Small and Medium Business

The Apprentice – 5 Tips to Hire the Best Millennials

Mike Buckley
October 13, 2016

We have a fine tradition in this country when it comes to apprentices: a proper first day isn’t complete without a wild goose chase. It’s an instruction given to the newbie like, “Fetch me a long weight,” “Order a tin of Tartan paint” or the Two Ronnies classic, “Four candles.” That moment when enthusiasm collides with stoicism is an irresistible part of our culture.

Perhaps it’s why The Apprentice is so popular. Another year, another eight million of us tune in to see the hopefuls. They emerge from wheeled suitcases like hermit crabs marching to Prokofiev’s Dance of the Knights. And a proper British knight awaits them. Lord Sugar, conductor in chief for 12 weeks of televised schadenfreude.

Glorious entertainment. It also has a knack of prompting employers to wonder, ‘How do we get the best of this generation?’

Here are five tips to help you:

1. Flexible Working — offer a work-life balance.

When the right to request flexible working came into force in June 2014, Jobsite found two thirds would consider it immediately. Two years later, 14 million people class themselves as independent workers employed outside the traditional nine ‘til five. According to PWC, it’s a trend that has 59% of financial services CEOs citing a shortage of skilled workers as a threat to growth. Firms who can offer home working, part-time working, flexi-time and job sharing will attract top talent.

Mobility tech makes it possible.

2 – Mobility — Go confidently in the direction of your dreams.

Mobility tech enables virtual collaboration, global connectivity, and 24/7 business. With a platform like Cisco Unified Communications, it’s easier than ever to achieve. It’s what allows our own staff to work remotely and as a tool to attract diverse talent, it works. 73% of new Cisco staff turned down comparable offers because the same flexibility was not on the table.

It could work for you too.

3. Build Trust — Give and take.

Especially as work becomes more modular, with measurable targets and objectives replacing arbitrary office hours; we find that if you trust your teams to work remotely, they will reward you with a groundswell of goodwill that equals good work.

An added bonus of which is that employers save on expensive desk space, as well as worker down time. For example, 66% of Cisco remote workers’ saved commuting hours are returned to the company. Most think nothing of staying on a little later or getting up a little earlier to collaborate with global teams in other time zones.

In return, staff get flexibility to meet personal commitments like the school run or care for a young family or an elderly relative. One-offs like doctors and dentists and getting the car fixed are easy. Only a robot worker could fail to find this appealing.

4. Embrace Digital — Connect, collaborate and create.

McKinsey & Co point to IT as one of six building blocks to create a high performance digital enterprise. More than half (58%) of workers already believe it’s time to get digital right to make their organisation more productive.

Digital means better collaboration. By making leadership activities transparent, digital recommits you to your teams. Cisco Spark allows you to create work groups, instant message, share files and hold video conferences anywhere. Combined with a Cisco ONE software purchasing model, your applications need never fall behind again.

Keep a physical presence at premises in key markets, of course. This is evolution not revolution. But money saved on fewer permanent desks could be re-allocated to make those premises work better for you. Employees can work smarter when they’re not reliant on legacy IT but free to roam the office on secure and reliable WLAN that prioritises business-critical apps.

It means when you do physically meet as a team, those occasions can be used in more creative and inclusive ways. And it’s an approach that’s working in London for multinational insurer RSA Group:

5. Innovate Everywhere — Bring Your Own Device (BYOD).

As digital natives, ideas do not always come to Millennials at their desks. They might be in a meeting, in a lift, or at home. In a BYOD workplace, everyone can work the way they want to, on their own device. Cisco Mobility solutions allow staff to use their own devices on a highly secure network that protects data. You decrease hardware expenditure, alleviate work delays and lower operating costs. They get collaboration, speed, efficiency and productivity. It’s a culture that ‘Demand Generation’ can connect with.

And when everyone is securely connected, anything is possible.