Millennial managers are now the majority of supervisors in the US.
Millennials were promised that if we worked hard enough, we’d have a nice house, car, family, and an employer who cares about us. We could have it all.
It was a lie.
The job market is a mess, the world is on fire, nobody can afford a house in the neighborhood they grew up in, and companies are making layoffs every five minutes.
And now, we’re trapped between Gen Z who think of work very differently (and who can blame them, seeing what happened to us?) and older generations who are just as overworked and so don’t have the time, or energy, to mentor us.
We tried to learn from the corporate mistakes of those who came before us. Make a more empathetic culture, support team members, be inclusive. But that’s all backfired with the extra pressure that comes with navigating these things alongside the more active parts of the job, plus personal and political stresses. Even just writing that is exhausting.
The average age of first-time Millennial managers is 30. We’ve started leading earlier, giving us an advantage in shaping team culture. But we can only do that with the right support.
So what can you do to support Millennial managers?
Mentor them!
Back in the day, mentoring new hires, or people looking to get a promotion, was relatively common. Now, we have to figure things out ourselves.
Even people entering their first job aren’t always trained. Then supervisors admonish them for not knowing what they’re doing. That’s a failure of management, not the employee.
Mentorship isn’t just about helping someone grow the direct skills they need. It’s about soft skills, too. It’s about getting them in the right rooms.
These skills and connections cannot and should not be underestimated, especially in the age of AI. They’re skills that AI simply doesn’t have.
Mentoring matters at every level, but when your Millennial managers are responsible for your company culture, it has an even bigger ripple effect.
Check your culture
If senior leaders support and mentor Millennial managers, they’ll show the same empathy and support to their team members. And so their team members will show it to each other.
On the other hand, if senior leaders take their bad day at home out on their employees, everyone else will feel like it’s acceptable to do that, too.
I’ve seen how this kind of culture damages people’s physical and mental health. And it’s heartbreaking to me that, by the time the company gets to the point where this is acceptable, they don’t care. It’s not about supporting each other, it’s about climbing to the top and staying there.
What a horrible mindset to have, and an even worse place to work.
Company culture is a journey, not a destination. It requires leaders to set an example, and care enough about their employees to control their emotions, not project them.
Train them!
Half of managers never experience any formal training. How can you expect them to navigate the complex workplace without any?
When my parents started work, they could start and finish their careers at the same organization. They had on-the-job training when they began, were placed on a career ladder to help them progress to management, and they knew where they were going.
Now, there’s no career ladder. No job certainty. Organizations stopped being loyal to employees, and employees stopped being loyal to their employers.
Training can build loyalty. More importantly, it can build the next generation of skilled workers who want to grow your business. 87% of Millennials consider continuous development essential. It’s a simple and cost-effective way to retain them.
In fact, 64% of Millennials will not stay with the same employer for over nine years unless they experience career progression. Not offering training isn’t a way to retain employees because they can’t go anywhere else, it’s a way to frustrate them and hold your business back.
Looks like that might just happen, too: 60% of Millennial managers are worried about a possible skills deficit in the next three years. If that’s true, it won’t be long before businesses feel the financial impact of a lack of training.
Give them the right tech (and I don’t just mean AI)
Every business needs tech in some form these days. 75% of Millennials believe access to that can improve their ability to do their job.
Rather than telling them what they’re getting, take the time to ask them what they want. How can tech support them to do their jobs better?
If Millennial managers are not part of the decision, taking their agency away in that way can affect their company loyalty and desire to do their jobs.
Create a culture of psychological safety (or help them do it)
Nobody can do their job properly if they don’t feel comfortable at work. It inhibits their ability to focus and function, and can have a ripple effect into their weekends, too.
And yet only 41% of Millennials feel psychologically safe at work. Have we learned nothing from previous generations?
Everyone is responsible for psychological safety, but it starts at the top.
Senior leaders need to feel okay with Millennial managers disagreeing or pushing back. When nobody can speak up and challenge how things have always been done, over time, they’ll stop.
If they can find somewhere in this terrible job market, they’ll leave. And if they don’t, they’ll job hug and you’ll get so little out of them your company will stagnate.
Conclusion
To support Millennial managers, you need to provide them with adequate training. The more training they have, the better they’ll be able to navigate the nauseatingly fast speed that the business world now moves in.
It’s not just about training, though. It’s about connections. When Millennial managers can connect with others in the same boat, or others who’ve been in the same boat, they can get real-time advice they may not get anywhere else.
Your employee groups can be the perfect place for employees to meet their colleagues with similar goals. With Workrowd, you can manage them more easily. So then you, and your employees, get more from your employee experience. And you can track the results. Get in touch to find out more.
