Retaining Gen Z Talent – An Insider’s Perspective

Context

Business leaders are struggling to retain their top young talent. An extremely tight labour market and stagnating productivity are compounding challenges. While millennials are known as the “job hopping” generation, Generation Z (born 1997-2012) is proving even more difficult to retain, spending 33% less time with their employer before changing jobs. While similar in some respects, Gen Z’s needs and perspectives are different than that of millennials.

Objectives

This speech aims to provide the roadmap for organizations to become a leader in Gen Z talent retention. It provides the necessary background for business leaders to understand their youngest employees. It highlights the three principals any organization must adhere to if they want to better retain their young professionals. Finally, it outlines cost-effective, actionable strategies companies can use to begin implementing the principals.

Key Takeaways

Organizations that retain their young talent best do a combination of the following:

1. Embed flexibility throughout the work: Not only do they recognize that the flexible work environment is here to stay, they take the concept of “flexibility” beyond just giving employees the freedom over where they work from.
2. Improve the in-office experience: They understand that the in-office experience builds culture and improves collaboration, so they offer incentives that make young employees excited to come work in-person.
3. Provide well-defined growth opportunities: They see how young employees re-evaluate their career progression every 6-9 months, so they create meaningful opportunities for employees to continuously develop and drive impact.

About Andrei

Andrei is a leading voice for Generation Z, connecting corporate Canada with the perspectives and demands of this demographic. As a university student himself, he has worked with dozens of organizations on Gen-Z focused research, marketing and strategy projects. His work has included leading the retention & recruitment strategy development for multiple TSX-100 companies. Over the years, Andrei and his teams have informed their work (and this speech) by connecting with 1000s of university students / recent graduates from coast-to-coast-to-coast.

About TEDxMcGill

Hosted annually in Montreal, TEDxMcGill is a day-long conference organized by McGill University students under license from TED. The conference connects 16 speakers of diverse backgrounds with 200+ community-leaders, local residents and students.