Gen Z in the Workplace: How Engagement Shapes Retention

Appreciate all of you coming out for Transform 2024. I love it. I think there's something amazing about the group of people that join these type of engagements. We all share this incredible passion for transforming the workplace, which is awesome to see. Some cases, we're the ones driving it. We want to drive the transform transformation that we see in the world of work. And then sometimes it's like happening to us. You know, unfortunately, we're the ones that have to transform to some of these external forces that are coming our way. And that's what we're here to talk about a little bit today. Those Gen Zs coming into the place. Can we get a shout out for the Gen Zs? I love it. I've had a mixed sentiment with some of the people I've been talking about. Some people are like, let's get these Gen Zs in here. Some people are like those fricking Gen Zs. I remember that when I first came in. It was the same sentiment. There's freaking millennials, But I'm excited. I think today we can start to rewrite some of those mindsets. By the way, we're also bringing in more chairs. I see if people sitting on, on the ground. Thank you. Um, we're bringing in some more chairs here, but I think through dialogue and discussions, we can actually be pretty excited about this next generation coming in and some of the values they can bring and new mindsets that we can adopt into the workplace. So I'm excited to dig into that. My name's Zach Doms, by the way, I'm with a achieve engagement. I'm the community and culture program director. Thank you. I get to spend my time working with HR leaders, people leaders in our community, and our purpose has always been to really rethink the ways that we can achieve engagement. And we do that by bringing together tons of thought leaders, practitioners, people who are leading research in this space, internal practitioners who are leading this work at their own organizations, and really share these insights, share some of these strategies and things that they're executing to kind of navigate the choppy waters of the employee experience. So we have a lot packed for you today. We have a great lineup. We're gonna introduce some of the research that we've been doing in this space as well, so you can start to understand like, what does Gen Z look for from their employer? How do they look to be engaged with the workforce that they're entering into over the next couple years? And then also we're gonna spend some time in discussion mode. I think one of the coolest parts of these transform experiences is also the people that you get to meet and it's day one, right? So hopefully we spend some time exchanging these ideas, but also developing some deeper relationships with the people around us. So I'm super pumped. Are you guys excited? Right on. One of the ways that we navigate this space is by working with a lot of different partners. So first, can we give a huge shout out for hi Bob for bringing this together. They've been an awesome partner. First. They're like leading some incredible research in this space, part of some of the stuff that we've been doing on this topic. So we're gonna release some of that with you today. We've also crowdsourced a whole menu of strategies for you. So everyone who joins and really engages with with us throughout this session, you're gonna get that almost like menu of strategies on engaging Gen Z crowdsource from over a hundred different companies throughout the globe. So super excited to share some of that with you today. Um, but to dig into it, let's share some of the insights that Hi, Bob's been releasing. I'd love to welcome my partner in crime with me today. Uh, Sarah Reynolds. Let's give her a warm welcome. Sarah's gonna share a little bit about what we've been learning. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for coming. Um, I know we are at standing room only. I'm really, really grateful for all of the interest in this topic, um, to dive right in and, and waste no further time. Um, my name is Sarah Reynolds. My pronouns are they and them. I am Chief Marketing Officer at Hi Bob. Really grateful to be here with some excellent partners in crime today, talking to you about how to engage Gen Z in the workforce. Um, as Zach shared, we're going to share some, um, insights and some findings from our research, but this session is really about you. So I'm only gonna be up here for about 10 minutes sharing a few key takeaways. Then we'll move into a panel discussion. We'll do some icebreakers and we'll do that workshop that, um, that deep dive within your tables later on in the session. So I'm really looking forward to this. Um, I don't think I need to tell all of you this. I think probably your interest in this topic stems from what you already know, which is that it's an unprecedented time in our workforce. There's four generations. Some people say five generations working side by side and they could not be more different. I'm really, really glad that you're all here today because you're starting to think about how to engage Gen Z early, right? They're not the biggest group in our workforce today for some companies, but they certainly will be as we move forward. You can see by 2030, about 30% of the overall workforce is gonna be made up of Gen Z, which means figuring out what makes them tick now is more important than ever before as we look out to the next five years of our business performance. So what did we find in our research was the challenge that people articulated when it came to understanding Gen Z, understanding how to engage them, understanding how to delight them at work. Wanted to share just three quick stats with you from our research, and you can find this online. It's called The Young Generation in Tech Research. It was done by hi Bobb in partnership with actually one of our investors, which is Eight Roads. Uh, it's a great piece of work. There are some, um, different cuts depending on where you're based. If you're based in the US or they're based in the uk and you wanna understand the different, uh, dynamics in your region. There's some great specialized data in there. But overall, let's talk about Gen Z. So first of all, 54% of Gen Z report that they are disengaged, actively disengaged at work. That is the most of any generation in the research. That means more than half of the Gen Z employees in your company are not just passively disengaged. They're actively disengaged. That's a real challenge when it comes to talking about not just engagement, but what engagement drives for all of us, which is productivity and performance. 