The Gen C Impact on HR Shared Services
The idea of Gen C has been emerging for the last few years, and the idea is impacting how we hire, how we relate to our community of customers and, if we are smart, how we deal with employees. Having an HR Shared Services team that knows how to connect to Gen C can not only improve satisfaction on both sides, but can help in getting your Gen C employees focused back on productivity sooner.
The term “Gen C” has been around for almost a decade, though it is only recently congealed into the current meaning. Gen C refers to the first non-age-based generation, and refers to those “who care deeply about creation, curation, connection, and community.” (Follow the link to see a short introduction from our friends at Google.) By their estmates, 80% of Gen C happen to be Millennials, but this is much more correlation than causation. If you want a great in-depth review of Gec C, this post by Brian Solis examines the evolution of both Gen Y and Gen C. While I suggest reading the whole thing, take a look at this image from that post, which details the evolution of the connected individual from 2001 to 2011.
These are your customers. These are also your employees.
The expectations for your HR Shared Services team are changing, but have nothing to do with your operating mode or past performance. They are changing as Gen C changes their expectations of the world in general. Old arguments that no longer really apply include “our employees don’t have email” and “people don’t want to use self service.” Both are outdated and, sadly, very expensive approaches to business. Your company is chock full of those who live online, even if you don’t realize it.
If you plan to support these employees, your Shared Services team needs to have the tools and knowledge to do so effectively. How well does your team understand social media? Do you have your self service tools fully formed and easy to access? Can employees reach your case management system from home to send in their questions? (I won’t ask if you have a case management system…I don’t have to ask that, right?) Do you have multiple access channels for them to reach you? Email? Chat? Phone? Text? Walk up? These are all viable options, and you’re missing some important communication methods if you decide on your own that “chat isn’t that important to our employees.”
Take the time to read the links. They are great primers into the way Gen C thinks, and how you’ll need to be prepared to deal with them.
