Many employers believe they are doing great things and would be an amazing place to work, yet are finding it harder to attract and retain young talent.
It is easy to cite generational differences or a difference in attitude, but the answer may be a little closer to home - the culture of your organisation and what you have to offer may be unattractive to the young person, resulting in them not wanting to work for you.
The great news is that the changes you could make within your organisation to drive youth engagement aren’t actually as difficult as they may initially seem.
Rangatahi - a shift in priorities
My experience of working with and meeting many of Auckland’s rangatahi is that they are a supremely talented and motivated bunch of humans, and have real clarity about what they want from their lives and the part that they want their career to play.
“What’s surprising to many is that the part of their life they’ve allocated to their career is often much smaller than most people over thirty”.
This doesn’t make them work-shy. This doesn’t make them lazy. This doesn’t mean they lack drive. It means they have a real sense of what’s important to them, what’s not, and what compromises they are prepared to make in order to get a perfect balance. A new values set is emerging amongst our rangatahi, and it’s one which fits extremely well with post-pandemic ways of working.
Hiring outside the box - potential vs. experience
I chatted to a hiring manager of a small Auckland-based FinTech company earlier this week. She’s been hiring for two junior roles in her team and received over 150 applications - anecdotally, she believes that around three-quarters of them were from youth applicants. We know that competition for roles is hot hot hot, which means that employers should be in a strong position to take their pick from an ever-increasing pool of talent, fed by the great resignation.
After a selection process, they offered the role to Mike*. Mike’s CV was littered with links to watch videos of him playing games, a list of projects undertaken at university, a proud list of custom Minecraft servers he’d built, and very little actual experience for the job he was going for. On paper, most recruiters would discard such a CV in the “no experience” pile. Fortunately, this hiring manager understands the relationship between potential and experience.
Two very different offers
At the offer stage, it turned out that Mike had also been offered a role at a consultancy firm - a very different career prospect and a much more challenging competitor in the war for talent for the hiring manager. This consultancy had received the same CV, and what they saw was also untapped raw potential. At face value, it seemed like Mike would be a great hire.
After very little deliberation, Mike chose to join the FinTech organisation - despite it being much less well known, offered a smaller salary, and would arguably deliver less prestige on his relatively sparse CV. Why?
The deciding factors: flexibility, culture and balance
Mike values *flexibility*. He’s from Waikato, and the idea of leaving home or having to relocate or commute was unattractive to him. In the modern world, there still seems to be a widely held view that you have to live near your place of work. For an increasing number of roles and organisations, it’s worth rechecking if that view is still accurate.
The consultancy insisted he move to Auckland - to leave his safety, his life, his friends behind. They were asking him to find a place to live in one of the world’s most expensive housing markets and potentially needing him to buy a car to be able to travel. I think that’s a lot for a 20 year old straight out of uni to contend with, and I think it’s unreasonable too. The FinTech firm allowed him to “work from anywhere he chooses”. Software development only really needs a computer and a WiFi connection!
The value of culture
Mike values *culture*. He liked “the realness of the people” he met in the interview process. No polish or shine - just real people - warts and all. They were honest about what isn’t great about working for the organisation, and where they want things to improve. They were open about challenges they faced, and their aspirations for change.
The consultancy pulled out all the stops for a slick process in a fancy office with some added razzle-dazzle to go with it. These things weren’t of importance to Mike. He didn’t get to spend time with the team who would be his colleagues.
The importance of balance
Mike values *balance*. He liked that he’d be able to invest more time in his wellbeing at the FinTech organisation. Crucially, he’d have time for morning exercise near his home. He’d have time between meetings for him to take a break. Most attractively, he’d be able to switch off his emails in the evenings, and not be expected to be “on all hours”, giving him time for other things he values in his life like playing video games and building Minecraft servers.
Untapping the potential of Auckland's rangatahi
Honestly - I wish I had the same smarts to look after myself as our youth do. At 20, I didn’t fully understand the benefits of sunblock, good nutrition, meditation, moderating alcohol, or sleep. Our youth drink less, smoke less, exercise more, meditate more, and sleep better than any previous generation (this study by the Health Promotion Agency discusses what might be driving that) and any workplace that would put that at risk by overloading workload, relentless pressure, and high stress is becoming unattractive to candidates.
If you are looking to hire and retain new talent, with new skills and a new drive to deliver for you, it’s time to consider and make changes to:
- your own culture
- your own hiring practices
- your own decision-making process for screening CVs.
Reach out to the team at Tātaki Auckland Unlimited - they can give you some practical advice on how to start making changes so that you too can hire people like Mike in the war for talent.
(*not his real name, to preserve confidentiality. Mike is Pakeha, has lived his whole life in Waikato and is 20 years old. He’s going to be an amazing software developer - his Minecraft servers are pretty cool too.)
Author: Nick Mackeson-Smith: Chief Curiosity Officer at Five NZ and Co-Founder of Anywhere Culture
Nick is driven by building awesome people, cultures and organisations. He has led transformative programmes in agile, people technology, diversity and inclusion, mental health and wellbeing, mindset and behaviour change, ways of working and learning enablement.
Nick has 20 years of experience in doing the small stuff and the very big stuff at some of the world's and NZ's leading organisations, and is very interested in building great employee experiences that drive great customer experiences which drive great business outcomes.