34%, they intend to leave their job within the next two years. Uh, I think lots of us have heard the story about how millennials are job hoppers. I think if you thought that that was gonna go away when the generational divide changed, perhaps I have some bad news that Gen Z is here to continue that trend. Um, and then finally, I think this is really interesting for me. Um, one in three Gen Z folks that we surveyed said that they would leave their job even if they didn't have another job lined up. And as someone who entered the workforce in a recession, this is very foreign to me, but I think it demonstrates the power that Gen Z feels in voting with their feet when it comes to making their, um, making their voices heard and helping you understand or, or teaching you very painfully that they're not willing to put up with anything other than success in the workplace. So of course that leads us to the biggest question of them all, which is we know what the problem is. Sarah, thank you so much for standing up here and articulating what we feel every single day. What is it exactly that they say that they want? Because we're trying to crack the code now. So what do they want? I think you might have heard this one in performance conversations in one-on-ones in coaching your managers in how to talk to Gen Z, they want professional growth. They're looking for a career path with your organization. They're looking for formal guidance. They're looking to understand what they need to do to move up. And if they don't see that path with your organization, if they don't see the opportunity for the next position and the one after that and the path that gets them where they wanna go, they're gonna go find an organization, they're gonna vote with their feet and find an organization who really lays that out for them. They want companies that align with their values, right? They wanna know, are we doing good in the world with what we sell and market and produce, right? Are our, is our company living by the values that we put up on slides from hr, right? Or are they just pretty words on a poster? They want to know that they are working at a company that they can be proud of and one that whose values really align with what they want to see and what they value themselves. They want connection. Uh, in our research, we actually found that a lot of Gen Z folks are looking for hybrid or in-office opportunities. They have, as the slide says, major fomo. And for many folks, you know, they went to college for example, or even high school during the pandemic when they really missed out on that connection. They want connection in the workforce and they don't want to feel isolated or at home, right? So think about how that impacts what they look for. And then finally, I think the one that you probably talk to your managers the most about is that they want different management styles. Um, I heard it described one time as take everything you know about people managing for baby boomers, gen X, millennials, throw it away because all of that stuff is gonna be a huge turnoff. It's gonna give Gen Z the ick and start again. The ick is like a turnoff. But Gen Z lingo for those of you don't, who don't keep up with, uh, love Island the way that I do. They're looking for leaders. They're not just looking for bosses, right? And they want to ask questions. They wanna be intellectually curious. They wanna know what the next step is. They wanna know why things are happening. For many of your executives and your leaders who learned people management, the fundamentals of people management at a different time with a different generational makeup in the workforce, you're gonna hear some wild stuff when they start to, uh, engage with Gen Z because either they're gonna feel like, you know what? I'm baked, they need to come to me, or you're gonna hear, I really wanna engage with them, but everything that I do seems to be wrong. It seems to be not what they want, right? Or I'm, I'm trying to get over my own bias, but I just don't know how. I think thinking about the management styles that you're trying to cultivate in your organization is so, so important when we talk about engaging Gen Z in the workforce. So thank you. As I said, there's a lot more insights in our young generation in Tech report. I do encourage you to Google it. Uh, I think my team, if you see one of the members of the Hi Bob team, would be happy to send you the link, uh, as follow up. Um, I would love to, uh, welcome Zach back to the stage. I think we're gonna move into a panel discussion where you can hear not just from me, but from some really great thought leaders on this topic. All right, thank you Sarah. Can we give her a round applause? Awesome. I love that. I mean, that research is buzzing, right? Um, that might be the only one I try tonight. But I'm excited for this panel because like I said, this is a lot of new experiences, new realities that we're trying to navigate. And I think some of the best ways to truly learn and evolve our own workplace practices is from our peers, other people who are in this space as well. So we have an amazing lineup. Obviously you just met Sarah Randalls. Can we give her another round of applause? I love to welcome up our two other panelists as well. We have Claude Silver. Can we give Claude a huge round of applause? And how about welcome? I know. Let's stick this. Alright, so unfortunately we don't have the entire conference to talk about this. So we, we have to really pack in a quick 30, 45 minutes on how to engage Gen Z, right? So we're going dig right into it. So I'd love maybe including introductions to a certain point and sharing a little bit about the work you're leading. But then I would love just to hear your philosophy or perspective on this subject as you have been talking about it, starting to talk about or whatever your realities are. So Hiba, would you mind kicking us up? Absolutely. Hi, HIA. So nice to meet you all. Um, I'm the Chief people Officer at Workweek and I also, uh, created and write a newsletter called, I Hate It Here About Work. Um, comes out every Monday, so hopefully you write it today. Um, what else did you want us to talk about, Zach? Our perspective on Gen Z? Yeah, let's start with that. Okay. Uh, gen Z, they've taught me so much and I'm not cool. Um, and I think they're really, they're bringing a different conversation to the workplace that I think a lot of people have been excited to have, but haven't really felt like they have the voice to have the conversation. So if you're Gen Z and you're in the audience, thank you. You're doing great. I agree. My name's Claude Silver. I'm the Chief Heart Officer at Vayner Media. Um, I'm a Taurus with a Scorpio moon and a cancer rising. Any mass Out there, we're doing astrology, You know, and, um, God, gen, gen Z is here to stay and I agree with you a thousand percent. They are talking about things that as a Gen Xer, I wish I could have talked about mental health, what, you know, you had to lie to go to a therapy appointment or find one on a Saturday. So, uh, they're here to stay. We're gonna be working for them. And, uh, glad to be here. Thank you. And then you already met me, but I'm Sarah Reynolds. My pronouns are they and them, and I'm chief marketing officer at Hi Bob. I love this topic because, um, as I say to folks all the time, the kids are all right. Um, as someone who's really proudly non-binary, one of the things I really appreciate about Gen Z is how effortlessly they engage in some of these topics. How effortless it is to talk to them about name changes or pronouns in the workplace, um, and how much they push the conversation forward. They're not afraid. I think as my co-panelists, uh, pointed out, and as somebody who's very outspoken myself, I think that that is, uh, is something that I have really come to love and cherish about the new folks who are coming into the workplace. It's not without its challenges, um, but I think it makes me a better leader and a better manager to engage. So I'm really excited, uh, to be here. I love it. What a lineup we have. Thank you. So you kind of started Sarah as well, Sharon, right. Comes with its challenges. And Claude, something we've even talked about before this with some of you notice how this even plays a role in the generational dynamics within the workplace and, and it brings its own unique challenges across these generations. Um, can you share some of your experiences with that so far, Claude, and, and your perspective? Yeah, for sure. Thank you. Um, well, let's stick