How to effectively retain Generation Y?

from TWSM#2

by The Work Style magazine

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Strategies Young generation at work

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How to effectively retain Generation Y?

Stimulation, involvement, organised training together with the freedom to experiment seem to be the keys of obtaining the loyalty of this group of employees.

Christian Gall Executive Director Core International Markets in AirPlus Inter-

national France explains how “Group belonging is important to them, so organisation of team events, dinners, games, challenges and group activities is important to engage and motivate them. Also they seem to be keen on finding a meaning to their work commitment and they want to see the vision of the company in the medium term explained in simple terms (no buzzwords like “strategic intent”, but for instance does the company want to focus on size or quality?).”

Bozzalla Matteo, a young expert in finan-

cial management in Ersel, Turin, states that one of the key elements is continuous, targeted training together with activities organised by the company to improve relationship skills. And adds “Motivation is also achieved through a working environment that allows Y generation to have access directly t o top executives first to share our ideas and our projects. We can discuss the worthiness of plans and have the chance to carry it out with a dedicated team.” Activities organised to encourage socialisation are always popular among young people.

Renata Spada HR Director Sales, Central Support & Corporate Projects SNA Eu-

rope told us that “at Corporate level activities are not planned world wide, but, as we are a company present in 25 countries, each country develops full programme of social activities designed to satisfy the requirements of the employees of the various branches.” Spada also emphasises that the motivation of young managers cannot be disregarded and they should have both the freedom and the possibility to experiment new ideas also through diversification.

Internal surveys are also carried out regularly in order to conform, as far as possible, to the needs of the young market. Peter Walmsley tells us “The average age of our employees in Tunisia is 29 and this is where we have the most concentration of younger people. We have recognised the desire for the younger people to accelerate through their careers at a quicker pace and want more responsibility at an earlier phase in their career. As a result we have developed a development programme whereby they can receive additional skills and development throughout their first two years with us and receive rapid career advancement based on performance. We also provide a salary increment every 6 months so we can build up a sense of both achievement and reward which are key motivating factors for this group. We also provide opportunities for advancement through providing opportunities for people to visit other countries on work exchanges or assignments. We have also recently completed an Employee Opinion Survey across all of our 13 countries which has given us a good insight into the views of all our employees. We have built action plans as part of this process and many of those actions relate to areas where our employees can be more actively involved in the future of the company.”

Virem Olivier, a young manager in the Spanish branch

of HrAccess explains “HRAccess is a “young company” that is extremely sensitive and engaged towards employees, “teleworking” for example. Company is expecting to reach the 20% “flexible” work ratio, which means in average 1 day per week working at home for each employee. There are many other good examples (“casual day”, “breakfasts”...) but I think those are good ones to show how companies today are offering “free” time and “flexible” work.”

So knowing who they are, knowing what the (mis)conceptions about this generation are, we can determine how to effectively retain employees from Generation Y. First of all: accept who they are. Every generation is seen as less responsible than the previous one, and this changes gradually over time. Secondly, Generation Y will change the workplace. The best thing to do is to enable them to do this in a responsible, controlled way. And finally, have direct manage• ment in place that genuinely cares for young people.

Everyone reacts in a different way towards the loss of a job. The 4 main types of the reactions are:

Lifestyle controlled: it is an attempt to personal security Lifestyle detached: it is destiny and it would happen sooner or later Lifestyle contextualized: it is an activation of shame normative lifestyle: it arises doubts about what happened and he takes full responsibility of failure

How to regulate emotions in case of a job loss

• Rumination to understand what happened and making a dialog with yourself • Making an emotional narrative about what happened • Being open to other people (disclosure) and social sharing

By MARIO ANTONIO REDA

Editorial Emotional consequences

THE EMOTIOnAL COnSEQUEnCES OF LOSInG A JOB Losing a job, could put a person’s ability to balance the emotional status into risk, and this ability processes with the regulation of the “negative” emotions caused by experienced situations. But how does the regulation of this emotion work? First of all it is important to understand what the feeling is and to establish a dialogue with ourselves; this is called “rumination” through which we think over the motives of our discomfort.

