Development and retention of Generation Y employees: a conceptual framework

Abstract

The paper aims to present a conceptual framework of development, commitment, and retention of Gen Y employees. Based on a review of existing literature and using social exchange and social constructivist approach, this study presents a conceptual framework with mentoring, strategic leadership social media, and knowledge sharing as its key constructs to retain Gen Y employees. Mentoring, strategic leadership, social media, and knowledge sharing has a great potential to foster competency development Competency development is critical to evoke affective commitment of Gen Y employees, which in turn result in intention to stay forth. The proposed conceptual framework should be empirically validated in the future research. Organizations should incorporate mentoring, strategic leadership, social media, and knowledge sharing into their talent management strategy for Gen Y employees. Competency development then in turn, evokes commitment of Gen Y employees, leading to intention to stay forth. The framework suggests an approach of generation-specific retention strategy. This is one of the first studies to propose a holistic framework to retain Gen Y employees. This paper adds a new dimension to the talent management literature by focusing on young generation employees.