with mental health. Let's stick with our emotions allowed in the workplace. That's a big one. And what do you do with emotions and how do we train our leaders and managers to deal with those emotions, especially if they're have, if they come into the workplace with armor, the last thing they wanna do is deal with Johnny over here, who's got a DHD and Sally over here who's got, you know, got gotta go to a therapist three times a week. Like, they don't, they don't have, we, those managers don't have the vocabulary or the awareness, and that's, that's not their fault. It's where we are right now in the world. Gen Z is really bringing us into, I think, the space that we've always, I think many of us have wanted to play in or be in, which is honesty and transparency and what's so wrong with that? It's fantastic. There is, there is a point where it gets a little bit much, where it's like, okay, wow, that was a lot that I just took in. Do you have support? Is there someone you speak to outside of work? You know, aside from us in people and experience team, what I usually, what I call hr, we're not, we're not doctors and we're not therapists. We're coaches and we're guides, and we will absolutely help connect them to whatever we possibly can within reason. But I'll never recommend a therapist put it that way. Um, so it's just, it's been, I, I think I'm speaking to, to the preaching to the choir. Speaking to the choir. Like they have a lot of needs and they want their needs to be heard, understood, and met. And I think there's a nice negotiation when it comes to what does met mean? Can I add something? Yeah, go ahead. Um, I think a lot of the clashes that happen at work between Gen Z and other generations, it's just about the norms. Like it wasn't normal. Even I'm a millennial and elder, millennial, um, and even there are things that I would feel uncomfortable talking about at work, like compensation or my mental health. And so I think that Gen Z, when they're in the workplace and they want to have these conversations and they're bringing up things that inherently might like for all of us, like not be the norm, it's the managers and the leaders then have like, not a great reaction. And so I do think echoing what clots are, like really talking to your managers about how to respond to these things that might seem different to you are actually standards to them. Yeah. Just really quickly. I I mean they talk about their salaries bonkers As they should, as they should, As they should get Federally protected, right? Everyone. And that's something, yeah. Gen Xers never did. So ongoing challenge that we have in our community at achieve engagement, especially for all of us in the HR people leader department, it's like, okay, we make, we get it. We wanna be able to spread these things. But sometimes the biggest barrier is getting executive buy-in or engagement on these things. And how about, I know you and I have talked about this, how it's, this isn't just an HR thing, right? It's gotta go beyond that. So, hey, would you mind, how do we start to maybe approach that? Or how do we start to make this less of just like hrs thing? And also it's everyone's thing throughout the organization. I Think by like 2040 they said Gen Z is gonna be the, or Yeah. Gen Z's gonna be the majority of the workplace. And so like, it can't be an HR problem and it's not even a problem per se. It should be everyone should be thinking about how do I engage with talent and they are gonna be the majority and you can't ignore that. And their wants and needs essentially need to be heard if they're gonna stay. I think Gen Z is changing jobs, Sarah, what you said faster than millennials were. And, and at the time everyone was like, oh my god, millennials are changing jobs so much. Well, gen Z will leave in six months if they're not having their needs met. Mm-Hmm. And so that is so much more than an HR thing. It's every one of your executives needs to understand what does this generation want and need, and can we fulfill that or not? And I think starting the conversation there is really powerful. I love that. Sarah, being in your role like CMO as well, how do you advise maybe some of the HR folk in the room here, you know, develop a deeper relationship with someone like you in, in this role or the executive team? How do you approach these conversations? I think it's all about first assessing where the person is on the other side of the table. So if you're speaking to someone who's maybe more curmudgeonly on this subject or isn't as hopefully open-minded as I try to be, um, or you're speaking to someone who is dismissive, I think that building a business case, just like you would build a business case for anything is a great way to go. You know, pointing out, for example, that whether you like it or not, the demographics are switching and this is gonna become the majority of your workplace. You know, for A CEO who has a five-year plan or a 10 year plan, this should be bullet point number one or two on that plan. 'cause it has a big impact from the business perspective. If you're talking to someone who's more open-minded, or genuinely curious or, you know, already sees the, the value of engaging with this generation, it might be starting the conversation in a different place. It might be saying like, what are you doing? What, what is a challenge for you? You know, let's create a safe space where you, who maybe aren't always comfortable talking about your emotions, but you can share your emotions with me, your HR business partner, your chief people officer to say, you know, what, what's been working for you? Or what's been working for your leaders or your managers? And what are they struggling with? So to HIPAA's point, you know, for example, politics, we're about to enter a US election year. There's a million things going on geopolitically around the globe, right? And all of those conversations are coming to bear in the workplace. You can't control that as much as you might want to. Uh, what you can control though is whether or not your managers have really great conflict resolution training or they have the opportunity or a safe space to share that. You know, these are conversations that are coming up and, and to talk to you and engage you on, well, how do you wanna, you know, set policy in your organization? How do you want to, um, put some boundaries in place if you feel like that's right for your team, right? How, what channels do you want these engagements to happen on? Right? Or, or how do you want to respond? Or how do you want them to respond or not respond when something comes up that, that they see or they hear, um, that maybe looks a little different from what they would've thought about in the last election year or the, you know, 20 election years that they've seen come before that. So I think it's really, really important for you to think about how do you, how do you start the conversation with the personality who's sitting across the table in the right place. I want to dig into that some enablement strategies too in a second. But Claude, do you have anything to add, especially having like that closer relationship with the c-suite, maybe having some of those longer vision conversations. Right? Share like five year strategies, 10 year strategies. That's definitely, hopefully part of the strategic plan. Um, Claude, can you expand on that as well of how do you spread that buy-in? Yeah. Yeah. I think alongside of that, we're a global conver, uh, global company. So you need to also think about, well, we need to think about how those