How to Be a Good Leader for Millennials

I learnt from a survey recently that two out of every three workers would rather sack their boss than get a pay rise! It’s hard to know whether to laugh or cry when you hear statistics like that. Surveys consistently show that a large majority of Australians are unhappy at work. Survey Sample International put it at above 40 percent. Poor management seems to be at endemic proportions. According to the Undercover Recruiter website, almost 50 percent of workers don’t feel valued at work, and 37 percent of people who changed jobs this year say they did it to get away from their manager!

So many people in this country are either under-employed or unemployed. Only half of all 25-year-olds in Australia have full-time jobs – that is a shocking statistic. Given that many talented people are looking for work, why is it that so many clearly unsuited and ordinary people are managers? I guess managing people is not easy, but lack-lustre managers tend to promote lack-lustre people. Sometimes people do not do well at work because they are more talented and intelligent than their managers. That’s why I believe in small business and being your own boss! I really believe in turning your passion into profit and saying goodbye to your manager and nine-to-five job.

The era of the ‘bossy’ boss is over

Rasmus Hougaard and Jacqueline Carter looked at the results of 1,000 leadership studies to write their new book, The Mind of a Leader. The conclusion they came: the era of the authoritarian leader is over!

Ms Hougaard says millennials – people born in the 1980s, 90s and early 2000s – are the reason why the culture at work must change. This new generation expects something at work that previous generations did not demand – happiness. It seems that us older generations fronted up for work for the money and because we wanted to advance our careers, but not this generation. “They are asking for more than just a pay cheque and an annual appraisal,” according to Ms Hougaard. People spend around 40 percent of their time at work, and the Millennials expect to enjoy that time, whereas previous generations accepted that work was …well, work. Millennials also want a boss who is approachable, more direct and personable. In the olden days, we’d call that a ‘friend’. The findings of Hougaard and Carter do line up with the Deloitte Millennial Survey. Nearly 20 percent of millennials said they wanted a workplace that was culturally diverse, inclusive and ethical.

Bosses think they do a good job, but their employees don’t

Perhaps one of the more surprising findings of Hougaard and Carter’s review was that bosses had no idea how badly they were doing. Around 77 percent of bosses thought they were doing a good job, but 88 percent of their workers said their bosses didn’t properly engage with them.

Once upon a time people were happy to join a company and work their way up over years. The Millennials don’t think like that. They are not loyal to any one company. They are instead looking for personal fulfilment. When it comes to looking for a job young people’s priorities are:

1. How much does the job pay?
2. What is the culture of the company?
3. Does it offer flexible work arrangements, like working from home?

Clever leaders understand how this new generation of workers think. Instead of expecting their workers to hang around forever, clever bosses know they have to instead engage the hearts and minds of the millennials and get two to three years of great service from them, before their employee moves on.

Walk like the Egyptians

To manage a young team, bosses need to adopt some young values. They need to let go of the hierarchical management structure and change their communication style. They need to genuinely engage with their workers and not be a distant boss.

Hougaard and Carter have some advice on how to become a better leader. The first tip is to be sincere and be present. Hougaard and Carter worked with one CEO of a pharmacy company. His workers rated him a poor manager. He could not understand it as he spent a lot of time with his workers, but what he didn’t realise was that he was always distracted by other issues. He started doing ‘mindfulness exercises’ – meditation that teaches you to live in and enjoy the present moment. After a couple of months his employees said he was nicer, easier to work with and more inspiring. He was also spending 20 percent less time with his workers, but when he was with them they had his full attention. Mindfulness requires discipline and patience. You have to stay on task and genuinely be with people.

The CEO of Campbell’s Soup, Doug Conant, developed physical and psychological rituals to connect with people. He remembered their names and learnt about their families. He wrote notes by hand thanking people for putting in extra effort and also reached out to staff having tough times. He genuinely came to care for his workers.

Sometimes people want empathy not solutions

Vice president of Cisco’s in the US, Gabrielle Thompson, said she used to feel pressured to come up with solutions to the problems presented to her as the boss, but then she discovered that often people just want to be heard and want some empathy. “As a leader, your role can be simply to create the safe space for people to air their frustrations and process their problems,” she said. Did you read the book, Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus? It explained that women in particular wanted to be heard and acknowledged rather than just be pacified with solutions that may or may not work.

Be Real

Head of Human Resources at Lego, Loren Shuster, said when he has an important presentation he takes five minutes to ground himself. He meditates and focuses on his body. “When you’re not grounded, when you’re not connected to your body and surrounding environment, you don’t have a strong sense of direction or purpose. You’re just floating. The smallest thing can distract you,” he said.

Be compassionate

To be a good leader, the biggest change you have to make is in your heart. Once, managers only cared about the bottom-line – were they making enough money for the company? Now responsible companies should be providing a service to the community. Also, responsible managers want to be making a profit and ensuring their workers are well and happy. Unfortunately surveys still show that clever responsible managers are rare.

More bosses need to learn that compassion is an essential part of leadership. Surveys show that compassionate leaders are perceived as stronger than leaders who lack compassion. Compassion is the intent to contribute to the happiness and well-being of employees. A compassionate leader has a genuine interest in seeing their employees not just perform and increase profits but thrive as people. The good news is that, with effort, we can all become more compassionate, but how many of our leaders will choose to do this?