With the recent reports that in the next five years, three out of five employees in the workplace will be Millennial, professionals converged in Lagos recently to brainstorm on the challenges faced by organisations whose workforce now increasingly constitute the Millennial demographic.
The event titled ‘Who Really Cares about Workplace Motivation’ was convened by Nduneche Ezurike, a marketing communication specialist and head brand and marketing communication in one of Nigeria’s commercial banks.
The event, which drew a large section of professionals from across the country, explored recent developments in managing Millennials in the formal sector. While the event attracted varied perspectives, it also agreed on the need for inter-generational harmony between the Millennials and the Generation X, the latter who still constitute the largest number of employees within the organisation.
Earlier in his presentation, Ezurike highlighted critical challenges being faced by organisations in their response to the challenges of the fourth industrial revolution. He noted that the leadership model, which has formed the crux of most corporate strategies over the years, may not be able to achieve the expectations of an innovative enterprise in the business environment of the future.
“While prevailing leadership models are largely focused on how to create, manage and measure financial capital, the millennial economy requires leaders to upskill themselves to ensure they are digitally smart as well as developing emotional intelligence skills as cultural competence, empathy, adaptability, and intellectual curiosity,” Ezurike said.
“Rather than describe and treat the millennial employees as the statistical manpower and workforce, the Millennials will want to be recognized as talents who have come into the workplace with a value proposition and will be expecting their employer to provide them with opportunities to accelerate their talent, in exchange for their contribution to enterprise productivity and innovation. The Millennial employee expects the organisation to have an employee value proposition that clearly defines shared benefits for both employee and enterprise,” he said.
