Greentarget

Madelaine Rickrode

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Over the next fifteen years, the American workforce will undergo a seismic shift. Baby Boomers will fully retire, and Gen Xers won’t be far behind. And that means Gen Z (those born between 1996 and 2010, currently 14 to 28 years old) will soon make up a significant share of your prospective talent pool.

Is your professional services firm ready for this inevitable sea change?

Gen Z has been shaped by vastly different cultural contexts than previous generations. Two events in particular — Covid-19 and the Great Recession — have influenced how members of this emerging generation approach their professional and personal lives. Whereas older generations considered things like flexible hours, work/life balance, and high pay to be hard-won rewards, Gen Z expects them as a given. What’s more, Gen Zers care deeply about working for organizations that meaningfully align with their personal values and ideals.

These realities create risk for firms like yours, especially if your current culture doesn’t match Gen Z expectations. Many Gen Zers are uniquely uninterested in chasing the proverbial brass ring. They want to do good, interesting work — but they also want to enjoy rich, full personal lives. If these priorities appear to conflict, conventional wisdom predicts a crisis for professions that serve the most challenging and sophisticated clients. Managers are fearful that a refusal to bend on cultural change will drive talent away.

Gen Z is an Executive Positioning Challenge

Much of our recent guidance on critical issues – whether it be geopolitical conflict, AI, DEI and ESG backlash, the 2024 election – is rooted in this assertion: if you are clear about what your firm stands for and can demonstrate how its values and expectations are in alignment, you will have an easier (or at least less fraught) time communicating controversial topics or positions that can create misunderstanding and conflict and damage the firm’s reputation. This is also true of the Gen Z challenge, and you can address it with the following steps.

1. Define your audience – You may only want Gen Zers who still aspire to the brass ring – they exist, no generation is a monolith. But focusing on that cohort may turn away the best talent and limit the diversity and alacrity of thought you can access. Either way, the first step is to define the audience you want to attract and retain. Then gather information about what they care about most and react to workplace culture.

2. Create a feedback loop – Effective communication requires a feedback loop. This can include formal and informal channels through which you gather input from your audience, identify expectations, and measure whether your messages are landing as intended. Regular contact with affinity groups, associate committees, or trusted intermediaries can inform your approach.

3. Declare what you stand for – We’ve written elsewhere about the University of Chicago’s Kalven Report. Create a process that is open to a diversity of stakeholders and engage them in a conversation about the values and principles that drive behavior at your firm. Clarify how you will make decisions that impact all the generations in your workforce and publish your guidelines for all to see. Going forward, your decisions may not make everyone happy, but they shouldn’t be surprised.

4. Reiterate and reinforce –If you can identify and occupy the space in which the firm’s priorities and expectations overlap with your audience’s values and aspirations, then you can alter your culture to encourage greater engagement. With every alteration you make to workplace culture, reiterate, and reinforce the values that drove the decision.

Meaningful Work and a “You Belong Here” Culture

What sort of alterations are appropriate? Corporate Counsel underscores the need to move beyond “no-meeting Mondays and free-pizza Fridays.” Such perks simply don’t go far enough to create the kind of culture that appeals to Gen Z. While aspects of your firm’s culture may be difficult, if not impossible, to change, there is room to maneuver within the “softer” elements of your culture that you can control.

McKinsey’s research findings show that Gen Z is passionate about:

· Advocating for social, racial, and environmental justice issues

· Finding purpose in their life and work

· Experiencing a sense of belonging within the context of a supportive community

· Expressing themselves individualistically

Considering this, you may need to formalize regular communication regarding:

· Your firm’s mission and values. What do you stand for and what is the impact your firm is making on your community, the nation, and the world, and well as on your clients and profession?

· Your firm’s commitment to DEI. What steps have you and are you taking to make your firm an authentically diverse, equitable, and inclusive place?

· Opportunities for meaningful work. What stories can you share about the ways colleagues are able to immerse themselves in work that has influence in their field, or to society as a whole?

· The global and social issues you support. Are there unique positions of authority your firm can hone to participate skillfully in the conversations that matter most to Gen Z?

Don’t Underestimate Gen Z’s Impact on Your Professional Services Firm

There’s no one-size-fits-all strategy for making your professional services firm an employer of choice for Gen Z. And you certainly won’t be able to flip a switch and get where you need to be overnight.

But even today, you can start doing the work of understanding what motivates and drives Gen Z. And you can begin communicating in ways that will pay dividends in the future.

Though urgent issues undoubtedly occupy your attention on a day-to-day basis, getting ahead of the coming generational shift is vitally important. By making this a priority now, you can future-proof your firm and set yourself up for continued success.

Need some help directing a smarter conversation with Gen Z? Let’s talk.

About the Executive Positioning Practice

Exemplifying Greentarget’s commitment to being a trusted advisor to clients, our Executive Positioning team provides C-suite executives (managing partners, CEOs, executive committees, and boards) with insights to anticipate, understand and respond to important global and social developments, analyzing key issues that can impact reputation and compel leaders to communicate.

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We now interrupt your relentless COVID-19 coverage to bring you this analysis of the public relations efforts around Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s split from the British royal family.

Through the wedding drama, pregnancy announcements, family feuds, celebrity intervention, paparazzi madness, and now, the exit, we have meticulously followed their public relations strategy. Meghan Markle and Prince Harry have not just severed ties with Windsor Palace, they’ve rejected the monarchy’s historically conservative PR strategy.

