MANAGING THROUGH THE RECESSION:A recent survey shows that Irish graduates place a higher importance on workplace flexibility than their international peers, writes CAROLINE MADDEN.
IRISH GRADUATES expect to be deskbound for their working lives, clocking in from nine to five, but what they most desire is flexibility.
A global survey Millennials at Work: Perspectives of a New Generation recently published by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) interviewed over 4,000 graduates from 44 countries in September 2008 about their work expectations.
At the time the full consequences of the economic downturn were still not clear. However, while job security must rank at the top of any short-term agenda, it’s interesting that in the longer term there are some disparities between Irish and international recruits in their attitude towards employment benefits.
Globally, new recruits said that they would prefer to receive training and development over cash bonuses. In Ireland however, the most highly prized benefits were flexible working hours, followed by greater holiday allowances. Why are Irish graduates yearning for flexibility and freedom more than their international peers?
This may be partly due to the fact that although the majority of respondents were new graduates due to start work with PwC, the Irish respondents had already clocked up a year’s experience with the accountancy firm, which suggests that they had a more realistic view of working life.
Secondly, the survey found that most millennials (individuals who entered the workforce after July 1st, 2000) expect to work regular office hours but with some degree of flexibility, whereas the majority of Irish graduates don’t expect flexible work practices.
Ireland also emerged as one of the very few countries where none of the respondents expect to stay with one employer for their entire working life. This compares to 8 per cent of all respondents who said that they expect a job for life. Some 90 per cent of Irish graduates see themselves having between two and five different employers. However, in countries such as China, the Netherlands and South Africa, millennials expect to job hop at least 10 times.
One of the key findings of the survey was that millennials are enthusiastic about working overseas – 80 per cent would like to work abroad and 70 per cent expect to use other languages during their career. According to PwC, companies can capitalise on this willingness to travel.
“Globalisation and opportunities in emerging markets mean mobile workers are an increasingly valuable asset to organisations,” says Henk van Cappelle, PwC’s European HR Services leader.
“The millennials’ desire to work overseas and use other languages could mean greater movement between countries at more junior employee levels, which would decrease some of the cost burden associated with incentivising senior executives to work abroad.”
However, although Irish graduates are just as keen as their peers to take up overseas assignments, their linguistic versatility – or lack thereof – could put them at a disadvantage. Only 18 per cent envisaged using a language other then English at work. This can be partly explained by the prevalence of English in the business world, but in other countries where English is the main language, there is a higher expectation that another language will be needed at work. For example in Australia, 46 per cent expected to use another language.
The report also delved into the area of technology and found that 83 per cent of Irish millennials are members of social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace, which is roughly in line with the international average. According to PwC, the desire of millennials to share information in this way could be harnessed to improve employee engagement, but it also presents significant risks.
“The millennials’ adeptness with technology brings benefits in terms of knowledge sharing, and savvy companies are already taking advantage of this by replicating Facebook-style sites in-house,” notes Van Cappelle. “But companies need to manage the reputational risks associated with this open and instant style of communication.”
For example companies who may have rejected a candidate, or created delays during the recruitment process, could find a disgruntled candidate making public criticisms on the internet which could be viewed instantly by thousands of people across the world, which would damage the employer’s brand, the report warned.
Corporate social responsibility is ranked very highly by millennials, with 86 per cent stating that they would consider leaving an employer whose values no longer reflected their own.
Although 80 per cent of Brazilians said an employer’s policies on climate change would be an important factor in deciding whether or not to work for them, just 53 per cent of Irish graduates were prepared to take such a strong stance. This probably reflects the higher profile of environmental issues in Brazil, such as concerns over the rainforests.
Surprisingly, PwC noticed only “nominal differences” between the results of this study and a similar survey carried out in July 2007. In fact it found “a consistency of views both pre- and post-credit crunch.”
Businesses are currently grappling with the immediate challenges presented by the economic downturn, but according to Mark Carter, partner in PwC Ireland HR services, demographics suggest that in the long term, “people supply” will be a critical driving factor for business success.
“With the global economic downturn presenting organisations with serious immediate challenges, businesses need to work even harder to balance short-term pressures with long-term objectives. This means acting now to manage the demographic changes that will impact their ability to compete effectively,” he advises.
“Eventually, in many parts of the world, fewer younger people will be working to support a significantly larger older population, making people supply a critical factor for business success and potentially changing the power dynamic between employer and employees.”
