Attracting And Retaining Millennials Through Development Opportunities: Tips For Small Businesses In Australia

If you are a small business in Australia, there are high chances that you employ work force spanning a few generations: baby boomers, Gen X, Millenials (or Gen Y) and Gen Z. So why should you focus on attracting and retaining Millennials? Career-focused, optimistic, ambitious, tech-savvy, creative problems solvers, socially aware, adaptable, flexible, and entrepreneurial. These are the buzz words that are often used to describe this generation as they mature. And they are all the great reasons why you should always strive to find out what makes them tick, and attract them to your startup and retain them.

One of the secrets of keeping Millennials on your payroll is offering them development opportunities. According to many small business support Australia experts, Millenials consider their careers as exercise platforms for personal developments and not as financial security. And this is the key to retaining them. Here are a few ways that you can do this seamlessly:

1. Mentorship programs

Many Millenials in Australia will be looking to you or your senior management for mentorship opportunities. This can be something as simple as after-work discussions where senior members of your organization present a few aspects about their expertise. Another alternative is to hook them up with senior staff who is on a role that can offer them new skillsets.

2. Personal Development Programs

One of the top traits of good leadership is identifying and nurturing talent in your employees or team members. To win Millennials, you need to show them that you are willing to help them nurture their talents. Talk about their career aspirations and find out how you can work with them together reach their potential and career goals. Formalize the process by implementing a personal development program every year.

3. External training

You can also leverage on online courses, most of which are currently affordable and valuable to small businesses. Millennials are very comfortable with online learning owing to their passion for technology and flexibility. Consider giving a choice with respect to courses that they can pursue. This will convince them that you are investing in them as individuals because you value their personal contributions to your business.

4. Allow them to step Up

Whenever a senior member of your staff is taking leave for a few days or weeks, you can give your younger staff an opportunity to step into their roles. This will give them an opportunity to review their skillset, clarifying for them some of the areas that they need to work on to move through the ranks in your organization.

Millennials are workforce of the future, and knowing how to retain them should be your business’ priority. Although they might have their quirks, with great leadership and development, they will prove to be great assets in your business.