The Millennial American Dream

Katie Williamson August 18, 2016

The Millennial generation, lovers of Facebook, the selfie, and on-demand technology, view the world through a different lens. And when it comes to the idea of the American dream, this is no exception. Yes, a successful career, a loving family and financial security are still as desired by millennials as their predecessors. But their means of achieving these successes is changing quite a bit. In fact, they may think these achievements look entirely different than their parents did.

The Millennial Career Dream

While the Baby Boomers and Generation X sought to earn a good wage and advance in their career, millennials are diving a little deeper. Facing the tragedy of September 11th, increasing gun violence, and the War on Terror, this generation is seeking to make a change. No longer is a paycheck enough to keep them satisfied at their nine-to-five. More important to these echo-boomers is making a difference in the world around them and being happy with their work. Sounds simple, but like many things, a closer look proves satisfaction in the workplace is more complex than it appears.

The Huffington Post reports that 67 percent of millennials want to be entrepreneurs. This entrepreneurial spirit is ingrained in this generation, giving them a greater appreciation for independence and autonomy. To them, a successful career is defined by freedom and opportunity to grow and learn. This, however, is not in the traditional corner-office type of way. Job titles and fancy views aren’t enough to keep them satisfied. But give them a chance to learn something new and change the world, and you will discover what they can accomplish.

The Millennial Family Dream

The American dream, however, goes beyond just having a career. For many, this ideal also encompasses strong family values and creating a better life for the next generation. This is a far cry from the stereotyped “Me Generation” . But just because millennials aren’t having kids right now doesn’t mean they never will, says an article in Bloomberg.

PEW Research Center reported in 2013 that fewer than half of U.S. kids today live in a ‘traditional’ family. Because millennials have grown up in these non-traditional environments, many are waiting to start their families until they are emotionally and financially ready in order to provide a more stable and sustainable family environment. Which often means starting a family later in life. But, according to a Gallup survey, only 5% of Americans say they don’t want kids, up only 1% from 1990. So just because they aren’t married by 30, doesn’t mean they never get married. It just might take them a little longer than it did in the 70’s.

The Millennial Financial Dream

Another possible reason millennials are waiting to start a family is due to an increase in financial problems. While the “rags to riches” stories of generations past may be lost on these Americans, they are no strangers to financial hardship. Graduating in the middle of the recession, this generation has struggled to find jobs and, adding insult to injury, battled the weight of student loan debt. For that reason, financial security ranks high among the priorities of millennials. Not for the purpose of putting a car in the garage or buying that house with the white picket fence, but for many millennials the goal is financial freedom from the overwhelming debts.

Understanding how millennials view the world and their hopes for the future will provide insights into our workplaces and our homes. While the American Dream lives on in this generation, the methods and goals have changed quite a bit. One thing, however, will never change: the American Dream is what drives this country and will continue to do so for generations to come.

Retention Before Recruitment

Katie Williamson August 10, 2016

According to JB Training Solutions, “91% of Millennials expect to stay in a job for less than 3 years”. And with Millennials making up the largest part of the workforce, we definitely have our work cut out for us when it comes to retaining these individuals. As younger employees begin switching jobs more frequently, the effects are costly and quite frankly, exhausting. In fact, a study by the SHRM foundation states finding a direct replacement for an employee can cost the company anywhere from 50% to 60% of the person’s annual salary. So let’s say you are looking to replace an executive earning $80,000. Finding a replacement could cost your company anywhere from $40,000 to $48,000, not to mention the loss of productivity in the meantime.
So how can we beat these odds and ensure our employees stick around for the long haul?

Employee retention begins before the very first interview.

The best way to keep employees satisfied is to fully understand what they’re looking for. Gone are the days when a high salary and great compensation package was enough to entice an interviewee. Millennials long for purpose and direction in their career. Don’t misunderstand, while some are seeking a C-level title, the majority aren’t necessarily looking for a lofty position. The overall goal of a millennial is to learn, grow and be developed in their position.

Start by putting a plan in place for their career path. Think about where you’d like to see them take their role in the next three, five, or even ten years. Having this plan in place shows you’re investing in them as an individual and their career with the company. Maybe you don’t know exactly what type of position they’ll hold in five years, but you can show them the things they will learn. Discuss educational seminars they will attend or new skills they will develop while on the job. This is guaranteed to go further than a corner office would.

Recruitment and retention strategies are two sides of the same coin.

While setting them up for success is important, also keep in mind not everyone is going to be a great fit. In addition to thinking about what millennials want, also think about your company needs and the overall culture. The best way to ensure an employee sticks around is to determine if they are a great fit in the first place. I’ve seen this in my own experience when a job wasn’t exactly how it was laid out to me, I eventually got burnt out and left unhappy and confused.

