Should leadership training be a part of employee benefits in 2023?

There’s a leadership problem in many organizations. Baby boomers, who tend to make up most senior and second-level executives, are retiring or nearing retirement age and there aren’t enough people with leadership qualities to replace them. This is obvious when you consider that Gen-X, the next oldest age cohort, only numbers about 65 million, too small to fully replace 70 million Boomers. The only way organizations can make up for that 5 million shortfall is by looking to Millennial and Gen-Z cohorts, who must now step up as leaders.

However, that introduces another challenge that most of today’s employers will be familiar with; younger workers are more likely to leave their jobs than any other generation. To attract and retain talented young workers, employers need to consider innovative ways to support their staff. And one way they can do that is by including leadership training in their benefits packages.

Changing trends

Numbering a combined total of 140 million people, Millennials and Gen-Zers can become potent leaders when they receive the necessary training and mentoring. Again, the challenge is that these younger workers are not as inclined as previous generations to remain with the same employer throughout their careers. Instead, they are switching jobs on average every two to three years and in almost every industry.

While many employers may feel exasperated by this job-hopping mentality, they need to accept that this is the new norm with younger workers. Millennials and Gen-Zers don’t view loyalty to an employer in the same way as previous generations. Rather, they see each employer as a stepping stone to the next stage in their careers. Part of this has to do with the desire for securing a higher-paid job, but it’s also about moving up the corporate ladder at a faster pace.

The good news is that companies can harness these very motivations to get more out of young employees. But to do so, employers will have to rethink how they invest in each employee.

Leadership as a benefit

Effective leadership can give an enormous boost to an organization’s overall performance. Yet most companies still view leadership training as something that need only be provided to senior employees. That view might have made sense in an earlier time, but it makes little sense in today’s job-hopping environment. In short, employers need to start offering leadership training benefits to their Millennial and Gen-Z employees, who will likely become leaders at a far younger age than previous generations.

Now, I don’t deny that this can seem counterintuitive. Why, you might ask, should I invest in an employee that will likely be out the door within two to three years? It’s a fair question and I don’t want to give the impression that leadership training will allow you to keep an employee for life. At best, leadership training might allow you to retain a young employee for a total of five years, but it’s unrealistic to expect much more than that. So, what is the advantage of training young workers for leadership positions?

Well, for a start, having more employees with leadership skills can allow an organization to plug any gaps in their team leader and senior executive positions. Sure, these young leaders might be gone within a few years, but with a developed leadership program in place, you’ll always have a talent pool to draw on when new positions open up.

Another advantage is that leadership training can be a very attractive benefit for Millennials and Gen-Zers. Unless they’ve attended business school, most young workers will not have received any leadership training in the past. Providing such training as a starter benefit can foster a culture of collaboration, and collaboration today means understanding that an employee will eventually grow into another position or another company. Organizations that can embrace this mindset will attract more young talent at a time when many businesses are struggling with worker shortages.

Moving forward

A lot of effort often goes into designing an attractive employee benefits package. Fortunately for HR managers and benefits agents, leadership training programs don’t require a lot of work to put together. Start by taking the room temperature and assessing how current employees would feel about attending leadership courses, as well as what they would like to learn. Surveys can be a helpful way to gather this information, just make sure you actually listen to the responses that come back.

Next, seek out leadership trainers who can provide instructional talks and development classes, paid for by the company. Be sure to solicit employee feedback and make adjustments based on those observations. Also, while attending these programs should be entirely optional, employees should receive plenty of notice and encouragement to try them out.

Of course, the same holds true for all employee benefits. You need to continuously remind employees that these benefits exist and are open to everyone. Too many companies don’t do this. Instead, they only communicate their benefits to employees during the onboarding process and then never bring them up again. My advice would be to periodically mail benefits information packages to each employee’s household. If they’re married, chances are their spouse will read them and provide further encouragement for the employee to sign up.

Related: There is a new paradigm for developing leaders

Putting together the right benefits package can make all the difference when recruiting new talent. Even so, I’ve noticed that many companies are stuck in their ways when it comes to their benefits offerings, thinking that what’s worked before will continue to work for today’s employees. If organizations wish to adapt and thrive, they will need to consider more innovative offerings, like leadership training.

Obviously, leadership training won’t be enough on its own to create the perfect benefits package, but it is a good step in a new direction, a step that will not only boost employee satisfaction but also prepare the leaders of tomorrow.