Millennials Are Loyal If They Work for the Planet

Millennials are a mystery to many employers. Young adults who enter the world of jobs are considered lazy and pretentious and hard to motivate. Companies often have difficulties finding the appropriate incentives, because thirtysomethings do not respond well to the usual financial rewards, such as salaries and bonuses.

Many young workers, not only in repetitive blue-collar tasks, but also in well-paying white-collar jobs in banks, law firms or consultancies, fail to understand and appraise fully the impact of their work. For some of them, motivation and loyalty increase when they have the opportunity to be engaged in sponsored activities which have a direct and visible impact on society, such as helping to reduce poverty and inequality and help safeguard the environment.

How do we know that millennials are interested in social impact work as part of their careers and what benefits can enterprises reap by giving them this option? In a recent project (with Jasjit Singh and Michelle Rogan as co-authors) I studied a consulting company which offers its employees the chance to get away from commercial projects for a few months, and make their consulting skills available to NGOs or development agencies with a focus on the social impact. Importantly, these projects are not pro bono, as the company believes that such an approach would be neither scalable nor sustainable. Instead, corporate customers are asked to pay, although at lower rates than commercial rates, for the service.

An innovative aspect of the model is that the consultants are asked to accept a reduction in their salary and forgo the usual benefits (travel in business class and accommodation in luxury hotels) for the duration of the project. The projects last three to six months on average and involve a salary cut of between 25% and 50%. Between 2002 and 2015, more than 1,000 employees have worked on such programs, accepting pay cuts totaling tens of millions of dollars. The fact that especially younger employees, namely millennials, are willing to make such a financial sacrifice is a good indicator of how much they appreciate the program.

In addition, we observed that the consultants involved in the program were less likely (up to 32% less) to leave the company than non-participants. It also appears that that the retained employees are efficient workers, people worth keeping. This is why the choice is positive for their employer. Since the actual replacement cost of a consultant can be more than 200% of his/her annual salary, the company has saved millions in turnover costs following the introduction of the initiative. This does not mean that compelling employees to do social work increases retention. The company stands to benefit when it gives really interested employees the chance to participate in socially innovative ventures, enabling them to have an integrated professional career combining business and social commitment, instead of having to make a clear-cut choice between corporate employment and working for an NGO. Following a similar pattern, in recent years companies like Google, IBM, Intel, John Deere, JP Morgan Chase, Mars, Medtronic, Merck, Novartis and PwC have implemented CSR initiatives focusing on employees. The more millennials advance in their careers and begin to occupy positions of responsibility, the more frequent these programs are likely to be. And for business it is not just a way to positively contribute to society, but also to motivate and retain staff.