How to Attract and Retain Remote Millennial Employees
Attracting Millennials to join your company is not the hard part. It’s keeping them.
I’m a Millennial. And, I’ve done my fair share of job-hopping due to poor company culture fit, not enough opportunities for advancement, and sheer boredom. We are notoriously more impulsive than prior generations. As a result, many managers of remote teams are worried about the turnover rate for their Millennial employees.
Let’s say you’ve attracted some standout Millennials to join your team. First off, congrats on piquing their interest. We’re a hard bunch to please and can be picky when it comes to settling down. Now comes the hard part, retaining those Millennials and keeping them engaged at work.
Here are four tips to help you keep your Millenials happy, productive, and on board.
Be better than the other options.
Millennials will leave your company if there are companies that are more enticing. Being remote is an advantage because many of your competitors are NOT distributed. Big perk, right there!
Take some time to jot down why your company is better than your competitors. Spend time looking at other distributed (and co-located) companies with great company cultures to find out what they do to attract and retain their employees. What could you incorporate?
Meet their intrinsic needs and desires.
Remote workers (and everyone, for that matter!) needs to feel important and respected at work. When managers and colleagues make it “feel good” to work on their teams and for their company, remote workers feel appreciated and that they are a critical member of the team.
Intrinsic motivation is often overlooked. Find out what drives them. Once you know their internal desires and reasons they come to work, you can use that knowledge to help them grow professionally and advance within the company.
Keep the conversation open.
When you notice Millennials getting antsy, be transparent. Address the issue head-on, keep the conversation open, and give them opportunities within the company to scratch that itch.
For example, you might have a design leader who wants to move up within the company but is tempted to leave because she does not see an opening in the near future. She sticks around because she likes your company culture, but you might lose her if another company with a great culture has an opening for her. Unless you were having regular conversations with her, you may never know she’s antsy until it’s too late.
Transparency and communication is a two-way street.
It’s easy to assume that everyone intuitively knows how to communicate well, especially on remote or hybrid teams. But, communication training is essential when it comes to working with and managing Millennials. Millennials often don’t understand the importance of cooperation and are afraid to be confrontational. Many will just up-and-leave, rather than tell you that something isn’t working for them.
When managers and leaders are vulnerable and say, “Yeah, I’m afraid I might lose you because I recognize that X is what you want and I cannot give that to you.” It’s respectful, open, collaborative. And, those are values Millennials value and respond well to.
What do you think? How is your company attracting and retaining Millennials? What are some issues you might have faced in keeping your remote workers engaged and productive at work? Tweet our team @yonder_io to tell us your story!
