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Many business and government organizations are facing the challenges of reduced budgets, increased retirements, and lost critical organizational expertise. On one end of the employment pipeline, a younger workforce is developing a new set of values and expectations, creating new recruiting and employee retention issues. The progression from an older, traditional, highly experienced workforce to a younger, more portable, employee generation has created critical challenges (Delong, 2004). Global and local companies need to have effective business strategies in place that focus on information security (Magid, 2014). The demand for more cybersecurity professionals is expected to rise to 6 million globally by 2019, with a projected shortfall of 1.5 million cybersecurity professionals (Morgan, 2016). The business world disturbance prompted by Coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, has necessitated an immediate shift to an organizational culture of remote work environments for all employees (Suciu, 2020). The move to telework has also created new organizational challenges around managing cybersecurity risks as employees use personal devices that could have significant cybersecurity vulnerabilities and risks for organizations (Suciu, 2020).
All of these changing workplace dynamics have created a need for organizations to consider the viability of hiring Generation Y and Z employees. These professionals have different interests from previous generations in terms of work environments and cultures (Lancaster & Stillman, 2010)
These younger professionals have undergraduate, graduate, and even doctoral degrees in Cyber-Security, Information Assurance, and Information Security that have just been created in the last 10-12 years. They also have certifications in Security + and Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) certifications. But to attract, recruit, and retain this younger generation of professionals with these critical and emerging skills, managers must consider alternative approaches that look to empower employees over micromanaging and controlling them (Burrell et al., 2015).
The research objective of this paper is to provide a contextual review of the literature and current events to provide conceptual and practical solutions to how technical organizations and cybersecurity operations can effectively manage and engage Generation Y and Z employees. For this research, employee engagement is the extent to which employees are acknowledged and valued for their contributions; they are allowed to participate in how their work is conducted within the organization.
This engagement definition is grounded in the fact that an employee’s work life and career achievements embody a noteworthy percentage of their identity, and such accomplishments gratify them on an insightful level. If an employee views their job, worth, and contribution as something more than just “work,” and finds his or her role in the company professionally and personally fulfilling, research has shown that he or she is less likely to seek a new position elsewhere.
The research process includes using a scan of current and significant management literature to develop an employee engagement managerial approach for technical Generation Y and Z employees built from the “Parenting with Love and Logic” method developed by Cline and Fay (2006) in a manner that does not proclaim that managers are parents and that Generation Y and Z employees are children, but rather to explore the utility of using a human engagement framework this is built off of accountability, setting clear expectations, and empowerment. The goal is to examine employee engagement through a never explored belvedere or perspective.
The research methods include the exploration of the significant literature around the areas of management, performance management, employee engagement, and participatory management to understand better the most noted effective managerial trends and the challenges of employee engagement and the management of Generation Y and Z employees.
The research results indicate command and control, and autocratic, dictatorial managerial approaches are not as effective in managing Generation Y and Z employees. Managing in ways that retain cybersecurity and technical employees becomes critical as more organizations face an increased onslaught of cybersecurity threats in conjunction with a cybersecurity workforce shortage. A new viable managerial focus on employee engagement could use the “love and logic” framework to be effective.