You can prevent your employees from experiencing this new hire whiplash by making transparency an essential element of your interview process. When I left to seek a new position, PerkSpot stood out to me in one of the most obvious ways: the job description. Instead of the usual bullet points outlining the position in obscure terms, the description was familiar and informal. It painted an excellent picture of what my days in the office would look like. The transparency from the words on the screen to the face-to-face interviews ensured that from day one, nothing was ever a surprise. Within the first few days I knew the job was exactly what I had wanted and expected from the interview process.

Retention, by definition, is a continuous practice.

Beyond a new hire’s first week, remember that on-boarding is not an event that happens on the first day. When thinking about what millennials want, remember two of the most highly sought after aspects of a career for them are mentorship and development. You should already have your plan in place for where you want your new hire to take their career. Now, you just have to enable them to get there.

Keeping employees engaged isn’t a “set it and forget it” strategy. They need to know the specific goals you’ve set in place and receive feedback on their performance. Find a mentor who can meet with them in a comfortable, open environment. This is not only to provide necessary feedback, but also help them develop the skills they need to reach their goals. Millennials are eager to learn, but they can’t do it alone.

As employees long for job stability and your company profits from a secure workforce, don’t let employee retention become an afterthought. Think strategically about how to keep employees engaged. Remember that retention is an ongoing process that starts before, during and after the recruitment stages. Think of what you could do with that extra $48,000 when you don’t have to spend it on recruitment.

Want more insights like these? Fill out the form to the right to subscribe!

Employee Engagement: Myth vs. Truth

Katie Williamson July 28, 2016

These two words are changing everything: “Employee Engagement”

Bombarded with ideas of what employee engagement means, struggle with how to implement this in our businesses. But many of these ideas are not authentic representations of what’s happening in our offices.

We’re debunking the myths employers often believe about Employee Engagement.

Myth: Higher compensation = higher satisfaction.

80% of workers don’t consider money a factor in engagement. While fancy compensation packages work for some, the majority of employees simply aren’t motivated by money.

Truth: Opportunity for growth is essential to employee engagement.

What does work, however, is when employees have a place to grow and learn. Many employees are disengaged because they lack challenging assignments or don’t see how their position plays into the overall mission and vision of the company. By providing a path to success, employers can motivate their employees through a sense of purpose when they walk through the door every day.

Myth: Employees love trendy workplace policies and perks.

We see perks like work from home policies popping up left and right, but is this really what employees want? Often these employees become victims of “out of sight, out of mind” by the very policy meant to incentivize them.

Truth: Employees want to be heard.

While offering remote working perks is great for some, the root of the issue is that employees want to be heard. With increasing diversity, it’s key that employers take the time to listen and understand the challenges of their workforce, and ensure that everyone feels like part of the team.

Myth: Every manager knows what it takes to engage employees.

The Association for Talent Development states that a “New survey finds that most managers enter the role without formal training.” It’s obvious that employee engagement, like other management skills, involves proper training and development which is simply not a focus in many of our business practices.

Truth: Every manager needs to learn how to engage employees.

There are so many things we think about employee engagement that simply aren’t true. As part of your onboarding practice, managers should learn the keys to employee engagement, starting with knowing the difference between employee engagement and employee happiness. New manager? Start here.

Myth: Non-cash rewards don’t work as well as cash.

Think a $50 bill is better than a pat on the back? Yes, there is a time and a place for putting your money where your mouth is; but, research shows that more and more employees are seeking recognition and rewards above monetary compensation.

Truth: Recognition and rewards improves business results.

Bersin & Associates, through extensive research, proved that employers who implement employee recognition practices produce 12 times more business results than their counterpart. This evidence is huge in not only showing the importance of recognition on employee engagement, but also its impact on the overall success of our business.

Don’t let what you think about employee engagement trump the realities of what your employees want.

The Hidden Challenges of Working Remotely

Katie Williamson July 18, 2016

A trend emerging in our 21st century workplace: the ability to “WFH”, or Work from Home. There’s nothing better than rolling out of bed, plopping yourself on the couch with your laptop, and getting to work.

Or so…. That’s what we used to think until we heard from employees who actually had the luxury to work remotely. Here’s what we found out.

Remote workers are often lonely.

There is something to be said about going into an office and seeing the same faces everyday. Working from home is often very isolating. There are few people to run your ideas by or even chat about that funny email you just got. In fact, Forbes reports that laughter in the workplace makes employees more productive.

Remote workers have a hard time getting things done.

While not only isolating, contrary to popular belief, it’s also hard to be productive when working remotely. When you collaborate on a project or try to solve an issue quickly, remote work presents new challenges. What is usually solved by turning around in your chair, might take over a day without that luxury. Of course, there are exceptions to this rule. For technical writers, developers and the like, working alone is necessary to get into an intense focus mode this type of work often requires.

