by Rikus Jansen, head of EOH Voice and Unified Communications

The workforce is increasingly filled with Millennials. In fact, more than one in three workers today is a Millennial, according to Pew Research Center tabulations. Here are some things to bear in mind when dealing with the ways in which Millennials are most productive.

How are Millennials different in the workplace?

Millennials work differently to their older colleagues. As a group, they possess a digital mentality and love their electronic devices, such as smartphones, tablets, and the like.

They carry this mindset into their work environments, even to the point of preferring digital interactions to in-person ones. In fact, 41 percent of Millennials prefer to communicate electronically at work rather than face to face, according to a study by PwC.

If you’re a business that employs Millennials and you hope to attract and retain them, you may need to adapt your communication and collaboration processes to include today’s most-advanced digital technologies.

Step up the challenge with UC

With a UC platform, employees can communicate more quickly than if they were using email or the phone. UC is especially useful for multitasking.

In-person meetings and long phone calls can really cut into the workday. After all, 57 percent of the 600 adults polled in a recent survey conducted by Workfront believe that meetings get in the way of their daily tasks.

Excessive emails came in second, with 40 percent feeling as though sending, sorting, and replying to emails affected their productivity.

Adapting your workplace to better suit the demands of the growing millennial workforce needn’t be a significant challenge. In fact, it can be a breeze when you partner with the right company to deploy new technology and communication services to your business.


Rikus Jansen is a Unified Communications specialist. He entered the South African technology space in the late 1980s, pioneering 3D animation and video effects in the broadcasting industry. This led to a career in corporate ICT outsourcing. He co-founded Ensync Voice Solutions, a unified communications company. After merging the Ensync companies with the JSE-listed ICT provider, EOH, he now heads up the EOH Voice and Unified Communications business, which is one of the leading communication providers in South Africa.