Where Will You Find Workers in the Years Ahead?

You face a lot of challenges when starting a business. You have to secure funding, get a marketing plan in place, obtain patents and other protections - and on the list goes. Like many new entrepreneurs, you probably think that you can worry about staffing later on. When you need employees, you will be able to find them.

I would urge you to set that kind of thinking aside and begin to think strategically about staffing now. The plans you make today will determine the success you can achieve tomorrow.

The Coming Workforce Shortage

At Age Wave, we recently completed a yearlong research project that looked at the implications of our aging workforce. Of all the effects that demographic change will cause, one of the most troubling is the coming retirement of baby boomers that will starve businesses of key talent over the next 10-15 years.

To make matters worse, the 25 to 34 year-old age segment will growonly about 7.5 percent over the next 10-15 years, while the number of available workers between the ages of 35 and 44 (prime executive-development years) will actually decline.

So where are your employees going to come from? Broadly speaking, you will need to hire and retain more mature workers. To do that, you will need to implement some or all of these strategies:

Create a culture that honors experience. To attract and retain baby boomers and other mature workers, you need to start with the work environment itself, which in many organizations has become alienating to anyone over age 50. Your efforts should begin with recruiting. Older workers - even high-energy individuals - can be discouraged from applying for work at your company if your ads stress "energy," "a fast pace," and "fresh thinking." The mature workers you need are more likely to be attracted to ads that emphasize "experience," "knowledge" and "expertise."

Case study: CVS runsads that stress that experience will be honored. That's why they are recruiting new pharmacists and other employees age 59 and older - some as mature as 80 - and building a reliable and productive workforce.

Offer flexible work. Older workers and baby boomers like to work when and where they want. Plus, baby boomers are often stressed by multiple commitments, such as the need to care for children and elderly parents at the same time. The more you can simplify their lives, the more attractive you will be.

Case study: ARO Incorporated, a business process outsourcer in Kansas City, allows employees to telecommute from their homes. Employees are encouraged to fit their work around childcare, eldercare - even pet care. Six years ago, turnover was 25 percent. Today, it stands at 7 percent.

Introduce flexible retirement. Flexible retirement, a logical extension of flexible work, allows maturing workers to continue to work indefinitely on a limited basis. An effective program might allow older workers to take sabbaticals, mentor younger workers or train current and/or new employees. The goal is to rejuvenate the careers of older employees by flexibly providing new challenges and opportunities.

Case study: At the Aerospace Corporation in California, a program called Retiree Casual allows workers over age 55 to consult on projects for up to 1,000 hours a year. Eighty percent of retirees now sign up and many of them come right back to work the day after they retire.

Summing it up . . .

Remember that retirement is a relatively recent phenomenon. It was first proposed at the end of the nineteenth century, a time when age 65 exceeded average life expectancy.

Because we are living longer today, we have the opportunity to tap into the expertise of our employees for more years than ever before. That's a benefit you can claim as you build and grow your enterprise. But to do so, you might need to rethink the issue of who your ideal workers really are and how you can integrate them fully into your organization.

Ken Dychtwald is the founding president and CEO of Age Wave, a San Francisco-based think tank and consulting firm focused on the maturing marketplace and workforce. A psychologist, gerontologist, and adviser to business and government, he is the author of 12 books on aging-related issues, including his two most recent: The Power Years: A User's Guide to the Rest of Your Life and Workforce Crisis: How to Beat the Coming Shortage of Skills and Talent. This is Mr. Dychtwald's first post on the Trump Blog, and we welcome him.

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