Remote workers are not necessarily more engaged.

For many businesses, offering flex time is a luxury provided in hopes of increasing employee engagement and retaining excellent employees. However, what often happens is that these employees, especially those who are full-time remote workers, fall into the “out of sight, out of mind” philosophy. For many, they feel forgotten by their employer who previously may have been a great mentor and resource to them. They miss out on these resources by simply not physically being around.

While there are clear benefits to offering flex time for employees, it’s also evident there are new challenges arising with this popular perk.

Does your business offer a work from home policy? What challenges or benefits have you seen with this implementation?

Are Perks and Benefits the Same Thing?

Katie Williamson July 12, 2016

We love perks so much we named our company after them.

But what are perks and how are they different than benefits when it comes to the workplace?

Benefits

Benefits are supplemental to salary and cover basic needs like health insurance, 401K plans, etc. While benefits are absolutely essential for companies, they also come at a price. Most benefits offered to employees cost the company something, unlike our favorite counterpart, the perk, which costs little to nothing for employers to implement.

Perks

Perks encompass everything from bike racks and lounge areas in the office to catered lunches and oh yeah, exclusive discounts on your favorite brands. While benefits are often costly, perks can be offered at a relatively low cost to employers but offer extreme value to employees. Offering perks alongside necessary benefits and compensation packages creates a powerful force when it comes to ensuring employees stay engaged and motivated in their offices. However, like all things, just making these perks available in and of itself is not enough to sustain and retain employees. As more and more businesses begin offering these incentive programs, competition increases when it comes to recruitment and retention. While nearly unheard of 20 years ago, workplace perks are more and more becoming the norm. Companies like Starbucks, Southwest Airlines, and other PerkSpot clients realize this, and that’s why offering perks are non-negotiable.

All Perks are Not Created Equal

So now the question is no longer, will we offer a perks program, but which program will we choose? Overwhelmingly, employees today request perks that improve their everyday lives, such as free gym memberships or discounts on everyday expenses such as groceries and cell phone plans. These programs are more likely to resonate with employees because they show that the employer is listening. It reaches the heart of what all employees truly desire: to be heard and understood. PerkSpot’s mission is to make that a little easier for employers. We negotiate the discounts so you don’t have to. We provide the tools to communicate with employees on how to use the platform, where to find the discounts, and even deliver the latest and greatest perks right to their inbox.

Want to learn more? Reach out to us at sales@perkspot.com

Don’t just offer perks. Offer the right ones.

Want more insights like these? Fill out the form to the right to subscribe!

Introducing the “Pre-Cation”

Katie Williamson June 20, 2016

In the land of start-ups a new trend is emerging called the “Pre-cation”.

If you’ve ever interviewed for a job, chances are one of the questions you were asked throughout the process was, “how soon can you start?”. Most of us jump right in after the obligatory two-weeks notice in our former roles just to fall into the same old trap of limited vacation days and fears of what will happen if we actually do decide to leave the office for a few days.

As a way of dispelling these fears companies like Atlassian, have taken a fresh approach by offering new hires paid time off before they even work their first day. As they put it, “This is all in the spirit of our “Build with Heart and Balance” value, in which we encourage all new teammates to start refreshed, recharged, and revitalized so they can bring their A-game when they start work.” Especially if you’ve left a job that was frustrating and draining, this little break could be exactly what you need to start off on the right foot in a new role.

It’s no secret that we struggle to find that perfect balance between work ethic and being a workaholic. By rewarding employees before they even start, the “pre-cation” helps to ensure new they leave the stress behind and start fresh. And what’s more is that by eliminating stress, retention levels are higher which can actually save employers funds they would have otherwise spent on recruitment and development.

Of course, the “pre-cation” is not without its faults. Starting a new job can be stressful in-and-of itself, so many people may find they are unable to relax and clear their minds before jumping into their new position. Not to mention, someone is paying for this time off. Unless you’ve come into a huge round of funding or already manage a very successful business, most companies cannot afford the luxury of giving employees this time off. Many of us are hiring to fill a void and therefore simply cannot afford to wait.

While flexible time-off policies may be trending, it seems the “pre-cation” notion may take some getting used to.

The good news is that you don’t have to offer your employees a “pre-cation” to be a great employer. Start by offering your employees exclusive perks through PerkSpot.

Work Ethic or Workaholic? (The Billion Dollar Question)

Katie Williamson May 10, 2016

The 12.3 Billion Dollar Question, actually.

I recently came across an article on how Elon Musk spent days sleeping at the Tesla factory in order to reach his production goals. While his passion is admirable, the poster of the article praised Musk for his “work ethic”. But can you really call sleepless nights in a cold factory “ethical”? If the boss is staying late at work, what kind of work life is he promoting to his junior employees?