cultures, what are those cultures even? Like, what are those, there's a Gen Z person in Bangkok. What is that culture like? I don't speak the language. You know, how can we embrace and make sure that that person feels like a vain or citizen locally, right? Because it's no good if I talk to them. The other thing I would say is there's this, when we think about strategies, you know, the immediate strategy is how are we creating entitlement? Because we don't wanna do that. And I think we came from such a, um, probably a, a, a warm and fuzzy place for a bit when we had that luxury, when finances weren't at such a crunch time where we could be, I would say, more empathetic than the average bear. Our our internal culture is called the Honey Empire. And I would say we were like 75% honey, 25%, uh, empire. And now we're probably about 51 Honey, 49 Empire. So, you know, entitlement and empowerment is something we're thinking about all the time. And again, this is globally. And in order to do that, we have to have systems in place. We have to have training capabilities, training, we just rolled out something called core competencies, uh, across the land. So, uh, and that's something that the Gen Zs really like because it really tells them how to get from point A to B2C to D. And that's what they want. They won't growth yesterday. And really, really quickly, I, this was amazing. I had this guy come in, um, first year, first year at a job, I think came in and he did his self-assessment and he gave himself all fives. And I said, wow, sweet. That's, that sounds so amazing. Hell yeah. Getting king. Yeah. And, and, and then I read his review, the review from the managers and I just said, gosh, I don't know. I would never give myself all fives. Like, wow, you know, how do you know just talking through that, that he thought he had done the job that was on the piece of paper to his liking. So there's so much conversation and fertile ground that needs to happen here. And I know we're gonna talk about the gig economy in a second, so I'll save that. Yeah, that's gonna be, we definitely want to dig into that. Do we have any fives in the room? I feel like we're all fives. Am I right? Hello. We're All fives. We are all fives. Um, and also any global companies, any global represents. Yes. All right. Props out to all of you. 'cause this definitely takes it to another level. Um, Sarah, you started talking a little bit about some of the strategies that can actually create some impact. I mean, some of the leadership training, the enablement resources, developing some of these systems. Um, in our conversation you shared something around, you know, the importance of career pathing as a another engagement strategy. Can you talk a little bit about how we might look at that for this generation? Yeah. So I think that there's a couple of different ways of thinking about career pathing. I think laying out a framework and being transparent beyond anything else is the very best thing that you can do. Because no one is born understanding that the first job that you enter into is maybe at a specialist level, then you become a manager, then maybe you become a head of in your organization, then you become a director, then you become a vp. Uh, trust me, as someone who looks at things like search traffic, people are googling like what's hiring an organization, a manager or director by the millions every single month, right? It's not obvious. And it's certainly not obvious what the differences are for people, managers, or individual contributors. It's certainly not obvious, you know, what the differences, different requirements for each of those roles are, nevermind just the level. So I would encourage you to be transparent, even if you don't have everything figured out, be transparent. 'cause they're gonna ask, right? They're gonna treat it a bit like a worksheet. Like what do I need to do to get to the next level? You better be transparent about what the answer is, right? Um, the other thing I would think about is we're all smart HR people, right? You're gonna bump into folks who are like, well, I wanna get promoted, you know, every two years. Uh, that's, that's my new expectation. That's been, you know, my experience at previous companies. And we've seen different ways that HR has come to maybe think about, well, how are we gonna address this? Um, my team shared with me an example from meta, right? They've got a billion employees or whatever now. Um, they, they've decided to, to do the thing that you would do if you were trying to solve this problem and maybe you didn't have a background in HR management or systems engineering or pay equity or building a salary structure. Um, they've decided that they're basically just gonna have infinite levels in their organization. So they are just gonna create, uh, every two year promotional plan where you move from software engineer one to software engineer two to software engineer, 3, 4, 5, 6, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You can imagine you're punking me. That's not real. Apparently. This is real. I'm sorry. But I think that for most of us, like we, we know in this room that we don't have the luxury of being able to do that. We need to have a, a finite number of jobs in the organization. We need to be able to group them, right? We need to be able to level them. We need to have a, a job catalog that makes sense for the size of our business. So I think in reality, like we're, we're not necessarily gonna go to that place where you have, you know, even five or even 10 levels of an engineering function. It's probably gonna be more like you have a, a se uh, a regular engineer and a senior, you're probably gonna have three, maybe a one, two and a three system, right? Whatever your company chooses, that's up to your company. And that's up to your strategy. What you can do as the HR leader is of course influence that strategy, but more importantly it's communicate that strategy out to the employee so that they know, you know, hey, there's, there's two levels in this job. This is what makes, you know someone, uh, a one and this is what makes somebody a two or a senior, right? This is what I need to do to move the needle and get there. This is what it would mean to me to take on people management or what my, you know, pay opportunity would be if I added a new skill to my resume. 'cause we're all moving to skill-based, you know, job architectures and whatever now, right? I think it's, it's really, it's a great time to be in HR and it's a great time to drive some really important conversations on this topic where, where you can educate folks a little bit about why, you know, of course they might have read an article about meta's 100 types of software engineers or whatever. But that's not gonna work when your company's 50 people. Exactly. Anyone else considering like creating a thousand levels of career opportunities? Don't do it. I just have one more thing to add to what Sarah saying. You were talking about, um, the infinite levels and Gen Z coming to the table with their talking points. They're like the most online generation ever, obviously. 'cause like the more generations more online, um, and they know better than we do sometimes. Like I'll watch tiktoks or people will say, well here's how I negotiated a salary. And I'll watch the whole thing and be like, wow, actually I would've, I would've given them the raise. Like that's actually a pr they made a good argument. And so they're the most online generation ever. So if you are waiting for them to come to you to have a response crafted, you're way too late. 