How Municipalities Can Attract and Retain Smart Young People
Cities, districts, and towns throughout BC recently had their elections. New mayors, councillors, and other elected officials entered office. They all have ideas on how to make their community better, and I have some they should consider.
Every community needs more smart young people to move and stay there to ensure its long-term success. I explain why in Smart Young BC. What better time to make this happen than after an election? Here’s what municipalities can do to attract and retain more smart young people and secure the future of their community.
Take stock of the people, businesses, and organizations in your community
Smart young people want to work with great people at great businesses and organizations. Often, the only reason a young person moves is for work. To attract and retain them in your community, you must find great people and businesses for them to work with. You’ll need to ask yourself and the leaders in your community:
What are the hubs for smart young people, and where do they spend their time? Universities, elite high school programs, interest-based clubs, and events for the industries of the future are good places to start.
What are the companies and organizations smart young people want to work for? In BC, this looks like companies and startups in biotech, crypto, entertainment (movies, TV, metaverse), cleantech, AI, and medtech. Here’s a list of examples.
Who are the people smart young people look up to or value their opinions? Look for the people hiring and influencing smart young people such as founders, executives and managers at great companies, and “thought leaders.”
Creating a list of the people, businesses, and organizations that smart young people value is the critical first step to attracting and retaining more of them. It gives you resources to work with.
Connecting smart young people with these resources
Connecting smart young people with the top people, companies, and organizations in your community sounds simple. It is, but it remains effective because leaders don’t do it. Everyone says they are too busy, but connecting smart young people with the resources in your community is one of the most effective ways to attract and retain more of them. You must create a cluster in your community for them.
The best time to make these connections is during “transition points” in smart young people’s lives. For example, you should encourage elite high schoolers to spend time with other elite high schoolers and go to the best post-secondary program. This doesn’t only mean university. They should know the options available to them other than university. Recommendations might include unorthodox options, like internships or entrepreneurial work in the community instead of university. There are more opportunities in your community for smart young people than you realize.
The same is true for top university students. They should know about great companies and organizations in your community and be encouraged to work there (reference the resources you’ve discovered). Often, they move elsewhere because they don’t know about the opportunities in their community. They only hear all about the big opportunities with big businesses somewhere else. A nudge in the right direction can make a big difference.
The internet allows businesses in your community to make an impact on the entire world. It allows smart young people to do work with people from across the globe while staying physically in your community. Helping open their eyes to the global opportunities in your community is critical. “You can do big things here” should be your message.
Events, work programs, and showcases are key to making these connections. Creating clusters of people, even small numbers, are critical. A small, passionate group is better than a large unengaged group. Encourage businesses to make use of co-op programs, and partner with them and business groups to promote job opportunities, especially in industries of the future.
Promote your resources to the wider world
Be proud of the businesses, organizations, and people in your community. Talk about them, ask others to talk about them, and use them as examples. Say that you have and want smart young people to join and stay in your community. This gives the businesses and organizations energy and status, it is moral support that helps them succeed. Encouragement is more important than you realize.
I realize that municipalities have limited ways of supporting the businesses and organizations in their community, but you should try. Investing in industries of the future help create the future of your community. Create win-wins for businesses, organizations, entrepreneurs, and other local leaders. Partner on projects, and help build the infrastructure they need. Listen to their recommendations. Especially help their investment in young talent, like work programs, events, or connections.
Another way to promote your community to the wider world is to get people from elsewhere (BC, Canada, and the wider world) to visit in the context of work. If you have conferences or events, get smart young people to join and try to join yourself. Ask them what it would take for them to move to your community, or why they are thinking of leaving. Connect the people who come to local leaders and opportunities. Creating these connections builds the roots that get people to make investments and stay here.
Unblock opportunity
More than you realize, smart young people are blocked from pursuing opportunities in your community. They can’t pursue their passions and live up to their potential. This is often why they leave. They believe they can become unblocked by heading somewhere else. I hear this story all the time from smart young people. You should try your best to unblock them within the community.
First, let smart young people live in your city. They’re likely willing to live in “worse” living conditions if they’re around other people like them. Building housing is difficult, but relaxing housing requirements can be easier. Housing is a bigger blocker than office space.
Second, remote work is still a big opportunity. With remote work, someone can work at a company they wouldn’t have access to, while still living here. They build their expertise and remain a part of the community. Many communities have resources like co-working spaces, coffee shops, and libraries that can be key spaces for remote work for young people. Often they don’t know about them, and they certainly don’t know about the other people around them working remotely. Some ideas for improving your municipalities for remote work:
Cluster people in specific spaces, and get people to meet and interact with each other.
Lead by example, try working in public.
Provide public spaces with good internet.
Get more online reviews for them. Ask that people do it.
Third, new people and immigrants in your community are likely more blocked than you realize. For example, all types of immigrants struggle with the immigration process, which takes up much of the time and energy they need to do great things. Provide resources and connections as much as you can. They also need encouragement to be ambitious and see opportunities in their community. Connecting them with relevant leaders and businesses in the community helps significantly.
Your community’s future is up to you
All this requires being proactive, something difficult for governments to do. Smart Young BC lays out the reasons why attracting and retaining smart young people should be so important, but it does require focus and investment from you and your government.
Attracting and retaining even a few more smart young people in your community can have a massive impact on its future. These are the people who are the future leaders, organizers, and businesspeople in your community. They have an outsized impact on making your municipality successful in the future.
Making your community a great place for smart young people requires someone to do something, and there is no better person to do it than you. You owe it to the future to make it happen.
I’d be more than happy to talk more about how you can do this in your community, send me an email or message on Twitter or LinkedIn. If you have recommendations to improve this piece, feel free to leave a comment or send me a message (I appreciate every piece of feedback).