Why Millennial Women Leave Their Job – Three surprising findings

There were three surprising findings that emerged from our ICEDR survey of organizational leaders and men and women age 22-35.

Surprise #1: Women around age 30 rank pay, lack of learning and development, and a shortage of meaningful work as the primary reasons why they leave organizations.

When considering the main reasons why women around age 30 leave organizations, one might expect the primary in uences to be motherhood or dif culty integrating work and life. Surprisingly, young women identi ed nding a higher paying job, a lack of learning and development, and a shortage of interesting and meaningful work as the primary reasons why they may leave (see figure 1).

Surprise #2: Men and women around the age of 30 mainly leave organizations for similar reasons.

One may think that millennial men are compensation driven, while women around the age of 30 are focused on balance and family. However, our survey reveals that the departure drivers for men and women around the age of 30 are closely aligned.

According to millennials, four out of the five top reasons why young women and men leave organizations overlap:

• “I have found a job that pays more elsewhere.”
• “There are not enough opportunities forlearning and development for me here.”
• “There is not a fair balance between how hard I work and the compensation I receive.”
• “The work here is not as interesting and meaningful as I would like.”