How To Get The Most Out Of Part-Time Student Employees

Golf courses often rely on student employees to fill such part-time or seasonal roles as maintenance help, pro shop sales staff, or golf cart attendee. Unfortunately, giving millennials simple, often repetitive tasks is not the optimal way to leverage their potential. The reality is that students accumulate a large quantity of knowledge through their schooling, which could prove beneficial to many golf facilities.

For example, a college student studying business could easily help a golf course in Marketing, even though he or she has not completed their desired degree program yet. So, to ensure that you have motivated employees that do the basic required work, but also do some diversified tasks in order to improve your business, you need to know who they are, what they are looking for, how to manage them efficiently, and how to leverage their knowledge.

Realties of Student Employees Today

Price of College Increasing Faster than Wages

Schooling is much more expensive today than it was for previous generations of students, and unfortunately, wages have not kept pace with this increase in cost. In fact, other than mortgages, student loans are now the leading source of debt incurred in the United States.

The price of getting a college degree has been on the rise for almost four decades, with a public university degree now averaging $20,000, and a private university degree averaging twice that figure. These figures are per year, rendering an average debt of $100,000 by graduation day.

Students Work More Hours Than Ever

With schooling becoming more expensive, students are working more hours, though this increase is still not sufficient to keep up with the cost of higher education. What’s worse is that, according to a study published by HSBC in 2018, time spent working is overtaking time spent studying, thus minimizing the value students are receiving for the exorbitant cost they’re incurring.

The outlook is not all negative, however. Other studies show that working an average of fifteen hours per week can actually be beneficial to the student in educating him or her in time-management and placing focus on one task at a time, and in many cases, rendering higher grades.

Supporting the Workforce’s Next Generation

Even though the financial situation is worsening for students, golf facilities can help by giving their young employees meaningful tasks related to their field of study, which will give them an advantage when it comes time to find a post-graduation job. In turn, this will help your golf course improve and get the most out of student workers.

How to Attract Student Employees

Leveraging Social Media to Find Candidates

Social media channels present a great way to access excellent young candidates, with this demographic spending a considerable amount of time on these platforms. Within the next five years, 75 percent of the working population will be represented by Millennials – knowing how to reach them is vital to finding top-quality candidates.

This means that the old way of doing things may not be applicable at many golf facilities. Recruiting employees based on the values that mean the most to their generation is important, and hiring managers should be organized and focused in their outreach to candidates. You must be flexible, consider employees’ work/life balance, be innovative, remain socially responsible, and make your club an attractive place to work, with learning opportunities and room for growth.

Using Schools for a Qualified Workforce

To efficiently find students studying in relevant fields, leveraging schools in your area can be highly-beneficial means of attracting employees. However, there is a lot of competition on campuses to recruit the best and brightest students. In fact, 75 percent of employers will look to recent college graduates to fill vacant positions. Hence, it is important to build relationships, offer internship programs, and post job opportunities on career sites.

Facilities should also create a campus recruitment strategy that builds your brand and highlights its effectiveness as a marketing tool. Using career centers, job sites, and social media, golf facilities can reach many local students, and with a sufficient job package, you can fill your open positions with bright, new talent that can be an asset to your club for the long-term.

Offering Interesting Benefits

The younger generation doesn’t only look for financial benefits anymore. Millennials have some very specific needs in their job choices – it is vital for golf facilities to stay abreast of these desired work benefits.

These primary “requirements” include:

• Career development
• Social activities with coworkers
• Flexibility in work schedule
• Student loan repayment assistance
• A happy and healthy work environment.

Leveraging and Managing Young Workers

Increasingly Tech-Savvy Workforce

Younger generations have grown up with technology as part of their everyday life, and usually have a better grasp on how to use it. Golf courses should leverage this knowledge to their advantage to develop an online presence and properly use this increasing technology in daily tasks.

To most effectively manage new Millennial and Gen Z employees, managers must get to know these individuals and gauge what makes them tick – what motivates them and what technology they’re most passionate about.

Take Advantage of their Field of Study

If a student studies in IT, Marketing, Supply Chain, Environmental studies etc. there are ways you can leverage the knowledge accumulated in school to your facility’s advantage by sharing ideas and building new strategies. This fresh perspective can create new opportunities across your facility.

Tips to Manage Younger Workers

To have motivated employees, it’s not only about giving cool tasks, but also fostering the proper environment to get the best out of every employee. We highlighted earlier the primary workplace desires of Millennials – understanding the importance of these factors is the first step to implementing them. If you’re doing this already, good for you – but for those facilities just grasping these concepts, it is vital to get on board. Millennials have passion and purpose for a job they value – if you’re creating the wrong environment, you will lose them.

Conclusion

Students can be an inexpensive investment with a lot to offer and can easily be motivated if put in the right environment. They want communication – they want a welcoming workplace – they want the progress of technology to drive their own career advancement, and your golf facility can be instrumental in satisfying each of these desires, helping your young staff grow.