Psycho-rumination

These motives are, in this case, always linked to the precarious working situation or to the job that is going to be lost. But the attribute towards past or future circumstances differ for each person. We speak with ourselves through the personal meanings and on the basis of making a narrative process by which we try to regulate the emotion. This is the first condition that characterizes humanbeings to be endowed with languages and it replaces the “fight or fly” behaviour or indeed helps us to have command over the instinctive side of our brains. Imagine what could happen with this emotional narrative, enabling us to find a relative safety through a confirmation of our identity, and to go ahead for finding solutions that help us to maintain our internal coherence. At this point there are two other important attitudes that have been objectives of recent studies: disclosure and social sharing. When we say disclosure, we mean the ability to talk about the incidents causing unwanted situations in detail, which in this case is the loss of job. Only, people with high disclosure can regulate their intensive negative emotions. Social sharing is another important element that consists of having people close to you with whom you could speak and who could help you out about the situation. In difficult situations, the possibility to ask for help from family or friends, is the base of social sharing and it creates the chance to get advise for replanning the research of new jobs. Having difficulty in disclosure or in social sharing, could increase the stress and the psychosomatic illness of the person, that are caused by losing a job. There are a lot of examples of people with illnesses like having tumors, dermatitis, infectious or viral diseases, that came out after a job loss, because they have weaker immune systems. Especially people with low disclosure have weaker immune systems compared to people with high disclosure. The different meaning that everyone attributes to their jobs or to losing their jobs, depends on his own personality or “cognitive organization” that each of us develop during the evolutionary process, from birth until the end of adolescence. The most frequent organizations of personal meanings that we could find in our social contest are:

COnTROLLED LIFESTYLE

This type of an organization is characterized by people who developed anxious reciprocity. For them, it is important to have control over the situation also at work. What is also fundamental for these people is the physical presence of a protective figure from whom they are afraid to be separeted. The loss of a job is percieved as an attempt to their personal wellness. The meaning attributed to this situation is that they speculate to be in a conspiracy with themselves, that they could not realize what have happened in time, and that they were not able to control the situation. The sense of weakness arises in the person’s anxiety, in his worries for his health and in his searching process for the protective figure. These are situations that could be overcame by sharing problems with other people, talking about the emotions caused by the loss and consequently regaining more flexibility for the future choices of life. An employer with this type of a phobic organization, tries to have control over everyone within the company. He thinks that “noone is irreplaceable” and tries to employ only the people who he can have control over and in whom he can trust, meanwhile he definitely pushes away the ones who do not fit to his requirements.

DETACHED LIFESTYLE

These people have solitary personalities. They are used to fall down and stand up back on their own, without the help of anyone else and consequently this causes for them to have a fake trust in themselves. The meaning they attribute to a job loss is the “destiny”. Because of having a negative relation with themselves, they accuse themselves for whatever happens in their lives. They feel mistrust and think that noone could help them. The recovery can happen only with a renovation of their own, without asking help from anyone. The risk though, is that they quit the excessive effort and have a depressive syndrome with a negative vision of themselves and of the world and indeed they can experience delirium fault or the idea of committing suicide. The loss of job for these people may be a motivation to find a new, original and personalized project only if they get help from close friends, even though they do not ask for it.

COnTExTUALIzED LIFESTYLE These people have ambiguous personalities, caused by a global insecurity that is retrievable only by showing an approved social image. The security is gained by the positive opinions of oth-

Meritocracy Business as usual? The recession; a year on…

By NIGEL PHILLIPS

12 MOnTHS AGO, THE BAnKInG SYSTEM WAS On THE VERGE OF IMPLODInG. Only an injection of $9 trillion of cash and governmental guarantees saved the world from financial collapse.

Communism for the rich

Bonus in Latin means good, but the system of bonuses was held to be responsible for everything rotten in banking and, in return for being saved by their governments and taxpayers, banks were expected to herald in a new era of meritocracy. Of course people expect to be paid fairly for their efforts and there is no intrinsic problem with offering ex- tra incentives for exceptional results, but Goldman Sachs received $13bn from the US government to prevent its demise and a certain degree of austerity was expected. The bank now faces less competition for business and can borrow at incredibly low interest rates. In return for the help it received, Goldman Sachs is planning to reward its staff with bonuses of $17bn, to howls of outrage. It is not just in banking. Rod Bailey, CEO of ExecutiveSurf, the global internet headhunting company, says: “There is less competition in general. It is basic supply and demand. There has been a huge loss of jobs, but those who remain can demand to be paid even more than before, much to general chagrin.” A Deutsche Bank analyst told us that he believes the recession has effectively come to an end. He says that firms cut into their businesses fast and deep. Trimming the fat, combined with a unified global approach to financial stimulus, means crisis has been averted for now. The situation is probably still overcast, but brightening, but the current tail-end result is the problem of galloping unemployment, with Germany, Italy and the UK hovering around the 8% mark and France and the US, both over 10% and climbing. The shadier aspects of banking were meant to have been stamped out by governments and businesses, but the bonus culture appears to be alive and well. Professor Willem Buiter, of the London School of Economics, calls it “communism for the rich.”

