CHROs, CEOs and business leaders in Professional Services, the same message is emerging: the challenge is to help Gen Z see a career worth staying for. These employees generally trust their organisations; what they want is greater clarity about growth, opportunity and what comes next.
The “T.R.U.S.T. in Practice” report, based on 110,000+ employees across 130+ organisations, bears this out. Gen Z, now 34% of the workforce, shows the lowest intent to stay of any generation: only two in ten say they are not looking to leave. Discretionary effort has slipped three points in a year.
This challenges one of the most common assumptions about retention: that trust automatically translates into commitment.
Trust remains the foundation of a great workplace. But for many Gen Z employees, trust alone may no longer be enough to inspire long-term commitment. Trust answers whether an organisation is a great workplace, while Gen Z expects visibility of a clear long-term career pathway. Whether the workplace offers a meaningful path to build and grow a career is an important retention question leaders must solve today.
Earlier generations may have made their way through ambiguities around career progression. Gen Z employees choose not to. When career paths feel vague, promotion decisions appear opaque, or development conversations become infrequent, Gen Z tends to make decisions quickly. They see longterm career growth as a natural outcome of trust.
This is more of a clarity problem than a loyalty problem and this makes clarity a business priority, not merely cultural aspiration.
The report reinforces that perspective. Organisations score strongly on respect, inclusion, safety and professional pride. Yet the sector’s weakest experiences revolve around fairness, rewards, recognition and visibility of opportunity. This gap matters most for Gen Z, who have the lowest tolerance for ambiguity on pay, recognition and promotion. They are evaluating whether culture translates into real career outcomes.
This is where managers become especially important for Gen Z retention.
Industry conversations with CHROs at Best Workplaces indicate that organisations need help building manager capability. Managers must set expectations clearly, have honest career conversations, explain decisions and give Gen Z employees a clearer view of success.
Gen Z employees rarely experience culture through policy documents. They experience it through conversations, the quality of feedback they receive, whether someone takes an active interest in their growth, and whether a manager can make the organisation’s promises feel tangible and achievable.
In Professional Services, the decision to stay or leave is made not in annual review cycles or during onboarding conversations but in daily accumulation of leadership interactions; whether a leader noticed and acknowledged good work, whether an employee felt heard when they raised a concern or shared an idea and whether leaders keep their promises and remain invested in the careers of their employees.
The irony is that managers themselves are among the most stretched groups in today’s workforce, balancing delivery expectations, client demands and people responsibilities simultaneously. Yet organisations that want stronger Gen Z retention need to invest more heavily in supporting managers, because managers increasingly determine whether long-term trust translates into long-term career pathways.
The organisations that succeed in retaining Gen Z will make career progression visible, explain how opportunities are earned, create confidence in the fairness of decisions and equip managers to become active career builders.
High-trust organisations have already earned Gen Z’s confidence. The next challenge is helping Gen Z see a future worth committing to. In a workforce with more choices and less tolerance for uncertainty, lasting careers are built not only on trust, but on clarity about what comes next.
Gaurav Choudhary is Director & Head, Professional Services & Public Sector Enterprises, Great Place To Work India