'cause they're gonna beat you to it. And then they're gonna realize that you're not on your game and they're gonna leave. And the cost to replace an employee is like three to four times their salary. And if you're just bleeding that because they keep leaving 'cause they're besting us at our own game. Like, there's something to be said there. So I think like having growth conversations mapped, compensation clearly communicated and being ready to have that conversation as HR is gonna be super important for Gen Z, I feel like there's this underlying value of just proactive transparency in all realms of HR career paths, pay bands, all these different things. Is this desire for transparency. It's not maybe sometimes always like, you need to meet my demands. I just want transparency around how these decisions are being made and like how do I dictate or better to find my future within this transparency. I saw an incredible stat that, um, this isn't just about Gen Z but employees in general, uh, a majority of them would leave their job today and take a, the same job in another company for the same pay, just for increased transparency around pay and, and career pathing, right? That's an incredible statistic. Like a majority of your organization would go take this. It's not even about the next job in the a hundred levels. They would take the same job someplace else just to get a transparent answer to their question. That means that you have incredible power to move the needle for your organization. So they're essentially really debunking a lot of the things that we traditionally do, right? And, and forcing us to kind of transform in that essence of transform a lot of the ways that we approach these practices. And how about you really, you and I talked a little bit at lengths about this debunking of the way we just even think about work or how, how this generation views work in its essence. Can you share a little bit about that and and what you mean? Yeah. I feel like, uh, I don't know, for the longest time I associated my career with like, my entire personality and self-worth. And I feel like Gen Z is like, what are you doing? You are sad lady. Like, and I I'm working on it in therapy. Okay. Like I'm working on, and they, I think they've changed my mind to like how I view work and how I interact with it as well. And I think that's like really powerful to just think that people want more than just coming to work and being great being a five. Like, they want to feel like they're valued. They wanna feel like they're appreciated. That, that you're seeing that their values align with your company values. They, they just want more. And I, I like just really appreciate it. 'cause there are things I'm too, I was too afraid to say I wanted at work that Gen Z is just on TikTok telling everybody they want it or their recording layoffs and exposing like a huge gap in how we even do that. And so I, I think like their relationship with work is, I honestly think they're like calling BS on a lot of the things we do as HR and it's like really hard. 'cause I'll watch it and I'll be like, EI do that too. And it, so I think like that's just the thing that they're doing and that that honesty is really important. So it's like kind of transparency, account accountability as well. Buzzword. Uh, while, while we have you on the mic, I'm curious though as well their expectations on some of the experiences that they have with you, especially from like a tech experience. Um, oh Yeah. I think one of the wildest things, I don't know if anyone raise your hand if you do this, if you open an app and the buttons aren't where they're supposed to be and you get really mad, does anyone do that? Or just me? I worked in tech. I worked in tech, come on. I was a project manager. So I think about this forever. I think the way Gen Z is interacting with HR Tech is incredibly fascinating because if they have to open up something and it takes them forever clicks to figure out anything or it's not even usable, or the only reason they open your system is to put PTO in which an employee actually told me recently that that's a problem. And so like as we're thinking about like how do we actually engage them, the solutions that we pick can be a huge driver of engagement. And so when you're thinking through like, what tech do I need in my tech stack, asking yourself like, is this even something that Gen Z would open and know how to navigate? If the answer is no, then like, what are you investing in? I'm just going to give a shout out to hi Bob. Because that's really one of the reasons that we picked Hi Bob about three years ago. I, uh, specifically said to Ronnie, the CEO that I wanted to be able to have a baseball card. I'm very visual. I just wanna be able to see like all the stats I need to see on this person and salary and whatnot. And lo and behold, they've been incredible, um, uh, design partners. This isn't, you didn't pay me to say this at all, but I think the greatest thing is that our employees are using it. This is where they do their self review. This is where they do their peer review. This is where they do this and that, and put up documents. And I just needed, we needed to get outta Google Suite and needed one place that was, as Ronnie used to say, Instagramable, it was pretty looks good. And that's, uh, and that's what we use. Very, very important. I think maybe just to add one more thing about that, which is collecting data, like all that great usage that you get out of a solution that is easy to use, that embraces that like consumerization of technology that we're seeing, suddenly you're getting a lot more data about what's going on in your employees' everyday life and, and what they want and what they need. If you're getting performance information and information from one-on-ones on a weekly basis, and you're getting responses to engagement surveys and you're, you're getting, you know, employee recognition and kudos and shout outs or employees are even telling you about themselves on their profile, what they like, what they don't like, how they identify what their pronouns are, all of that data is incredible. Like insight that you can mine later in your organization. What if you could determine if the LGBTQIA plus employees in your organization or the Gen Z employees in your organization had fundamentally different engagement scores or fundamentally different like performance results than other employees of other demographics? You don't get that information unless employees are volunteering that information to you and you're capturing critical data in the system that you can then use to, to look at those types of analytics. So I really encourage you to think about, you know, of course it's, it's beautiful. Of course we want our employees to use it, but it's not just using it for using its sake. It drives engagement and then it drives better decision making in hr. And I think for all of us sitting in the room, that that's such a powerful opportunity for us to take advantage of. And I'll say for the HR executives in our community, hands down the number one personal goal a lot of these individuals have is to be a more strategic data led HR executive, right? Like, how do we actually use these insights in a strategic way that speaks to the c-suite, gets buy-in and continue to make an impact on the things that we're trying to do, right? And, and it's so hard to do when you're working in Google Sheets, right? So, um, I'm, I'm, I love that that tech enablement piece. Now we've, we've kind of, and Sarah, you've started to talk a