Millennials currently make up the largest portion of the U.S. workforce. They are known for their familiarity with the internet, social media, and digital devices. As a generation that grew up on stickers and participation trophies, millennials have come to place high importance on collaboration, teamwork and helping the greater good.

So what are the things that you're putting in place for these workers? Because if you’re thinking, “well, I'll just wait.” What you're waiting for is not necessarily coming. Millennials make up about 75% of the workplace, there are more MBAs in the millennial generation than have no degrees at all, 30% of them are living with family, and 36% have tattoos. Planning for the future includes the millennial and gen z employee.

ENCOURAGE THEIR “CAN-DO” ATTITUDE
Millennials want to know that their work is valued, and they are somehow making a difference. The best way to connect with your millennial colleague is to explain the big picture to them and let them know how their work impacts the families or communities you are serving.

They are looking to see that the work that they do adds value to something. To me what this is: Are there things that matter to those employees? If there are, can they be in charge of it. For example, something as simple as doing a can drive. One funeral home did Wreaths Across America and they put their millennial employee in charge of that. They loved it, because they bridged that gap between work and something socially responsible and doing something different. What we find is that the values millennials, and even Gen Z, will go after are the ones that are actually trying to accomplish something versus something that just wants to make money. So, if we can have that kind of balance between those things, make it available to them. Plus, doing drives like this — can drives, clothing drives, things like that — it also boosts the funeral home as well.

CREATE AN ENVIRONMENT THAT IS POSITIVE AND CONSTRUCTIVE
Millennials are accustomed to using technology in their everyday lives, and they expect the same at work. As digital natives, they are comfortable learning and utilizing new technology. If different procedures can be digitized, these employees want the workplace to invest in the new technology and innovations. Mobile integration and modalities are expected, not only by employees, but also by the millennial family members you serve.

They've grown up surrounded by digital devices, but ‘digital natives’ does not mean that they are technologically savvy. If you want them to help you on Facebook and Instagram, that's your group. But if you expect that they are going to somehow run your website, that they're going to fix your printer, got another think coming. The millennials and the Gen Z at Worsham College, if the printer does not work, they will just look at it and go, “it's not working. It's not working.” I am probably more technologically savvy, because I remember dial-up and when I had to read descriptions and put things together.

ENCOURAGE THEM TO GIVE THEIR OPINIONS AND IDEAS
Millennials grew up with parents and teachers who facilitated open communication techniques. They are used to having their opinions heard and having a seat at the table. While millennials do favor encouraging feedback, they also want consistent communication. They want to be informed about the job and the employer’s expectations and have regular meetings to check in on their progress.

They want both instruction and independence, so teach them through conversations, not commands, allowing for feedback and repeating. Give them measurable goals and help them hold themselves accountable for achieving them. Do not threaten punishment if they make mistakes but give them the confidence to take responsibility for their actions, and the support they need to fix their mistakes.

What are the needs of our millennial generation? They need coaching and mentorship. They want to develop their skills and know how they're progressing. I'll say it like this, everyone that comes into mortuary science school — the ones that graduate and move on — they want to be you. They want to be funeral directors. That's why they go to school. So they are excited, they can't wait to start. The idea of you coaching and mentoring them matters a lot to them, because it's such a part of who they are. And it's what they want to see and be a part of.

ACKNOWLEDGE THEIR IMPACT
If a millennial is doing a good job, they want to know. Acknowledge hard work through recognition programs and performance-based incentives. However, this recognition should not be competitive. It is more about them staying motivated rather than outperforming their co-workers.
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Many of our students work at local funeral homes, and we had a student who worked a visitation. When he came to school the next day, he says, “I had a great day at work yesterday. A funeral director gave me this.” And he holds up above his head, as if he just had won the lottery, a $10 Subway gift card. All our students were so excited, so happy, because here's the two things that happened in that moment: he was recognized and he was appreciated. It doesn't have to be huge. It doesn't need to be these massive rewards. It just needs to be something and you're saying, “Yes, I see what you're doing.”

It’s easy to stereotype generations because it makes some intuitive sense that people born in similar eras would have similar skills, experiences and attitudes. But good management and a positive work environment matter more than how many generations are co-existing under one roof.

So, for example, if you have an expectation of how you want to receive communication, you need to tell them, If they don't follow your policy, they're a bad employee, get rid of them. But most of the time, the generations are actually be able to change and communicate with you the way that you want.

Many times the actions and behaviors of the millennial can seem like they are disengaged or disinterested in their job but that is not entirely accurate.  For example, many funeral directors say that once a millennial completes their task list they grab their phone and do not look around to find additional tasks.  My response and suggestion is that most of your younger employees have been taught that once you complete a task list you are done. So if you want them to find additional tasks ask your millennial what is missing from the task list.  Make them part of the discussion.

