From "Herman Trend Alert," by Roger Herman and Joyce Gioia, Strategic Business Futurists
GREENVILLE, SC — Employers worldwide are stressed. They’re challenged to find, engage and retain the skilled workers they need to manufacture their products and serve their customers. Some companies have had mission-critical jobs open for more than a year. One hospital has been looking for a physician for three years. Consultant Ira Wolfe’s “Perfect Labor Storm” is here.
What’s behind this “storm” is a combination of years of low birthrates in the developed countries with unprecedented global prosperity and shortages of trained workers. Complicating this difficult situation is the competency deficit and a lack of leadership. When the schools are not adequately preparing young people for work or college and employers haven’t been training their next generation of workers, it is a set-up for disaster.
In some countries, notably Mexico and China, the productivity simply isn’t there. According to futurist Edward Gordon, “the productivity of China’s workers is only 14 percent of their United States counterparts.” When Joyce spoke at the first Human Capital Conference in Japan, back in 2000, the VP HR for Intel Asia complained that his productivity was one-third that of their U.S. operations.
And the wages in both India and China are growing exponentially. According to a study by the World Bank titled “Global Economic Prospects 2007,” real wages in China appreciated a whopping 110 percent between 1989 and 2004.
Advancing technologies address some of these deficits, but they only increase the demand for more highly skilled workers — in short supply. Offshore, though we find the schools in India, Germany and elsewhere doing better at job-preparation, the training is insufficient to meet the increasing demand. Going forward, retaining and engaging top talent will be the global strategic competitive advantage.
This global tightening of the labor marketplace is only the beginning.
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