Would a millennial marry an attractive employer?
On the fourth of April 2020, the front-page of the Algemeen Dagblad, a Dutch newspaper, covered a story about the Henk (91) and Mien (87) from Berlicum (a small town in the Netherlands) where they have been living their entire lives. They have met each other in the fifties on a fair. And now, in 2020, they were still together and married together for 63 year. Together they had four children, ten grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.
Henk and Mien had a bicycle store together. While Mien would sell bicycles in the front of the store throughout the day, Henk would repair bicycles in the back of the store in his workshop. They took real good care of each other, they were a real team together.
Henk was also a volunteer in the local fire brigade for 35 years. He was actually one of the first to join the voluntary fire brigade when it was established in 1951, and became a commander of the fire brigade in 1963. He even got a Royal award for his dedicated service when he left the fore brigade.
When the coronavirus came to the Netherlands, they were asked by their son in law, “what if the coronavirus will hit you?” They both replied “We had a beautiful, long life. It’s fine like this”. Pretty quick after this talk they had with their son in law, Mien got infected with the coronavirus.
The story in the newspaper starts early in the morning on Friday, the 27th of march. ‘ when they were both still lying next to each other in bed as they have done for the past 63 years. Nevertheless, things aren’t secure and familiar any more. Corona had sneaked into their home and cast their future away’. At 5 am, Mien passed away leaving Henk all alone.
Later that same day, Mien is being taking care of and picked up. As the stretcher with Mien on it is being carried away, and being parted from Henk, he said, “goodbye mean, I’ll be right there”. The next day Henk passes away at 1:45 pm.
A few days later they got buried together. There was a beautiful funeral procession on the way to the burial site, not going in two separate funeral cars, but on bicycles with one great-grandchild on a tricycle and another great-grandchild on an autoped, and the rest of their family walking behind them.
Marriages of 63 years are becoming more rare. Having a lifelong spouse is becoming more rare. The story of Henk and Mien touched my heart and made me think about my life and my marriage but also my children, my work, my ambitions, my future, my goals and my service. Unfortunately the divorce rate is rapidly increasing these last few decades when taken the marriage rate into consideration. The crude marriage rate is also declining. It becomes more normal to live together without marriage, perhaps to end a relationship more easily?! Divorces are also becoming more and more common. What is happening? Do we fear commitment? Do we detest commitment? Are we afraid to lose our freedom? Are we afraid of being bound? And not only in marriage, but in all aspects of life. I also see this same kind of attitude with other types of commitments, engagements and alliances. Don’t we want to commit to something out of fear to come across something better?
Being a millennial myself, I recognize this behavior within really strong among the millennials. They are known for their job hop attitude. I’m a little bit different, I’m not the typical millennial. I do prefer a lifelong employment and it is my greatest desire to stay married. I do prefer commitment. But it has to come two ways.
There are a lot of attractive persons, and you might feel attracted to one or two, or even more. But that doesn’t mean that this person is marriage-material for you! Appearance alone will never be a good, solid foundation for marriage, and the chances it will fail is tremendous. To truly fall in love you will need much more than that. And even after you have fallen in love and got married, it can still go the wrong way. But it all starts by falling in love. To marry without love is just unthinkable.
I personally believe that mutual respect is the most important ingredient is for a successful marriage. If you truly respect your partner, you would always be committed, honest, integer, trustworthy, helpful, forgiving, patient etc. I also truly believe that mutual respect is the most important ingredient for a successful lifelong employment. Also for millennials like me!
So here’s my message to all employers out there who wants lifelong employments from millennials, there are just four rules:
1. Attracting millennials by portraying yourself as an attractive employer will not set a solid foundation for a lasting commitment. It will just get our attention.
2. You can’t buy love! You can’t buy commitment! Offering a nice company car will only attract us for a moment, until we come across a better offer.
3. We are really ambitious, we want to develop ourselves and keep developing ourselves. In order words, we want a lifelong development. The chances are that an employer offering a lifelong development to their millennials, will gain their lifelong employment. It’s a commitment that will come from both ways. BUT, just offering a lifelong development is not enough, that’s just a masquerade! It will only make you attractive and get our attention for a moment, but we will run away as soon as the make-up wears off. You will have toyou’re your money where mouth is. Work with us, and keep working with us, track our progression often and keep providing us sufficient support. And we will work for you and keep working for you and keep growing your company. It’s a continuous process. Too often employees are facing stagnation in their development. They’re not progressing no more, and stagnation means decline. We hate this to happen.
4. I saved the best and most important ingredient, for last! RESPECT! We want to be respected. A top-down culture does not work for us! That’s too old-fashioned. That doesn’t mean that we want a bottom-up culture, but we just want mutual respect. TRUE RESPECT! Not just empty words. Truly care for us, and we will care for you, you will gain our lasting commitment. The previous three points are useless without respect!
Treat us as a package, and we will leave.