When funeral professionals learn the right approaches to working with the different generations it alleviates a great deal of stress and frustration in the workplace. Acknowledging the different styles of employees allows for them all, regardless of their generation, to contribute and be a meaningful part of the workplace.

Understanding generations particularly around communication, trust and decision-making can go a very long way in helping funeral professionals understand how to better connect with different generations of employees and families they serve. At a time when the profession continues to be more consumer-centric, the potential benefit of better communication is significant. Regardless of the generation most all people want the same thing: to work in a place that treats them fairly and values their work.

Hello, my name is Michael Dixon. I am the president and founder of Funeral Professionals Peer Support. Before I tell you why that date is so important, let’s go back a bit. I was born 57 years ago in Transcona, Manitoba to two amazing, successful parents. I was the youngest – and only – boy in a family of girls.

Growing up I had a lot of things stacked against me: I was born with a serious heart defect and a stutter, and in childhood I was sexually abused. The heart defect was cured and with a lot of work my stutter was overcome, but the scars of abuse stay with you forever. I hid it well. I buried it away by playing football and baseball, and, sadly, with alcohol. Upon graduating from high school and college, I started working in the hotel industry. After almost 10 years of that, I discovered that hotels just were not for me.

Funeral service was always my second choice out of high school, so I decided that I would give it a try. After finishing my 40 hours observation, I felt like I belonged for the first time. I was with people who were like me: kind, compassionate, and caring. I started working for a large funeral home and I was loving it. I was a sponge: I soaked in everything I was being taught, both by new directors and seasoned directors. Some are still my role models to this day.

Four years into my new profession, I began to work for a removal service that this funeral home owned. There I saw firsthand how truly cruel humans can be to each other. In a three-year period, I attended over 38 murders—scenes where people were shot, stabbed, and tortured—and some of them were just children. Car accidents, train accidents, and suicides were too numerous to mention. Some calls you will never forget, even though they happened over 20 years ago. I can still picture the Christmas gifts all over the road that came from a car that flipped over on Christmas Eve. I can remember the song that was playing on the radio at a murder scene, or the smell of blood, gas, or anti-freeze.
I know I am preaching to the choir, but things like this never leave your memory. They make you turn the radio off when you hear “Welcome to the Jungle“ or take another route in order to avoid the site of that accident, suicide, or murder scene that is embedded in your memory. Otherwise you get triggered. Or you stand in the doorway of your kids’ rooms watching them because your memory just won’t let you fall asleep. When you do sleep, it’s not a sound sleep for the recommended eight hours, because death does not just happen from Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

But with all these negative things, I never wanted to leave the profession. I tried to do my job well, hiding my feelings of failure, my low self-esteem and loneliness. I always put on a brave face, using comedy and humour to hide the depression that was slowly taking over my life. I, like most people in funeral service, felt that I had no one to go to. I didn’t want to talk to my wife about what I was feeling. The people I worked with at the time did not offer a safe place to talk about your feelings. There were no organized debrief or talk-down sessions, and the ones we did have were usually at a bar with alcohol, which is not a positive healing environment. In that time, the feeling around our profession was “You knew what you were getting into.”
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So, like everyone else, I went ahead and did my job well. I made good work friends and worked hard, but, due to my depression, I was never myself. I was always putting on an act—which often got me in trouble at work and especially at home. I always felt that I never fit in at either place. I didn’t think of myself as a good person, especially not a good father and husband. I thought many times that everyone’s life would be better if I was not around.

One thing about depression, it’s a slow killer. The year 2015 should have been a great year: I had a beautiful home on a nice piece of land, my three amazing kids were successful and taking on the world; my wife was in a good job and an active, well-respective member of our community; I was in a job that I loved, and for the first time I felt loved and respected.
But things were starting to unravel for me. I had terrible anxiety. I hated to be away from home, and when I was at home, I was usually in my room, cut off from everyone. I was not sleeping well, I was having terrible anxiety attacks where it felt like a heart attack—trouble catching my breath, chest pains, etc. I was using alcohol now as a crutch more than I had done in the past, using it to give me confidence to go out, to make speeches, and to meet people.

A month before Christmas in 2015, I decided I’d had enough. I was tired. I was tired of going on. So, I planned this suicide attempt. I scouted out locations, bought a good insurance policy, even did a practice run. January 7th was the day. That Christmas, we went overboard on gifts and had a lot of parties. January 7th came and I got up at my normal time. I was not sad or upset. I was totally at peace. I kissed my wife goodbye, drove my son to school, and off I went, pulling into the parking lot at a park. I sat there having my last cigarette and thought “Okay, let’s do this.”