little bit about, you know, this calling of BS when organizations are ne necessarily living to their values and maybe they're projecting a certain culture but not actually authentically living it. Um, but then there's sometimes this tension that I, I hear in our community of like, well, we're not A NGO, we're not a social impact organization. It's hard for us to take a political stand on anything because we're not sure how to do that. Um, so I guess how do you, how do you encourage organizations to navigate maybe that desire from Gen Z who desire their companies to take a social stance, but then organizations having that friction or tension of engaging in that? Yeah, I mean, I, I think the adage is, you know, they wanna make the world a better place. And like people say that derisively is if that's bad thing. Um, but I think the most important thing that you do in this work is all about being authentic to the reality of the experience at your organization. So if you have corporate values, right? You, you want those values to, to actually match an employee's experience. There's nothing worse than feeling like values are words on a poster. You want your values to represent the employee experience. You want them to speak truthfully, right? Same with, you know, making the world a better place. Of course, we don't all work at NGOs, we work at technology companies, right? Or we work at services firms or IT consulting, right? But you can also think about like, what do your customers go on to do and how does your technology empower or your services empower your customers to do something different in the world? I'll give you an example. I used to work at a industrial software company. They made very not glamorous, you know, software for the manufacturing industry. And manufacturing has a reputation of being dirty and, and dangerous and bad for the environment. And when they thought about, you know, how do we connect with employees? How do we help them understand that their work is really important and that their work is helping to make the world a better place? They thought about what do customers design in our software that goes on to help with sustainability challenges or goes on to be those giant wind farms that you see everywhere? And they told stories about, you know, it's not just about the work that you do at the company, it's also what people take out of our organization or out of our software and use to do in the world that helps you make that stamp on what's, you know, next for, for this global world of ours that's changing all the time, right? So I think it's so, um, it's such an opportunity for you to partner just a shout out to, to friends in marketing. Like your, your friends in marketing can help you tell maybe some of those creative stories or they could even tell you like, what are customers doing with your technology that maybe you don't even know about sitting in hr? Or you could tell them, you know, Hey, this is, this is the feedback we're getting on our values and, and this is how we need to change to, to really represent the authentic work experience that we're delivering. So think about how you create that great storytelling opportunity and, and think about how you deliver it with true authenticity so that it really lands. 'cause I, I promise Gen Z will call b******t if it's just words on a poster. If you had to add to that, like, this is the Gen Z is the most diverse generation ever, right? As more generations go on, they get more and more diverse. I just don't think I understand that. Don't be political. I worked at the CEO who very much said his stance was, I will not say anything political. The company will never say anything political. I respected it, it was his company, his choice. But if you're a company and we are in the most diverse generation out there right now, and you fail to acknowledge the things that are happening in the world and the experiences they are having, they will not feel like they belong in your organization. And so that is just something to think about. They see it every day. They're reading the news, you can't ignore their existence. And I think one thing I remember from the research that you released, and, and I think there's aspects of not as much design in your organization to take like a true stance on something, but just that, be in the conversation, right? And then just have the dialogue. It's not necessarily you have to put your, you know, line in the sand and choose something dramatic on certain stances, but there, there's an expectation that you're in the dialogue with them in some ways. So I think in some ways that relieves a little stress of like, okay, maybe we just figure out how do we hold space and have a dialogue about things that are important to us. Um, another aspect of, of unique values of Gen ZI would say this is also beyond in the millennials as well, but, um, this desire for flexibility and be able to work where you work, when you work, how you work, and also the flexibility to work on other things outside of your job. And, and Claude, you'd already kind of talked about this, I I would love for you to expand on it, but especially this interest in the gig economy, right? And being able to have side gigs that you work on outside of your main role, which is really cool that you can do that today and have multiple lines of income, but it also makes it an incredible headache for some of us HR folk in the room. So, uh, Claude, could you share a little bit about that, uh, and how you're navigating that too? Yeah, I'd love to. I, I feel like this really increased during COVI when we were all at home and people were in front of their computers and had extra time or, or you know, whatnot. We all, we all were like, I'll make lunch, I'll eat it, you know, make chicken eight times a week and I'll eat it. What else can I watch on that? But that's where really like, you know, you see, um, is it Upwork and, um, those other, um, uh, those other apps that you can use and you can get, you know, employees for hire by the hour. So we were really, uh, you know, we're in a creative social media agency, so creativity is what we look for. We want, and, and, and many of the residents that we've hired Gen Z are actually YouTubers or their TikTok influencers. So I mean, that's juice for us. We want that. So, uh, as we came out of c and, um, we, we put out another, uh, non-compete. You could do anything in the world except compete with the work we're doing. Anything you wanna do, social media for shoes, go ahead. We don't have a shoe client, you know what I mean? We don't that kind of stuff. Um, and what we ended up seeing is as this, as we were rolling the survey out across the globe, of course, um, we would stumble on an Instagram page from one of our employees who was putting up their side gig, and it was, it was competitors. So this one, for example, this one guy in particular had three other side gigs while he was supposed to be designing for us. And one of them was j and j, which is a, a a, a very big competitor to a lot of the companies, CRG companies that we use. And, uh, it wasn't a problem for this person. It didn't really a disconnect. Like this was good work that he was doing and very proud to put it out. And it just can't fly with us. I mean, that just really like, kind of flew in the, the face of, with the policy that we had. So I feel very comfortable with the policy right now. I really, really do. I think it's something that we have to monitor, of course, because we have clients out there that are looking on Instagram as well. But these are