Millennials Job-Hop More Than Previous Generations, But They'll Slow Down Eventually

(Co-authored by Gloria Yang)

Millennials job-hop more than previous generations, right? Not so fast! The US Bureau of Labor Statistics published a report in Sept. saying the average number of years “workers had been with their current employer hasn’t changed since 2012." In response, FiveThirtyEight declared the “myth of the job-hopping millennial is just that -- a myth.”

Millions of college students will graduate next month and flood the workforce. Most are currently evaluating job opportunities, and which industries they’ll work in. Meanwhile potential employers are wondering if they’ll be easier to retain than previous generations. So we figured it’s an ideal time to tap into the Economic Graph to find out once and for all if millennials are getting a bad rap. Here’s what we discovered:

• Job- and industry-hopping have steadily increased over time.
• Job-hopping (defined as a member changing their employer on their profile) is occurring in all industries, but it’s more common in the Media & Entertainment, Professional Services, and Government/Education/Non-Profits industries. 
• Job-hopping is slightly more common for women than men, and the gap between the two is widening.

Job Hopping Increasing Steadily Over Time

To effectively measure job-hopping over time, we divided generations of professionals into five year periods based on when they graduated college. Generation X graduated between 1986-1990 and 1991-1995, and Millennials graduated between 2001-2005 and 2006-2010.

The average number of companies that each generation worked for within five years after graduating has increased steadily over time. Younger Generation X grads job-hopped more than older Generation X grads, and younger Millennials job-hopped more than older Millennials. Over the last 20 years, the average number of companies professionals worked for in the five years following graduation has nearly doubled. Workers who graduated between 1986-1990 averaged 1.60 jobs during their first five years on the job, whereas those who graduated between 2006-2010 averaged 2.85 jobs.

While younger Millennials didn’t start the job-hopping trend, they sure picked up the pace. As you can see in the chart below, the leap in the average number of jobs between 2001-2005 grads (2.27 jobs) and 2006-2010 grads (2.85 jobs) was noticeably larger than any other graduate groups.

But can they keep up the pace? As you can see, every graduate group showed a sharp slowdown in job-hopping after their first five years on the job. And while we don’t yet know how much job-hopping 2006-2010 grads will do after their first five years working, we predict they too will mellow out over the course of their careers. Still, younger generations are likely to work for more companies in the second half decade of their careers than previous generations did.

Average Number Of Companies Also Growing Quickly

We wanted to ensure that the rise in job-hopping didn’t merely reflect a small “tail” of hyper-switching Millennials. So we looked at the 10th, 50th, and 90th percentiles of each graduate group. It turns out that the increase in job-hopping appears to be standard. Few professionals who graduated between 1986-1990 worked at numerous companies in the five years after they graduated. But 20 years later, the average professional worked for three companies in the five years after they graduated, which is comparable to the number of jobs the 90th percentile of the 1986-1990 grads had 20 years earlier!

Industry-Hopping Has Also Become More Common

People often say Millennials job-hop more early in their careers because they want to explore different options. To test this argument, we looked at industry-hopping among these graduate groups. LinkedIn’s data shows that industry-hopping is also more common among recent college grads. For example, 2006-2010 grads explored 60% more industries during its first five years in the workforce than the 1986-1990 grads.

We also discovered that professionals who ended up in the Media & Entertainment, Professional Services, and Government/Education/Non-Profits industries job-hopped the most the five years after they graduated. These industries also experienced the greatest turnover of 1986-1990 grads. Whereas the Oil & Energy, Manufacturing/Industrial, and Aero/Auto/Transport industries are where the 2006-2010 grads who job-hopped the least the five years after they graduated ended up.

So, if you’re a college student graduating in May, and you’re evaluating industries to work in, Oil & Energy, Manufacturing/Industrial, or Aero/Auto/Transport are your best bet if you prefer stability. Whereas if you enjoy change, a job in Media & Entertainment, Education, or with the Government will suit you better. And be sure to check out open jobs on LinkedIn; there are more than six million jobs on LinkedIn!

Women Job-Hop More Than Men

We also discovered that while job-hopping is common among both genders, it’s women job-hop slightly more than men(1). While the differences aren’t statistically different, the gap is the widest we’ve seen to date among the most recent college grads (2006-2010).

So there you have it -- Millennials are job-hopping more than previous generations. Case closed! This is just our first stab at measuring labor market fluidity and churn. We plan to analyze other dimensions of this behavior. For example, we want to analyze whether or not the Great Recession has influenced 2006-2010 grads’ job-hopping behavior. So stay tuned for more insights that can help you advance your career, and be sure to follow me on on LinkedIn and Twitter!

Methodology

The results of this analysis represent the world seen through the lens of LinkedIn data. As such, it is influenced by how members choose to use the site, which can vary based on professional, social, and regional culture. These variances were not accounted for in the analysis.

For our basic unit of observation, we split college graduates in the United States since 1986 into 5 half-decade groups (1986-1990, 1991-1995, ... , 2006-2010). We used year of graduation with bachelor’s degree. We also restricted our sample to individuals who reported starting a job within one year of finishing college and have had LinkedIn activity within the past month. We did this to reduce the possibility that some older graduates may be omitting early work experiences from their LinkedIn profiles (maybe because they consider their early experiences less significant or not relevant to their current career goals), and to ensure we were only considering profiles that were most likely up to date.

(1) A BLS longitudinal survey published on Friday seemed to capture a similar gender-based pattern for college grads. It also noticed the same slowdown in job-hopping as workers aged. However, unlike our research, it didn't compared across generations to determine whether or not Millennials job-hop more than previous generations. The BLS survey only evaluates individuals born between 1980-1984; most of these people likely fall into the "older Millennial" bucketed (graduated between 2002-2006).

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