Millennials (those born in the early 1980s – the early 2000s) have surpassed Gen X has the largest generation in the US workforce. Soon there will be more millennials in the workforce than Gen X and baby boomers combined! With this rapidly growing generation have come a lot of changes to the way companies are doing business, especially in regards to human resources. How, exactly, are these millennials affecting HR technology?
It comes as no surprise that millennials are very tech savvy. The first generation of technological natives has high expectations, expectations that are pushing HR tech vendors to improve functionalities and user interface to meet their standards.
Here are a few other ways millennials are changing HR tech:
Millennials are mobile
Approximately 68 percent of American adults now own a smartphone of some kind. Smartphone ownership is especially high among younger Americans; 86 percent of people ages 18 to 29 have a smartphone. According to the same Pew Research Center survey, desktop computer ownership has stalled out at 73 percent of adults.
What does this mean? With more adults owning smartphones than desktop computers, searching and applying for jobs is being done by phone. In fact, 43 percent of smartphone users used their phones to look up information about a job and 18 percent actually applied for a job via their smartphones.
Because so many people rely on their smartphones, most vendors have developed either an app or html 5 formatting of their HR tech systems, allowing employees to access their benefits summaries and insurance cards, enroll in benefits, view paychecks, etc. – right from their phone or tablet. Those vendors who haven’t subscribed to the mobile game are far behind!
Millennials are social
Social media has been – and continues to be – a huge trend in today’s society. HR is no exception. Social media has some great features and can produce exciting results.
Social technology is being used in recruiting. Job candidates are increasingly relying on social media for an inside look at companies for which they’d like to work. According to a Glassdoor survey, 79 percent of job candidates are likely to use social media in their job search. Eighty-six percent of people in the first 10 years of their career are likely to use social media in their job search. It can easily be said that a majority of not only millennials but job candidates in general are using social recruiting sites to look for and apply to jobs.
Social learning is another way the social aspect has invaded HR technology. Social learning technology and vendors have seen a huge increase over the past few years as more and more employers recognize the need to tap into the collective knowledge of their employees. Social learning allows employees to easily collaborate and share knowledge.
Social recognition is another way for HR to embrace the social trend. These tools promote increased engagement by allowing employees to recognize colleagues for jobs well done via technology. Millennials are said to crave feedback and recognition, and social recognition apps and tools help do that. It also helps employees feel like they have a voice and are contributors to the organization. Social recognition tools increase collaboration and encourage better teamwork.
Wellness programs are another area that can benefit from the social aspect. What a great way for employees to encourage and even compete with each other to achieve health and wellness goals. There are a lot of wellness programs that offer the social aspect hand-in-hand with their technology. For example, Vitality gives participants the option to create a social profile to join community challenges
Millennials want choice
Decision support has become a very popular add-on feature with most benefits administration vendors offering some sort of decision support tool or feature. Millennials are embracing choice and have actually come to expect it. According to the PNC Healthcare survey, 50 percent of millennials compare insurance options online. Decision support tools help millennials with their benefits comparisons.
Millennials communicate digitally
I’m sure if you’ve read anything about the millennial generation, communication style has been a big generational differentiator. Growing up with technology, this has become their main and preferred means of communication.
Millennials like instant gratification, so employers can definitely benefit from making information accessible anytime, anywhere and customized to the individual. Most importantly, employers should use technology to communicate. Send those benefits enrollment reminders via email or text message. As we mentioned before, millennials consume most information via their mobile devices and vast amounts of it. Keep your communications brief, yet informative. One HR tech vendor’s survey revealed that 44 percent of millennials prefer to receive benefits information from their employer via text message. Most vendors are offering functionality to send employee communications or alerts via SMS text messages. If they aren’t yet, it is probably on their roadmap (or should be). Don’t worry: emojis are not standard in those communications.
We realize it’s not fair to stereotype everyone born in the millennial range with these millennial traits, but as a generation, millennials have definitely affected HR technology in the areas of user interface, mobile functionality, social features, decision support and communication style. The HR tech of yesterday is changing, and it’s changing fast!