Graduate recruitment is serious business, and rightly so. Organisations invest significant resources in sourcing, nurturing and developing their graduates to fill the company pipeline with tomorrow’s leaders.
To this end, there’s considerable discussion regarding what graduates are looking for from an employer and what organisations should be providing to keep their grads happy. Six figure salaries, highly flexible work arrangements and constant job variety are some of the more common rumblings from grad employers regarding their efforts to attract and retain.
But with so many anecdotal suggestions floating around it’s hard to decipher fact from fiction - everyone seems to have a different experience or opinion on the topic. Research around the world is now starting to catch up and focus on the needs and attitudes of Gen Y graduates given that this generation will begin to dominate the workforce over the coming years.
I was interested to see what local data could tell us about what graduates are looking for in an Australian context.
Onetest has asked thousands of graduates over the past few years to indicate what they want in their ‘ideal job’. Graduates, the bulk of whom were Gen Y, individually ranked 20 work factors in order of importance. The following factors came out on top:
- Ability Utilisation – being able to apply relevant skills and abilities on the job
- Achievement – gaining a sense of accomplishment from work
- Advancement – having opportunities for career progression
I found these results pleasantly surprising, though fairly logical. Grads appear to be keen to apply their newly acquired knowledge and skills, to make a meaningful contribution in their work and kick some goals, and have options to progress their career. These findings are in line with previous research that described Gen Y graduates as highly motivated by challenging and interesting work and looking for opportunities to climb the corporate ladder as quickly as possible1.
Pop media shaped my assumption and expectation that salary and independence would be top priorities for this group. However this didn’t play out in the results with these factors ranked among the bottom few out of the 20. This is not to say that these work aspects are not important to graduates, simply that they are less important than other elements at this point in their career. It would be interesting to see if or how these rankings change once grads find their feet in the workplace, and whether economic conditions play a role in directing their priorities over time.
Of course, each individual brings different needs, values and expectations with them to the workplace. Uncovering individual needs and priorities during the recruitment process will assist in achieving cultural fit and lead to better retention outcomes. A comprehensive understanding of the needs and values of younger generations can help organisations remain an employer of choice for graduates.
References:
1 Great expectations: managing generation Y (2011). Institute of Leadership & Management and Ashridge Business School. United Kingdom.