When times are good the spoils are shared among the few; when things go wrong, we all share the misery. If we are now operating in a system that is meant to be meritocratic, it would seem some people are more equal than others. ExecutiveSurf canvassed HR professionals for their views on the new order of meritocracy. We asked whether they felt that bonuses are now more closely linked to the reality of performance than they were 12 months ago. Alessandro Tosi, strategy director of ExecutiveSurf, based in Milan, said that many financial institutions

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have increased their base salary levels, to compensate for the lack of bonuses, but that one-off payments have also been given instead of bonuses, which only serves to muddy the already murky waters. The public is baying for blood and UK newspapers daily publish examples of public sector workers receiving bonuses and counting on the righteous outrage of their reading public. Bonus has become a dirty word, conjuring up images of venality and hypocrisy.

Hans Lodewijks, of Holland, said he thought bonuses are currently more realistic, particularly in sales, where the bonus is frequently fixed as a means to facilitate the transfer of staff globally.

He added that, in The Netherlands, stock option plans are no longer seen as a viable job benefit, because of the state of the stock market and that company cars are also offered less frequently, while companies are also cutting back on staff training and entertainment. Governments are trying to be seen to stamp out the bonus culture and stock options may well become the means for business and banks to circumvent these popular limitations. Bailey says that the pecking order of what people expect in their executive package may have changed slightly. “A cash bonus, share options, a company car, a decent pension, health insurance, relocation, all are desirable, but stock options may currently be temporarily less popular.” Bailey has seen three recessions and he says: “Whenever there is a recession people complain about their stock options, but once the market picks up, they will be bragging about them again. I really don’t think we have learned anything; here we go again on our jolly old cycle.” When Lehman Brothers went bust, their local champagne bar shut up shop immediately, but restaurants in the City of London are now stocking up on champagne as banking bonuses return, much to the disgust of expensedrinking journalists. It is human nature for people to attempt to profit themselves and business reveals greed, red in tooth and claw on an organised scale, using the talents it has at its disposal to profit and thrive. Gerrie Knoetze is the owner of City restaurant, Vivat Bacchus, and in the past year he has watched the sales of champagne with interest. “A year ago it was politically incorrect to be seen celebrating with champagne; it was off-limits.” He said: “Since the beginning of the year, we have seen sales double of champagne at £50 a bottle. The fact that people are drinking champagne tells me people are smiling again; you don’t drink champagne with a frown.” This may well be the case, but people who are worried for their future, or have lost their job, certainly do not see re-runs of the 80’s overt consumption boom an edifying sight. Membership of private members’ clubs are booming globally, as the select few enjoy themselves, seemingly at society’s expense. The fortune of champagne bars and clubs, seems to be reflecting business in general. As one business closes, another succeeds in a less cluttered environment, catering for an even more elite customer. The banking crisis was meant to be the cue for governments and business to clean out the Augean stables, but normality seems to have been resumed, with fat cats gorging at the trough once again (if I may mix my metaphors). Bankers, politicians and paedophiles are the current targets for public hatred and distrust; journalists can breathe easily again. Plus ca change… • ers, so the loss of a job causes shame for them. Living on the judgement of the other people, they feel unsuccessful as they have disappointment of expectations and a sense of emptiness caused by the loss of social approvation of the other people. In case someone asks them about their jobs, it is possible that they develop a syndrome of social anxiety. Overcoming of the loss of job for them, can be possible only by understanding that failure in work does not mean that they fail as a person too. The unsuccess could be overcame by searching for new objectives that are more suitable both for themselves and for their social images. For an employer with these features, it is important for him to surround himself with collegues who agree with him most of the time.

nORMATIVE LIFESTYLE

These people are the ones with ambivalent personalities. They consider themselves positively only if they can pursue social and moral rules, control their feelings, and maintain a rational behaviour. They pursuit perfectionism at the edges: everything is either black or white for them. The loss of a job causes negative feelings, arises doubts and makes them think that they are either guilty or the victims of a universal conspiracy. The swinging between the two extreme edges can bring arrest or obsessive “rumination”. A recovery in this situation, can consist in considering the complexity that has caused this situation and moderating the strict vision; by placing some ‘grays’ in between blacks and whites. An employer with this kind of an obsessive organization manages the relations with his employees in a rational and legal way, and is attentive to the rights of everyone.

