Millennials (people born after 1980) are now a widespread force across all levels of the modern workplace, and they bring with them a whole new set of employee expectations.
Having grown up with feature rich technology at their fingertips, with interconnected devices, mobile apps and hosted collaboration platforms, Millennials’ expect at least equally high standards when it comes to workplace technology. Sadly for many businesses, the workplace environment falls dramatically short!
We explore the rise of the Millennial to explain why it’s crucial for your technology infrastructure to match expectations when it comes to recruiting the most talented young workers.
The Millennials are taking over. As each year passes, a greater proportion of the workplace will be populated by workers born since Bucks Fizz’s Eurovision victory, the royal wedding of Charles and Diana and the Falklands War.
They’re a generation with different priorities to those that came before, rapid career progression and ongoing personal development coupled with work-life balance are now expected. Yet it’s in their familiarity and use of technology that Millennials will make their biggest impact upon the workplace.
Millennials are set to make up half of your workforce within the next five years. Their use of technology is completely changing the organisational workspace and the way in which we move within it.
Over 40% are happy (indeed prefer) to communicate electronically, with 75% believing that access to technology makes them more effective at work.*
When you consider the proliferation of technology throughout the developed world, into almost every aspect of our lives, it’s no surprise that Millennials should demand workplace technology that’s at least as powerful as what they have at home.
By 2013, 89% of young people used a smartphone or tablet to go online, up from 43% in 2010.**
From email and the internet in its earliest form to what we have today (Google, online banking and YouTube to contactless payment, online shopping and online donating, let alone social networking), technology and connectivity are now seen as almost a human right as much as a privilege.
For businesses, however, this ‘privilege’ is no longer a luxury but a necessity.
Maintaining technology and ensuring good connectivity is imperative, and largely driven by demand.
However, the challenge for businesses is that, for as long as end-users own and continually upgrade to the latest smartphones, tablets and computers, recruiting the best Millennials will depend on the quality and relevance of their organisation’s technology infrastructure.
The challenge for you lies in how you prepare for success in a Millennial-dominated world!
* “Millennials at work” report, pwc.com
** GDIS Policy Paper December 2014