We took a break from pretending not to care about Meghan and Harry to take a look at their PR moves through a Greentarget lens. We found a few hits and some misses for the young couple:

PR Blunders

Choosing authority over authenticity: This month Harry and Meghan shared a lengthy letter declaring that they would no longer work with four major British tabloids. This isn’t the first time the couple has tried to control the tabloid narrative this way. In January, Harry and Meghan announced their desire to choose their own press pool, excluding certain media outlets – including those same UK tabloids – from official engagements. The move was perceived as retaliation for negative coverage of Meghan, rather than an effort to support “credible” outlets. What could have been an opportunity to shake up the traditional royal rota system to incorporate social media, new journalists and other trusted media organizations, backfired and became a war on the press.

No defined strategy: Harry and Meghan communicated their messaging seemingly without input from the royal family, resulting in contradicting messages. In fact, in an attempt to beat the news cycle and a potential leak, Harry and Meghan rushed out their messaging on their own channels. This resulted in a back and forth release of statements and misinformation from media outlets that was public and messy. Even if you think the couple was right to get their message out, perhaps they needed a better strategy from the outset.

Unclear objectives: Harry and Meghan claimed their exit was in search of a simpler life out of the spotlight and away from the paparazzi. But a month into their royal-less life, they were house hunting in Los Angeles – another paparazzi hub – and are set to speak at high-profile conferences. While too early to tell, it seems the new life they are chasing closely resembles the royal life they left behind. At least, it wouldn’t fit under most people’s definition of a simpler life. Assuming their plan wasn’t to simply move to a different spotlight, the couple’s objectives didn’t correspond with their actions.

PR Triumphs

New media channels: Harry and Meghan effectively broke the mold with their personal Instagram account and website to communicate directly with their audience – something unheard of by royal family terms. This was a smart move, one that was particularly crucial in communicating their exit. It was best exemplified by complete transparency with their follows on the spring transition with a FAQ sheet released in February, and accounted via Instagram Stories, a relatively new channel.

Designate a spokesperson: While there isn’t much alignment between the royal family and Harry and Meghan, the couple made a smart decision to make Harry designated spokesperson while Meghan has stayed fairly off the radar. He has communicated their plans, the reasoning behind those plans, and personal experiences that have impacted his decision to abandon his title. Harry, amid a lot of criticism, has demonstrated a strong, unified message and avoided further miscommunications from too many voices chiming in on the same matters.

Humanizing yourself: More so than other members of the royal family, Harry has opened up about his personal experiences. In October, he made a rare statement in a lawsuit against British tabloids comparing the treatment of Meghan in the press to his late mother’s. And following the birth of the couple’s son last May, Harry and Meghan deviated from the usual royal protocol and waited days to release formal photos and speak with the press, a move that many could relate to.

Now that the breakup is official – and now that they’re in the limelight of Hollywood – Harry and Meghan will likely have a host of new PR opportunities and challenges. Will they learn from their mistakes while building on the smart moves they’ve made? Only time will tell.

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Humanity Rising needed a hand. The nonprofit group, which gives Chicago-area students scholarships for self-directed volunteer service projects, wasn’t telling its story in ways that resonated. Debbie Ferruzzi, Humanity Rising’s founder and CEO, came to Greentarget for help.

In the course of six months, our team not only revamped Humanity Rising’s messaging but also helped Debbie and her team develop and execute on comprehensive marketing and communications plans. In all we spent nearly 200 hours, all delivered pro bono, on Humanity Rising – an investment in time that easily paid for itself in inspiration and gratitude for our team. Here’s how it happened.

Capturing Our Imagination

In 2017, Greentarget launched its first-ever GT Cares Grant to expand our pro bono reach and build a deep connection with an organization that truly aligned with our service offerings, our background and the collective passion of our team. Each member of the Greentarget staff sought nominations through personal and social media networks, casting a wide net to find organizations that would match our strengths and push us to stretch our comfort zone. Our Pro Bono and Community Investment Committee carefully winnowed the group to five candidates to take to the full staff for a vote. While each of the candidates was deserving, and each would have been an exciting challenge, one in particular captured our imaginations.

Humanity Rising is a movement to create a better world through volunteer service. By enabling students to choose a cause they feel passionately about, Humanity Rising helps bring awareness to dozens of worthy causes – making it a perfect fit for our team, which has a broad range of philanthropic passions.

Throughout our six-month engagement with Humanity Rising, we assisted with messaging, media relations, event support and digital and social strategy. All of this work came together in a comprehensive PR and communications plan, which included sets of strategic messages tailored to Humanity Rising’s stakeholders: students, individual donors and corporate sponsors. It was important to define a clear message for each group, and we produced versatile messages to be molded and iterated across different types of marketing materials and external communications as Humanity Rising continues to grow. The plan also included in-depth media and influencer lists tailored to the organization’s audiences.

In addition to this plan, we provided press release and media advisory templates, content for sponsorship brochures, a social media plan, draft social posts and strategic guidance on Google Ads and website structure. We also gave support and guidance on follow-up for a conference Humanity Rising attended and developed a job description that led to the employment of a new intern to help support PR and marketing initiatives into the future.

Purpose-Driven Work – At Work

In the end, we left Humanity Rising equipped to more strategically and effectively communicate its mission. They’re poised to execute a media relations plan and develop savvy content. We’re looking forward to seeing what’s next for them.

At Greentarget, doing purpose-driven work isn’t a requirement; it’s a benefit for our team. And from an organization standpoint, we are lucky to contribute to causes we believe in while offering our colleagues unique experiences in both public relations and life. From the United Way of Metro Chicago and Heartland Alliance to the Domestic Violence Legal Clinic and the Cameron Kravitt Foundation to Culinary Care and Barrel of Monkeys, Greentarget has committed hundreds of hours to a broad spectrum of organizations that are working tirelessly to improve the lives of thousands of individuals and their families.

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