In all of these situations, it would be useful to organize a psychotherapy group, in which every person who has lost a job, could speak about their discomforts. Through social sharing and disclosure it could be possible to experience recovery for everyone. •

Workplace Exchange ideas

By VALENTINA RIGOLDI

A QUALITY WORKPLACE is fundamental not only for better productivity but also for better exchange of ideas. Work and wellbeing: the interior space and the quality of the surroundings.

Fabulous ideas

In his book “Labour, work and architecture” (2002), talking about a Swedish car plant in the late 1970s, the architectural critic Kenneth Frampton says: “A feeling of almost deliberate isolation, in the physical and psychological sense, pervades the entire structure and site […] This is distressing when one realizes that this is the landscape in which some 600 men regularly spend the best part of their working day”. Nowadays the belief that the collective wellbeing in a workplace creates a virtuous circle in the whole company is wide spread among architects and employers.

In 2008, London-based studio Foster + Partners completed the project for the new stylish headquarter of Ernst & Young – The Netherlands in Amsterdam, the so-called “Vivaldi Tower”, which can be considered, as an example of this philosophy. We asked Reinhard Joecks, a Partner of the studio, to describe us the building from the architects’point of view.

What was the main reason to have such a stylish office instead of a regular one?

For over forty years we have explored the possibilities for open and flexible working environments in which communication can flourish. “Vivaldi Tower” is the Dutch headquarters for the global professional services firm Ernst & Young. As such, it is an expression of their ethos. So, as well as being stylish, the sustainable aspects of the building were equally vital. Moreover as the first building within the new Zuidas district, the tower was conceived as a landmark on the route into Amsterdam, thanks to its distinctive silver diagrid façade.

How does a workplace affect on its em-

ployees? As architects, we believe that the quality of our surroundings has a profound effect on the quality of our lives. For employees at Vivaldi Tower, there are a wide range of facilities close to hand: the adjacent pavilion building contains a ground floor bar and a restaurant with views of the water-court, along with conference facilities and a fitness centre. In the tower itself, an informal ‘living room’ with armchairs and views of the landscaped setting occupies part of the ground floor and there is a library at the top. While the living room is single height, the entrance area is a grand triple-height atrium that reflects the geometry of the diagrid façade. The building has a highly progressive environmental strategy and, as a result, is ten per cent more efficient than the target Dutch environmental standards. The water-court, accessed by a shaded walkway, is an attractive setting for the offices, yet also plays a role in the environmental approach. It is an ecological pond, naturally cleaned by a planted biotope of reeds, water lilies and grasses – 65% of rainwater is retained on site and the run-off feeds into the Amsterdam canal system to control water levels following peak rainfall.

Mirjam Prins, Sr. Service Manager at Ernst & Young – The Netherlands, and Marco Noort, Sr. Facility Manager who was personally involved in the process, described us the peculiarity and the facilities of the new headquarter and the feeling of working in such a brand-new building. “We call the building ‘The Cross Tower’ because of the shape it has in its architecture. Among our 18 branch offices in Holland this is the most wanted as it offers a 5 star hotel comfort, which has also a very good influence on our clients. It is a very open building which generates wellness and a very good atmosphere for us. Besides the openness, the building offers privacy for everyone as well, with our separated offices. It is usually very crowded here, with all the employees, the clients and the visitors, yet you almost never feel that crowd thanks to the brilliant architecture of the building, that it is definitely very spacious”. According to Prins and Noort the new facilities, such as the coffee bar, are noteworthy: “The furniture, the chairs, the tables, and even the wallpapers are so diligently picked, that it feels like home more than an office cafeteria; we call it ‘the living room’, as you can grab your coffee and spend time with your colleagues and enjoy the cosy environment”. Talking about other facilities they said: “We have a gym within our building, not only for personal training but also for group classes. We have high standard meeting rooms that can compete with 5 star hotels in Amsterdam due to the spectaculare views on the 21st and 22nd floors and the outstanding catering facilities. These offer our staff the possibility to invite their clients to • the office and to be attentive to their guests best way they could”.

01 - 04 Internal of Vivaldi Tower ©Foster + Partners 02 View from Vivaldi Tower ©Foster + Partners 03 External of Vivaldi Tower ©Foster + Partners