Gen Z: listening and innovation drive career choices

Listening and innovation guide the choices of Gen Z who, according to the 2026 edition of the ‘Best Workplaces for Gen Z 2026’ ranking compiled by Great Place to Work Italia, have placed Edera Nordest on the podium, a Veneto-based financial services firm specialising in loans for employees and pensioners, followed by Bending Spoons, the company that acquires and develops businesses in the digital sector and has just been listed on the NASDAQ in New York; and Quantyca, based in Monza, an IT consultancy specialising in data management, advanced analytics and data streaming.

Alessandro Zollo, CEO of Great Place to Work Italia, explains that “young people born from 1998 onwards are no longer satisfied with the old professional paradigms, but are looking for transparency, fairness and, above all, leadership that is capable of listening and guiding with consistency”. Against a backdrop of an ageing population, in which Italy’s population is falling by around 2 million people every 10 years, “companies’ ability to attract and retain junior staff is the real, tangible competitive advantage, because it is precisely these staff who will facilitate the technological transition of the more experienced workforce in companies with an increasingly high average length of service,” continues Zollo. “Companies that are able to engage, intrigue and inspire young people will be the ones that succeed in securing a generation that is dwindling in numbers and will become increasingly costly in terms of investment,”

When asking a sample of over 5,000 Generation Z workers about the strategic levers that companies need to utilise to attract and retain them, Great Place to Work found that listening to and valuing employees’ contributions stands at 90 per cent in top-performing companies, compared with 28 per cent (+62%) of the Italian average; similar trends are observed both in the promotion of innovation and experimentation (83% compared to 26%, +57%) and in opportunities for professional growth and development (84% compared to 29%, +55%). The gap widens when analysing factors related to leadership: managerial competence stands at 93 per cent in Best Workplaces, compared with 36 per cent for the Italian average (+57 per cent), followed by consistency among managers (91 per cent versus 33 per cent, +58%) and the impartiality of managerial behaviour (86% compared with 29%, +57%). The overall quality of the working experience is rated highly by 86 per cent of young people employed in these organisations of excellence, compared with 29 per cent in an average Italian company (+57 per cent).

The data also highlights a clear gap in terms of opportunities for innovation: in the Best Workplaces for Gen Z, almost one in two employees (48 per cent) say they have ‘plenty’ of opportunities for innovation, compared with a mere 6 per cent recorded as the national average. Conversely, over half of young people working in companies that fall within the Italian average complain of having “few” (36%) or even “no” (16%) opportunities to innovate. In the 20 top-performing companies, this sense of restriction and dissatisfaction drops dramatically, standing at just 9 per cent and 2 per cent respectively.

Rounding off Great Place to Work’s ranking of the top 20 companies for Gen Z are Jet HR (information technology), Accuracy (professional services), Groupe ISAGRI (information technology), Hilton (hospitality), Méthode (information technology), Kiabi (retail), Octopus Energy (manufacturing & production), Florence One (information technology), Auxiell (professional services), Fiabilis Consulting Group (professional services), Aton SpA (information technology), GLAS Italy (financial & insurance services), Reverse (professional services), Caffeina (advertising & marketing), Up2You (professional services), Gruppo Breaders (hospitality) and Sector Alarm (retail).