Humans in the Loop
The soft underbelly of every organization in their quest to be effective is the challenge of retaining and developing talent. There exists a myriad of barriers between achieving optimal levels of retention and striving for peak development. Far from the least of these challenges is the much-talked-about fact that there are more generations at work in the same companies than ever in human history. People who were born well before personal computing existed are working alongside and leading people who have never known a world without the most powerful computers ever produced. While this can be a problem, it doesn’t have to remain one. To be successful, we must first focus on the most powerful and dynamic computing device, the humans in the loop.
Why Talent Retention Matters
The most effective way to maintain corporate knowledge is to retain the talented members who have accrued it over the course of advancing and growing the company. Their knowledge bears immeasurable value and can be hard to replace depending on continuity systems or the manner in which each person departed. Retention is not just about loss prevention. If a company can retain its best talent for long enough, it can evolve them into leaders of the next generation of workers, leaders who have grown into their roles as active members of an organization and ones who have the advantage of intimate knowledge of the organization. The advantage is mutual in that the home-grown leader knows how to navigate and shape the organization, while the entity benefits from the shaping and leading from someone who knows it best. While developing leaders from your most talented members is simple, it is never easy. An organization must ensure talented members learn the right lessons, share those lessons far and wide, and apply those lessons to create positive change. Although a simple formula, it is far easier said than done!
The Old and Young Can Benefit Each Other… Who Knew?
Another challenge to talent management is found in the generational gap. The gap is problematic because retaining and developing an organization’s young talent is often done by its more senior leaders, who can vary widely in age and kinds of experiences. Though there may be a temptation here to break every generation down by its poor taste in music and coping strategies, I will instead focus on what we all have in common. From the most senior member of an organization to its newest, we were all young once. And in our youth, we all faced the most dreadful question of all: “What the heck am I going to do with my life?!”
Where generations differ, is how each answered and actioned on that question. My parents—each of whom are Baby Boomers—grew up, learned, and worked most of their lives in a culture of organizational loyalty. They chose an industry and a company, then committed to stick with each for the duration of their careers. My generation—the feared Millennials—watched as the financial crises of 2008 decimated our parents’ finances and retirement plans. We responded with what some have coined ‘Gig Culture.’
Millennials, and the generations after us, are like mercenaries who switch jobs and careers when the circumstances suit us. So, how are you supposed to retain us? By suggesting that the answer to the question of purpose is in the opportunities an organization can provide. To do that, address the root of the question itself.
Luckily, young people have wondered about purpose for as long as there have been young people. Because of the long and consistent history of existential crises, the bank of literature on the subject is vast; it turns out there has never been a shortage of youthful angst. My favorite description of the young person’s dilemma comes from the Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. In her novel, the antagonist, Esther, utters her famous allegory of the fig tree. For those of you who hate English Literature, feel free to take a quick nap. For the rest of you, the story goes like this:
"I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet, and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet."
Welcome back literature haters! During your nap you missed Esther so frozen in her indecisiveness that she watched in horror as the many life choices ahead of her—represented as frayed branches of a fig tree—withered up and died. She learned that indecision is a decision. This is the paradox of youth; in this situation each of us were young enough to have more options than one can choose, too young to know which one is right, but wise enough to know you can’t choose them all.
A lot of young people entering the work force can relate, and as one of the most quoted allegories in modern literature, they are not alone in their struggle. However, there is a bit of a twist to this parable. It comes from the same novel, on the very next page. After sitting down to eat, “[Esther] felt immensely better after the first mouthful. It occurred to [her] that [her] vision of the fig tree and all the fat figs that withered and fell to earth might well have arisen from the profound void of an empty stomach.”
Esther was hangry. That’s it. She was freaking out about her future because she hadn’t eaten yet. And that is the tragedy of youth; we don’t quite appreciate all those calories our metabolisms are burning. The lesson we should take from Esther’s growling stomach is that the future is serious business, but so are immediate actions and self-care. Sometimes we can get so lost looking at all the fig branches, that we forget that the most important parts of the tree are beneath us; the roots and the soil they rest in. Young, talented individuals are best served nurturing their growth from the bottom up. Organizations that want to recruit, develop, and retain that talent are best served in helping them do the nurturing. When young talent and organizations understand these truths, they can coexist productively, regardless of the generation gaps that exist.
Age and Experience as Tools for Mentorship
When I mentor up and coming military officers, graduates, and family, I break all their choices down to the most granular and immediate actions. Sometimes, I am initially met with eye-rolls until we get to the actionable part of my stump speech where we decide, together, what must be done the following Monday. We then draw a clear line to how that task will inform their future decisions, thereby making their choices much more manageable. My mentee and I are, at that point, only concerned about Monday and not the whole of their professional existence. They also have a greater faith in that ‘Monday’ meaning something, namely progress. It’s a Monday that moves them toward clarity, though they may not know exactly what is being clarified. This allows people of any age to accept a bit of uncertainty in their lives because they understand that though they may not have every answer, they are actively working toward finding them. They don’t have to choose a fig branch right now; they just have to water the tree. And as their metaphorical tree grows, they’ll gain intimate knowledge of the branches, making a choice between them much easier.
All of this is to say that those of us born before cell phones have the duty to help the Tik-Tokkers in our workforce explore themselves personally and professionally if we want them to stick around. Every one of us needs detailed guidance, but this up-and-coming generation has more choices at their fingertips at age eighteen than most of us have ever had or ever will have. While daunting, if an organization can accept this struggle, rather than fight against it, and embrace it by making life’s choices more manageable through quality mentorship, then it can shift its young workforce’s mindset from that of the gig to one of productive loyalty. As a result, the newly established, long-term collaboration between the organization and its young talent will net resolute corporate knowledge and a well-informed leadership structure ready to navigate the entity through an ever-dynamic future.