How to retain Generation Y employees in company X

The purpose of the thesis was to find how to retain Generation Y employees in company X. The main objective of the thesis is to find out the biggest drivers for Millennials leaving Company X. The company in question is among the biggest event management and marketing companies active in Finland currently, with more than 300 employees at the time of the survey. The survey was answered by 30% of company X staff and of the respondents 74% were Millennials. As survey was given to active field employees and administrative staff were not included. Most of the employees are Millennials so it was crucial to find a way to retain the top talent and attract more of them in the company. The author agreed with the client company that the development task for the company would be to have a look at retention theories. By evaluating the current recruitment and retention theories can one understand what are the shortcomings and development opportunities. Martha Fields elaborates well on how recruitment and onboarding is vital for retention as can be seen in the development of theory. Another important theoretical framework was the millennial view of Maslow’s theory based on the original of 1954 (Mann 2016). Last essential theoretical base would be the needs triangle, which maps out how Millennials view the package of incentives for the employee per Woodruffe (Humanassets 2009). The most viable way to reach the target audience during the Corona virus lock down was to create a survey and this way get the results. The survey was also built in such a way that first topic was external recruitment and ended in exit interview to get a wholesome picture of the current strategies. Based on the survey the major obstacles and opportunities are in internal and external recruitment as well as communication. The effect of Covid-19 to the retention rate has also been noted in the survey and the challenges it presented in the mind of the respondents’ retention rate. Recognition initiatives are important to the millennial who wishes to retain the value in the market place, as such the survey results support this claim. As recognition initiatives fall in line well with career growth, the opportunity to go higher up in the chain of command is important to the Millennial. Finally, salary is the most used reason to leave a workplace however it does play a part in garnering the attention of the millennial. The way all these components are utilized to facilitate an ideal workplace is reflected in the retention rate