Musical Millennials: 4 Key Ways To Motivate Millennials In Your Sales Team
Millennials, Baby Boomers, Generation Y, are all great names for a punk band, yet instead they’re the names used to describe the different generations in today’s workforce.
What makes Millennials specifically so important? Well because there’s SO MANY OF THEM in today’s workforce – more than any other generation in fact. Back in 2017 Millennials occupied 35% of the UK workforce with that number expected to rise by 50% in 2020 (PWC). This is definitely reflected here at Prime, with most of our workforce across both offices made up of Millennials.
With Millennials being such a prominent part of today’s workforce it’s important to know what makes them tick and what can motivate them to tick even faster. Now when it comes to sales, every business owner knows that if you have an unmotivated team you may as well be running a one-man lemonade stall. Put your Lemons away – Prime are here to help. We’re about to give you Prime’s 4 musical tips for motivating Millennials, each attached to a famous song lyric. Why? Well because we do things differently at Prime and because we love a good sing song.
“These boots are made for walking” – A fun working environment
Nancy Sinatra once sung “these boots are made for walking” and that lyric is no more relatable than to a Millennial who’s unhappy in their job. When a Millennial isn’t engaged in their work, you’ll more than likely know about it, according to a statistic from Gallup – About 21% of Millennials report switching jobs within the last year, and 60 percent are open to a different opportunity (Gallup). This means they’re not afraid to quit their job if they’re unhappy, which means your recruitment and retention policies need to motivate them to perform at their best and stay on your team.
As a career in sales normally comes with lots of out of office work and long hours, making your work environment a place where your staff want to be is the best possible way to rectify the issue of a good work-life balance. At Prime we have flexible working hours to accommodate the millennial mindset. When asked, 75% of Millennials said they would favour a job that gives employees the option to work flexibly (Workplace Insight). Additionally, we have multiple staff nights out and target hitting incentives (including holidays and free meals) as all of these are big selling points to Millennials, and definitely help reduce the challenges associated to a work-life balance within the sales industry. And why wouldn’t you want to have fun with your team anyway?
“I’m movin on up now” – Quick and clear progression
Now if there’s one thing that can make a Millennial quit their job, it’s boredom! Although a fun working environment is a good way to motivate them, they still need goals to strive towards in their day to day. When asked the question, what is the “right” amount of time to stay in a single role before being promoted, about two-thirds said less than two years, and a quarter said less than 12 months (Dynamic Signal). Keeping clear goals, targets and a progression plan with lots of short-term growth will allow Millennials in your workforce to always have an achievable target to strive towards, meaning they’re less likely to get bored in their role.
Where the hours of sales/recruitment can often work against attracting Millennials, the progression opportunities massively work in our favour. For example, through Prime’s fast-track progression plan you can go from a Resourcer to a Director in 6 clear promotion steps. Millennials are hungry for success and that’s why it’s important to motivate them through achievable milestones.
“It’s the eye of the tiger” – Training
Just like Rocky Balboa everyone needs training and your Millennial workforce is no different. They’ll be grateful for the training as well, as according to Millennial Branding, 72% of Millennials value the chance to learn new skills and 35% of them felt that excellent training and development programmes were essential when considering a potential employer (PwC). Because of a highly competitive workplace, Millennials want to have varied experience that complements their main area of expertise and raises the likelihood of career enhancement. At Prime we believe in giving people the skills they need to succeed, and that goes for both our candidates and employees. Through consistent training and continued support you won’t only get to see your team become more competent, but also they be growing a better understanding of the role and industry they’re working in. Subsequently, it’ll make them more likely to stay with your company due to the investment you’ve shown in developing them and the trust you have built between yourself and your members of staff. This too will benefit you as when there’s trust between a company and its staff, employee retention rates increase. ‘When Millennials believe their company has a high trust culture, they’re 22 times more likely to want to work there for a long time’ (Firstup).
“You raise me up” – Support and feedback
Did you know, that according to Dynamic Signal, 44% of Millennials say they are more likely to be engaged when their manager holds regular meetings with them. But only 21 per cent of them meet with their manager on a weekly basis (Firstup). Millennials are known to embrace inclusion and teamwork so it’s a no brainer that constructive feedback and regular 121s are a key way of keeping them motivated and engaged. In a sales environment, as well as regular 121s allowing your employee to address any problems or challenges they might be having, they also allow you to discuss any performance issues or give praise where it is needed. Moreover, this will allow you to set individual members of staff targets which adds to the clear progression and incentive opportunities discussed above.
Most importantly though these regular meetings show your workforce that you care about them as individuals and not just as a means to make money, which is another huge motivation for Millennials. A stat from greatplacetowork.com states, ‘at companies where managers show sincere interest in millennials as people, the organisation sees an 8x improvement in agility and 7x increase in innovation’ (Future Legacy). Basically, if you invest in the development of your team of Millennials, you’ll get it back in abundance.
