Money Makers: FlexJobs Survey Finds Wanting to Travel a Surprisingly Popular Motivator for Why Millennials Work

According to a July 2019 FlexJobs survey, which included more than 1,600 millennials, travel is a surprisingly popular motivator for why millennials work. 63% of millennials say the desire to travel is their primary reason to work, second only to paying for basic necessities (83%) and well ahead of more traditional reasons for working, such as saving for retirement (58%) and paying off debt (51%).

Work-life balance (81%) took the top spot for factors millennials consider when evaluating job prospects, slightly ahead of salary (79%), and well ahead of health insurance (41%), 401k benefits (35%), and paid maternity/paternity leave (18%).

“With millennials such a dominant presence in the U.S. labor workforce, it’s critical that companies pay attention to the value millennials place on work flexibility and work-life balance, or they’ll risk losing out on that talent,” said Sara Sutton, founder, and CEO of FlexJobs. “According to our survey, millennials are more likely than older workers to quit jobs that do not offer work flexibility, and they’re more willing to give up important benefits, like vacation time, for the option to work from home. It’s clear that millennials place a high value on work flexibility,” Sutton concluded.

Additional findings about millennials and flexible work include:
Flexible work preferences: Telecommuting 100% of the time (74%) was the top choice of flexible work arrangements for millennials, followed closely by flexible schedule jobs (73%), with part-time (43%) and freelancing (38%) jobs considerably less desirable
Productivity: 66% of millennials say they would be more productive working from a home office than in a traditional office
Social media for job searching: 20% of millennials don’t use social media like LinkedIn or Facebook in their job search

Work Differences Between Gen X* and Millennials
Quitting jobs: Millennials are more likely than Gen Xers to leave a job because of flexible work issues. 71% of millennials have considered leaving a job because it did not offer flexible work arrangements, compared to 66% of Gen Xers
Trade-offs for remote work: Millennials are much more willing to give up some vacation time (28%) in exchange for the opportunity to work remotely, compared to 19% of Gen Xers who reported the same thing
Negotiating work flexibility: Gen Xers are more competent at negotiating work flexibility with their employers, experiencing a 61% success rate, while millennials report a 53% success rate
Encountering job scams: Millennials know more people (28%) who have been scammed while looking for a job online vs only 20% of Gen Xers who report knowing someone who has been scammed

To help millennials find remote jobs at highly rated companies, FlexJobs compared a recent list of the best large workplaces for millennials to determine which of these companies are also actively hiring remote workers. Below are the top 25 companies which met these criteria, and are excellent prospects for millennials seeking remote work options:

1. Ultimate Software
2. Hilton
3. Salesforce
4. Workday
5. Edward Jones
6. Red Hat
7. Cisco
8. HubSpot
9. Zillow Group
10. Stryker Corporation
11. AbbVie
12. Intuit Inc.
13. Adobe
14. Splunk
15. American Fidelity Assurance Company
16. Quicken Loans
17. Allianz Life Insurance Company of North America
18. Total Quality Logistics
19. Atlassian
20. NVIDIA
21. American Express
22. Kronos Incorporated
23. SAP America Inc.
24. Novo Nordisk Inc.
25. BayCare Health System

For job seekers of all ages, FlexJobs has also outlined ten phone interview tips to help advance to the next step of the interview process.

For more information please visit https://www.flexjobs.com/blog/post/top-rated-workplaces-millennials-remote-jobs/ or contact Kathy Gardner at kgardner@flexjobs.com.

*2,800 Gen X respondents

About FlexJobs

FlexJobs is a premium online job service for professionals seeking flexible work, specializing in full-time and part-time remote jobs, employee and freelance jobs, and on-site jobs with flexible, part-time, and alternative schedules. Since its start in 2007, FlexJobs has helped more than 4 million people in their job searches and has created the largest vetted database of legitimate flexible job opportunities in over 50 career categories. In addition, FlexJobs provides robust career support, including curated expert resources and career coaching services, to partner with job seekers in all phases of their journey. A trusted source in the media, FlexJobs has been cited in top national outlets such as CNN, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, CNBC, Forbes, and many others. FlexJobs' Founder & CEO Sara Sutton has also launched two additional partner sites, Remote.co and 1 Million for Work Flexibility, to help provide education and awareness about the viability and benefits of flexible work. Sutton is the creator of The TRaD* Works Forum (*Telecommuting, Remote, & Distributed), dedicated to helping companies leverage the benefits of telecommuting, remote and distributed teams.