The 10,000-Hour Rule

The Millennial Generation has grown up hearing things like Malcolm Gladwell’s 10,000-hour rule. Gladwell states in his book, “Outliers” that if you practice a skill for 10,000 hours or more, you will undoubtedly become an expert, or rather, an outlier. Outliers are people like Bill Gates, Kobe Bryant, Oprah Winfrey… to name a few. These examples are experts in their field and have reached a significant level of success that one could only hope to imitate. His conclusion is based on research from Anders Ericsson and Simon and Chase’s “Skill in Chess”, which, to oversimplify, states that the more time you spend on a skill (on average 10,000 hours), the better you become. Seems pretty obvious, right?

The problem in our world of instant downloads is we want to clock those 10,000 hours as soon as possible. If we work 40 hour work weeks, 52 weeks of the year, we’ve only clocked 2,080 hours. Which means it’s at least five years until we reach the average number of hours it took for these “outliers” to achieve greatness. That is unless you work 100 hour work weeks or respond to emails while interacting with your kids, like Elon Musk.

Ok, enough bashing on Musk. He’s accomplished plenty of great things and we don’t presume to know the day in and day out of his personal life. However, the discussion of whether or not we should praise his “work ethic” is definitely up for debate.

Finding the Balance

While things like the 10,000-hour rule are prevalent in discussions about the workplace, possibly even more dominant is the need for work-life balance. It’s as if we live in constant contradiction. Achieve success by working hard, but not too hard. Work 100 hours a week so you can run a billion dollar company, but also make sure you spend time with your family, cook Paleo-perfect meals, and vacation for a week in Spain. Totally achievable.

Fast Company recently published an article “How to Advance In Your Career Without Becoming A Workaholic”. The article focuses on the quality of work we do, versus the quantity. The author suggests targeting a few key factors. These include staying engaged in your work, being more efficient, investing in relationships, asking questions, and learning when to say no. These traits are arguably more essential to a true work ethic and a healthy work-life balance. Isn’t it more ethical to leave at five knowing that you’ve done your work well, learned to delegate when necessary, and accomplish personal tasks with peace of mind?

Want more insights like these? Subscribe using the form to the right!

Hey Millennials, Quit Wasting Time

Katie Williamson May 5, 2016

Time is a precious commodity in our 21st-century lives. But, social media and streaming tv aren’t the only things that steal our time. Here are some ways to be more productive and stop wasting time, provided by older generations of workers.

Ask for help

It’s hard to balance confidence and humility in the workplace. Having a stubborn attitude when it comes to asking for help doesn’t demonstrate confidence, but can demonstrate arrogance or even ignorance. Everyone needs to be taught sometimes so instead of wasting time trying to figure it out on your own, don’t be afraid to ask for help. Your boss or coworker will admire your humility. This openness also creates a dialogue and builds trust in your relationship.

Focus on the positive

One of the biggest wastes of time can be focusing on our mistakes, others’ mistakes, or things we wish we could change. In my own experience, I’ve found dwelling on my mistakes actually causes me to make more errors. I get caught in my own head instead of remembering to double-check my work or again, ask others for help. When we fixate on the things we cannot change, it causes our creativity and innovation to stall, instead of moving forward.

How should we handle mistakes? A good friend of mine told me I need to allow myself to feel it. Once we feel the weight of it, we can forgive ourselves and move on. Be transparent and apologetic with others who may have been affected, learn from the mistake, and next time think hard before repeating the same error.

Choose happiness

It’s easy to spend time being unhappy in our jobs, relationships, or in other aspects of our life. I’m still a young professional, but I realized early-on my first choice for a career was not what truly made me happy. We spend a LOT of time at our nine-to-fives, so it’s important to leave each day feeling fulfilled. After some intense soul-searching, I decided to switch careers and have never looked back. Once I started doing work I enjoyed, I found other areas of my life felt more complete as well. Don’t waste time in a place that doesn’t provide value in your life.

This advice doesn’t just apply to our careers, but also in relationships or even the places we live. If the relationship isn’t healthy for you or the other person, get out of it. If you don’t love where you live, move. Frank Warren, the creator of the PostSecret movement, says “Be wise enough not to be reckless, but brave enough to take great risks.” Don’t make a rash decision because you’re fed up, but make sure you aren’t getting to a place where your unhappiness consumes you.

Don’t let your job define you

Lastly, it’s important to remember there is more to life than your work. Don’t let your whole life go by and regret not doing more because you spent all your waking hours at work, on your way to work, thinking about work, hanging out with coworkers… you get the point. It’s a big world out there and life is too short not to experience it. Plus, new experiences can make us more innovative in our workplaces. Win-win.

What’s some advice you would’ve given your younger self?