Public sector leaders do not want to hire young workers because they are being stereotyped as narcissistic, impatient and disloyal, overseas research has found.
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The report, compiled by consulting giant Deloitte for the Canadian public service, suggests that the unfair and inaccurate prejudice against 'millennials' is harming efforts by that nation's bureaucracy to get young workers into its government departments.
In Australia, which is facing the same challenge of an ageing workforce in its federal government, the public service authority insists it does not have a problem.
But the official figures tell a different story: less than 11 per cent of Australian federal public servants in 2016 were under 30, according to the latest official figures.
The percentage of public servants in that age range has been trending lower over the past decade. In 2007, 16.5 per cent of public servants were under the age of 30.
In 2007, the number of public servants under 30 was 23,648. In 2016, that had fallen to 14,832.
Nearly one-third, or 32.3 per cent, of Australia's Commonwealth bureaucrats were aged 50 or over in June 2016 a huge increase from 21.2 per cent 15 years previously.
The Australian Public Service Commission, which produced the demographic research, says it has been "extremely successful" in attracting workers aged under-30 to the service, saying that in 2016, more than 40 per cent of new hires were in that age group.
But in 2015, the figure was 46 per cent.
Canada has shown signs of being prepared to confront its workforce demographic problem head-on, and the Deloitte research, reported in the Ottowa Citizen , calls for a fairer go for younger would-be recruits.
Far from being "disloyal" the consultants found, millennials, or workers aged under-35, were actually more likely to stay in their federal government than to quit.
Instead of being disdainful of a public sector career, Deloitte reported, young people are likely to be attracted to the stability and relative job security and the chances of work-life balance that came with a public sector role.
Like in Australia, the Canadian public service's lengthy recruitment processes could be putting millennials off, Deloitte suggested, and older workers who were delaying retirement and taking-up jobs were also cited as a potential barrier to the recruitment of younger workers.
The consultants suggested the Canadian public service streamline its hiring processes and use more technology and less paper for its forms and applications.
But the report also noted that several pilot schemes, aimed at attracting more millennials, were already in place in the Canadian bureaucracy.
The Australian Public Service Commission, which has suggested that part-time or casual work might hold the key to easing some the public service's grey army out the door, told Fairfax the bureaucracy had done very well in recruiting millennials.
"The APS has been extremely successful in attracting millennials," a commission spokeswoman said.
"In 2016, more than 40 per cent of new ongoing employees in the APS were under the age of 30.
"2016 APS Employee Census results show that the employee engagement levels of this age group are higher than average."
The commission's spokesperson brushed aside the decline, between 2015 and 2016, in the percentage of millennials hired.
"Data over the past 10 years shows that the proportion of people under 30 hired in ongoing positions fluctuates each year," she said.
"In this context, the 3 per cent decrease between 2015 and 2016 is not significant."