people that want to explore curiosity, continue to grow, continue to nourish themselves, I think is very much, uh, live work. I don't think it's work, work to live at all and whatever, you know, whatever they need to do, if they're interested in teaching or a lot of times creating content and all of that, we have to allow that, that is the world that we're in today. It is a TikTok generation. That is what we, that's what we're doing. That's what, that's, that's the generation that's with us. So we had to find a middle ground. And the middle ground is like, you know, just don't compete with our, these huge clients that we work with. So I, I would say that this is one of those topics I think that you will bump into with your c-suite. Um, it's certainly one that I've bumped into like, well, you know, how, why do they have so much time to do X, y, and Z thing? Aren't you giving them enough work? You know, like, what is this? Like how, how could they do that to us? Um, they're hiding. They're yeah, hiding. I think that there's an incredible opportunity to start a different kind of conversation with your c-suite at this point. And, and this is one where you can kind of turn the tables. Um, hey, uh, do you sit on any additional boards besides being the CEO of our company? Oh, you do, huh? Do you, um, do you work with nonprofits and, and charities? Oh, oh, you do. Uhhuh. Why is it different? Like you're pursuing your own professional development, you're, you're giving time back to your community. You want to have that flexibility in your own job, and perhaps you think that it comes with the pleasure of your, you know, c-suite title. But I think it's, it's sort of translating that for folks who are like, well, I, you know, I made it now, now I get to do that. To say, well, everyone should have the opportunity to, to give back to their community, to volunteer in what they believe in, to explore a new creative passion, to be able to consult on something that they're really good at. Maybe we don't put that skill to work at our organization enough, and we should look at that as a tremendous opportunity to engage them differently. But I would say this is, this is one of those great topics that like, I kind of like when that objection comes up. 'cause I'm like, I'm ready. I like this idea of like asking them that and if they don't have one, be like, oh, we gotta get you a side gig. We Gotta get you a side hustle. You know, I'm like, we gotta get you one. And I also like this idea though, and, and I don't know how this would actually play out, but when you don't have those career path opportunities that we're talking about before, maybe using some of those side gig, you know, conversations as a way to be like, okay, how do we support that? Like I, we need you to keep this as a main priority and reach our goals and objectives or KPIs or whatever we're putting in place these days. But it's like, while we do that, while also help you develop and improve on your passions on the side that you're also building. And maybe that's like another way to keep them there when you don't necessarily have the thousand levels of job opportunities that meta has as well. Yeah. Really, really quickly, just to jump in, there's plenty of people that have side hustles, side gigs that my CEO Gary has backed, like literally a hot sauce. Kenny's making hot, different hot sauces in Brooklyn and it's taken off like wildfire, boink, you know, uh, um, mental health app bo like, we're into that. We're really into all of that because this is like things we haven't even thought about. So there's a real upside to, I think, culturally there as well. Yeah. So one of the last main cultural values, which has been like an interesting tension of how this lives up is like the desire for connection in the workplace and having deeper connections and relationships with your peers. But then I was even just talking to a few individuals outside this room before this and we're like, we can't even get our teams to turn their cameras on, let alone come into the office when, right. Like, and come into the office when we do have these peer engagements and they, they, you know, don't want to come in and things like this. So, um, how about, you and I talked about this need to maybe better define connection and how we approach that. Can you share a little bit about that? Yeah, I think like we, the last few years, like connect our connection is like human society has gone down, uh, 'cause of covid and then we were all in our homes. And then, I don't know about any of you, but like, I used to be an extrovert before Covid and then Covid happened and now I don't know how to talk to people. Like if you meet me, I'm gonna say like probably five weird things and I'll be like, I don't what to do with my hands. Like, that's a real thing I do now. I don't know, I don't know what happened to me. Like my whole life I was an extrovert, COVID happened and then I got really comfortable in like my sweatpants and like not making eye contact with people. So I think we're all just like experiencing some of that. And then in the workplace too, it's like connecting virtually is like kind of awkward. I don't, I'm like, I slack people all day long and it's still awkward to be like, Hey, welcome to the company. Um, what's your favorite book to read? Like, I like don't know what to say. So I think as you're thinking about like connection, your employees want it, they want it with each other and they also kind of want it the company too. But that can be hard if the mission isn't aligned with their personal missions. But I think like finding new ways to foster that connection at work is gonna be a game changer for us in hr. And nobody wants to go to one more happy hour. Does everyone remember on Zoom when people were like watching zoos? Nobody wants to do that anymore. So I think like, thinking of new and unique ways to connect with each other, whether it be like introducing people, a donut, a coffee, something unique they do together, um, a course, something they build. Just getting really creative about what does connection actually mean and how do we take it one step further from, you know, just saying hi to each other on Slack. I always say that we are only as good as our connective tissue is only as strong as our connective tissue is. And we take a lot of pride in introducing people to one another in different countries and in different, uh, uh, departments and whatnot. Even in, or our orientation is three days, it takes three over three days. So if you're in the c-suite, you're getting oriented in the same group with the copywriter. It's, it's all great, it's very flat. And in those three days they're meeting subject matter experts. I'll talk to 'em about why we feel, why we think these ways, you know, what our values, how does that come to life? And then they all have buddies for those three days. It's all virtual, but they have buddies for those three days that are gonna be very different than their buddies that, that they'll work with on the, on the account. And so it's a real for, for, for us, I feel like it's a good way to at least ignite the fact that, hey, this is about capitalizing on the fact that everyone's accessible and available. It's beyond Opendoor. Like you can write Gary right now, you know gary@vaynermedia.com and, and, and he'll get back to you. So there's something really cool about that, that I think not only this generation is thirsty for, but we are, we're all thirsty for it. And I love that transition from virtual to in person. When you do architect it well, like