I opened the car door but for some reason I could not get out of the car. I could hear this voice in my head saying “It’s okay, I got you, make that call!” and I could feel these hands on my shoulder. I started to cry because I was thinking “Who would walk my daughter down the aisle or be there for my two sons and my wife?”
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In my despair, I made a deal with myself. I was going to call my doctor and, if someone answered the phone, I would go for help. If I must leave a message, I would walk in the forest. The phone rang once and a nurse picked up, and I thought “When does that happen? When do you ever call your doctor and they pick up the phone?” After telling the nurse that I was suicidal, my doctor came on the phone and told me to come to his office right away. After an hour of talking, I went for tests and I was diagnosed with severe depression and PTSD.

From that point on, I decided to not be quiet, but to be very open about my diagnosis. When I told my colleagues what I was dealing with, many of them said “Man, I am going through the same thing. I am tired, frustrated, and burnt out and I am thinking of leaving.” So, instead of staying quiet and only worrying about me, I reached out to a few friends and we decided to come together and organize the very first funeral service peer support group in the world.

Ottawa Funeral Peer Support was born. Our profession finally had a place where people could meet and share their personal struggles and get the support and encouragement to get help. In January of the following year, we started to get press coverage from local newspapers, which other news outlets from across Canada picked up. We then started to get requests to do radio and TV interviews both locally and internationally.

Once that happened, we started to hear from funeral directors across Canada saying “We need this in our communities. We need support.” We realized quickly that our long-term goal had to be our right now goal, and Canadian Funeral Peer Support was born. Within a year, support groups have come up in New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, not to mention Ottawa, Hamilton, and Winnipeg all in Ontario. There is also serious interest in Alberta, British Columbia, Toronto, and Windsor.

Then COVID hit. Our peer support groups met in person so, when everything shut down, we had to come up with a plan to stay connected with our people. It was then decided that each group would host Zoom meetings, which opened us up to funeral professionals from around the world. We started to have people connect with us from throughout the United States as well as England, Italy, Australia, and Kenya. We started to hear from people everywhere that this is something they needed and wanted to be part of.

Our management team got together and we realized we are no longer just a Canadian company. We had to go international. In February of 2021 we started an international support line for licenced and non-licenced funeral staff, along with their families. With a phone call or text, you can speak to a counselor with funeral service experience that will listen and help guide you through any issue you have—for both work or non-work-related issues. We became Funeral Professionals Peer Support (FPPS).

One thing that has made us successful is we have always responded to a need. This year, we brought Peer Support groups into the United States. We are reaching funeral professionals from across the United States and Canada with online support meetings and educational webinars.

FPPS has learned is that there is no “extra money“ from our governments for mental health care. That’s why it is now the responsibility that all businesses make positive mental health care a priority in our workplaces. It is our belief that funeral service can be the leader in the goal of a positive workplace.

Stats tell the story of where we are now:

• In a Work and Well-Being Survey less than half of working Americans reported that their organization supports the well being of its employees.
• In 2014, $186 billion was spent on Health care services to treat mental health issues in the US
• 44.7 million adults 18 or older reported mental illness and burnout in 2016
• 8.8 million adults reported visiting a mental health provider in the past 12 months

Poor mental health and stress can negatively affect employees:

1. Job performance
2. Engagement at work
3. Physical capability and daily functioning
4. Absenteeism

We can’t go on doing the same thing and expecting different results. We have lost too many amazing, talented people in our profession to suicide and burnout. That’s why, as a profession, we can be the leaders. We joined this profession because we care about people. Now it’s time to care for one another.

Peer Support is now being looked at and valued as a positive first step in mental health care around the world. In Canada, federal government departments are now instituting peer support groups for their employees. In Canada and the United States, first responders and the military are starting peer groups as well.

Peer Support helps you meet with people that speak your language, learn from people who have been where you are, and support each other. We provide tools that are applicable to the job, make no judgement, ensure confidentiality and offer the opportunity to give back. Our groups have had speakers talk about burnout, stress, compassion fatigue, yoga, healthy eating and—my favorite—personal support animals. All valuable insight into a healthy work and home life.
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If you are interested in a Peer group in your community or you have any questions please visit us at www.funeralpeersupport.com or call 343-961-2470.


Funeral Professionals Peer Support is committed to the improvement of our brothers and sisters’ mental health. My hope is that no one else in our profession is ever sitting in a park alone in their car playing roulette with their life.