generation of employees want?

Whether that refers to literally the newly minted degreed engineers, scientists, and communicators coming into our industry, or folks who have been in the industry for a while who got the savory taste of something new in the mass shake-up of the pandemic; we can all see ourselves as this ‘next generation’ of the workforce.

There are many ways of assessing employee satisfaction, and it may well be worth doing, with record numbers of employees changing jobs for different opportunities. A Visier study found that the rate of turnover has skyrocketed over the last year, where they remark that “In 2020, people wanted to quit. In 2021, they actually did it.”1 For more information and graphics with the stats, see footnote 1 .

New tactics of understanding employee’s preferences, including “stay-interviews”, new retention benefits, investments in employee growth and satisfaction, and more flexible work environments, are growing more common in the workplace. Additionally, polls and articles have flooded news cycles recently about what the younger folks in the workforce want. And it varies, but not as widely as we may expect. Based on a recent Gallup poll, “Gen Z and Millennials now make up nearly half (46%) of the full-time workforce in the U.S.” 2– so it very well may pay to invest some time and money into understanding what this means to employees in your workplace. The top four things that the Gallup article2 mentions as desires for Millennials and Gen Z are:

1. Above all, Gen Z and millennials want an employer who cares about their wellbeing.

2. Gen Z and millennials want their leaders to be ethical.

3. Older millennials want open, transparent leaders.

4. Gen Z and younger millennials want leaders who support a diverse and inclusive workplace.

Of important note, there are a number of employees now, who started work during shelter-in-place time, and have never known what it’s like to work in an office. Recent grads (even new employees, regardless of career length) have less in-person time with coworkers and potential mentors, which means new ways of coaching and connecting need to be explored. This is a great opportunity to get creative – by asking your coworkers what they want! This could be done through a brainstorming session, or asking others in the industry what they’re doing. From randomly assigned small-group company-paid lunches, weekend hikes, picnics in a local park, to creek cleanups; there are many ways of connecting in this environment that can be fun and fulfilling, while also creating the bonds we enjoyed in the workplace.

1 Four Things We Learned About the Resignation Wave-and What to Do Next, 2021; Visier. 2 4 Things Gen Z and Millennials Expect From Their Workplace, March 30, 2021; Gallup.

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