some of the examples you're having, like I'm sure many of you joining today, have many friends joining this conference that you only see virtually, and now you're seeing them in person for the first time. Like in some ways that's so nerve wracking, right? And like I always joke, like on camera, I'm six foot, you know, so it's like, oh, they waist up. But when you meet in person, it's always that awkwardness, but at least like having those like architected situations. And, and, and Claude, if you, you talked about that power of community and the importance of these community resource groups. Can you share what you're doing on that front and, and ways organizations might leverage that? Yeah, for sure. So how many of you have ERGs or C we call them CRGs or bgs, whatever? Yeah. We have found even pre Covid that these were just wonderful safe spaces for people that could be in community with people that they, they had an affinity with or they were part of that group. Allies of course, were invited as we came out of covid. We've had even a stronger push to op, open up and start more CRGs. So we now have one called the Shalom Group. We have one for Muslims. We have one that's called Variabilities. They all name themselves. Uh, they're self named. They're autonomous. They get a budget variabilities for seen and unseen, uh, abilities. And it has really galvanized across the globe, with the exception, I would say, of far East Asia, just because of the time zone, uh, Southeast Asia, I should say. Um, but it is a really great way for people to come together and feel even safer in times where they might not feel that safe. You know? Uh, we don't need to get into what's been going on in, in the world today in terms of wars, but, um, there's only so much we can do from a corporate level and that Gary will do. It's an independent company. So making, making sure that these places and people that lead the CRGs, whether or not it's, uh, uh, the Vai, you know, evasions, I mean, there's so many, um, that they also know how to conduct courageous conversations, though that's the one caveat that we've worked on, uh, train. We've worked on training, because some of these conversations are going to get a little bit cont could get contentious, um, within their safe, safe space, however it's working. And I find that it's a big part of when our recruiters are out there talking about Vayner. It's a big part of what they're selling. Like you will be, you will find your people here amongst all of us, other people. There will be a place for you. You will belong, you will connect. And I think for me, one of the biggest, one of the biggest things I could say is, and you'll matter. You know, you'll really matter to us. You'll matter to people. And one of the underlying like impacts I love of having really that foundation of community and connection through these groups is one really takes the pressure off of you as a leadership team to like drive the conversations. If anything, maybe one of the key strategies to engage in Gen Z is letting them drive the engaging strategies, right? And enabling them to form these groups and organize and connect around things that are passionate for them, and just work as like more of a enablement service towards that versus the decision maker in a lot of ways. Um, which I, I love that kind of format with these resource groups. So unfortunately, we're, we're coming up on time. I feel like I could talk with the three of you for this entire day on this topic and many things beyond. But as we kind of wrap up this discussion, I would love if maybe you just provide some closing thoughts, uh, maybe some words of encouragement to our HR executives out there on things maybe they should start with. And, um, and kind of wrap up this discussion. So, Hiba, do you want to kick us off? That's A lot of pressure. Just kidding. Um, wow, what'd I say? I would just say like, get to know Gen Z and what they're looking for. Like we all, we, there are all these values that we all read about and there's a bunch of research that hip Bob did. I would highly encourage reading it, but I do think just like they're a human too. And I think a lot of times we forget when we're in hr, even though like we started, or at one point we're named human resources, we forget that the people across the table are humans and they have wants and needs, and those wants and needs are shaped by their perspective and their lived experience. And that we might have a different perspective and lived experience, but it's our job to really try to understand the person and attempt to meet them somewhere that works for both of us. That's all I got. Yeah. Round applause. Let's give her some Claude, what, what's your Thoughts? Yeah, I would say I, I agree a thousand percent. And I would also say for us, it's, it's giving them at bats, letting them try things, giving them a chance on, uh, fortune 50, uh, a client or account, you know, letting them be in a client meeting. Why not let them speak in a client meeting? These are all things that they have to figure out anyway, and we're a wonderful, safe place for that to happen. So I would say definitely at bat's, opportunities, growth, everyone is everyone. We've talked about it already. This generation in particular is like, I'm gonna be the CEO tomorrow, and I, I gave myself all five, so why wouldn't I be the CEO? Um, and then the one other thing that we, we didn't touch on, and it's an entirely other, you know, uh, topic to, to talk about is feedback and how essential, how essential, clear, specific, actionable kind feedback is current. And they need that, and we need managers that can do that. So there's the, the rub right there. Woo. My last thought would be don't wait. Uh, we talked about how Gen Z is the most diverse workforce, uh, that we have ever seen. Don't wait for states, provinces, the federal government, governments around the world to protect and help you to keep safe, the diverse talent in your organization. If you don't take proactive steps to think about how do you make the life better for, uh, your bipoc employees, your LGBTQIA plus employees, your trans and non-binary employees, you'll lose that talent to someone who will. And it's really critical that you think about, you know, it's not just one, um, experience of work that you deliver. It's an experience of work that is truly intersectional. It's a experience of work that is so different from person to person for so many different reasons around the table. Don't wait for those folks to, you know, volunteer those reasons to you or to ask you for help proactively approach them proactively. Think about how you're going to engage them, how you're going to create safe spaces like ERGs or bgs or CRGs, uh, for you to, to use and really take the, the things that they raise seriously. If your, you know, your ERG comes to you and says, Hey, you know, we love working here and it would be great if we could have gender neutral bathroom facilities. I'm the executive sponsor of our LGBTQIA plus erg, right? Engage them in the conversation. Un approach them with curiosity, just like they're approaching their work with you. Understand why that's so important to them, why that would help them feel more safe at work. And, and understand that if you don't take action, they will find someone who does. So, so please don't wait. Well, thank you so much to the three of you for joining us volunteering your time to share some of your perspectives and guidance. Can we give a huge round applause for our panelists?

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