Companies need to embrace and accept the change that is happening and has happened.

The employee is demanding more from the workplace today, and companies seem to be either creating fake forced culture to make the employees happy or not being accommodating or concerned at all.

Everyone is an individual, that’s why building a culture that everyone must fit into is not possible or sustainable. It’s also quite foolish to create this ‘happening culture to suit current employees’ based on staff churn figures of today’s employees, which I believe is an average of 2 - 3 years in any given position.

The best company cultures I have ever been in have not been contrived or forced but have occurred naturally between people based on common goals and mutual respect. It’s obviously good to create opportunities for team members to spend time, so create natural environments for this such as team lunches and think tanks focused on company outcomes and learnings. Don’t attempt to get everyone on board with a certain cause, because this just creates further division.

Companies haven’t quite found the way to deal with the changing landscape, yet I think it is quite simple.

You need to understand your employee.

If you have the skills to understand your employee, you might find that meeting their workplace needs and career drivers is more simple than you think.

Some employees just want to come to work and go home, someone may want be involved in the creative process even though it may not directly be part of their role and some may want to contribute in other ways that is not typical, but the key here, is being open.

The director and company mindset has to change from hiring for a pigeonholed role acknowledging they are hiring a real person, an individual, that may actually bring with them some great ideas.

It’s a more consuming management style and causes you to have to be closer to your employee, however this has its advantages. you’ll be able to understand exactly who you’re employing, you will be able to monitor this more transparently along the way and you will probably get the heads up when that particular employee will be seeking to move on.

When hiring an employee, you need to see this as building a new relationship with a skilled person, not hiring a skilled person who perhaps you will build a relationship with.