“Facetime” is Not a Social Media App: Engaging the Millennial

A Millennial worker I know texted me for advice. He had been working with a team on a project and found it very engaging. He was told that he was no longer on that project and sought to gain clarification as to why.

I asked the young man if he had called or tried to see his boss about the issue. “I wasn’t provided a clear answer” the man replied. That we were texting about this problem was metaphoric. It relates to the communication challenges managers are having with the Millennial workforce.

Helping Millennials through “career progression” is different than the “Leadership Training” approach typically taken in corporate culture. Each new generation of workers has had to be guided through becoming part of an organizational culture. The company that learns how to fully engage Millennials will be better able to capitalize on their strengths and increase retention.

The traditional career hierarchy of climbing the ladder may seem daunting to Millennials, in a hurry, especially with the focus on team collaboration. We counsel Millennials that “career progression” is more likely a series of steps that include forward, diagonal, sideways and sometimes back, all to gain the required experience.

Our approach integrates individual learning styles and personality type assessments with engagement across the multi-generational teams in the workforce. Through experiential learning exercises, we help teams and leaders better understand how to work together and discover that the organization’s strength is in the sum of its parts.

Oh, and the “texting Millennial?” He happily learned an important lesson, not to compound a miscommunication through a blizzard of texts when a phone call or a quick face to face discussion could have clarified the misunderstanding. He had been left off the team by mistake, and was soon back engaged in the project. I advised him, in person: “Never assume, and always be your best advocate by engaging in face to face discussion for important topics needing alignment.”