I am seeing a new warning sign in finding candidates for employment in our organizations’ in the near future. There is a widening gap between the knowledge and skills of people that are looking for work have compared to the knowledge and skills needed in our workforce of the future.
I read a book a few years ago entitled “The World is Flat”. The main thought was, as third world countries take over our lower skilled jobs, American businesses will replace those lower skilled jobs with jobs requiring higher technological skills. American workers will just advance to a higher level and therefore continue to drive the economy. We continue to hear this concept from people trying to explain how the shrinking middle class will come back to its former levels.
I believe there is information missing in presenting this theory. The jobs are certainly getting more technical, but the workforce is not. People are people; with the same variety of abilities that have existed for generations. There is only a percentage of the work force capable of handling the new technical levels. Certainly, they can all handle their I Phones and all the social media, but most of them are not critical thinkers. They are not problem solvers. They are the worker bees. They get the hands-on work done, not highly technical work.
I heard an “energy expert” trying to defend this theory say the coal jobs we have lost will be replaced with wind power jobs. I see two problems with that statement. These industries are not in the same area of the country and the education level to do the needed work is greatly different. How does that help the coal miner find work with a middle-class income? We need to realize the percentage of various levels of analytical thinking is not going to change from one generation to the next, where are the people that can only qualify as assembly line workers, coal miners, etc. going to find sustainable employment?
If you doubt what I am say, look around when you are in a public setting; on a mall, in the grocery store, in a “big box” location. Take 15 minutes and just count the people that appear capable of filling your future positions compared to the number that don’t. My experience tells me that number is around 20 to 25%. Add that reality to the work ethic of the average young person today. Scary isn’t it.
As organizations try to fill these technical jobs, they are fighting over a smaller “piece of the candidate pie”. I remember saying ten years ago we were going to run into a shortage of employable people in the next decade. That now is common knowledge. Every company I know is struggling to find qualified help. This next decade is only going to get worse because the knowledge and skill levels needed in our future workforce will out strip the supply of capable people.
Organizations today need to realize they need to “build a bridge” into Academia. Investing in partnering with High Schools, Tech Schools, Colleges and Universities to find and guide the talent that is preparing for the workforce in the next few years is critical.
In the past in my career I work with a company that built a bridge to local universities. Students held internship positions in all departments. The students that match the personality needed and the skills needed became employees. Many are managers in that company today; one is the President.
Currently I have connected a manufacturing company with a local High School. Students that are not college bound, but want to learn a trade and find a career that will give them a livable income are able to co-op and prove their value to the company. Both the company and the High School see great value in this partnership.
In both scenarios, the organization was able to get to prime talent before they were visible to the market. Programs like this are a “must add” to your recruiting strategy. Without that type of forward thinking, organizations will struggle even more than they already are to find qualified employees in the next decade.
Christian Life Coach 