The Leading Edge - Winter 2009 - (Page 14)

Q&a in a nutshell by Chris de Santis IMpENDING rETIrEMENTS poSE NEW ChALLENGE For CoMpANy Q: our company employs several hundred people—35 percent of whom will reach traditional retirement age in the next five years. What should we do now to ensure a smooth transition? The retirement age was set at the age it was because most people, at the time, didn’t live much beyond it and therefore the cost of carrying people wasn’t burdensome. Life expectancies have changed. What isn’t changing are work habits. Boomers have worked hard all of their lives. I for one do not see them leaving work where they are fully engaged for 10 or more hours a day and suddenly sitting around and gardening, golfing or pursuing any number of leisure activities. While that might be fun for a short time, it will not meet the needs of a large group of formerly productive individuals. What you will see is a slew of second careers, which brings us back to what to do about those people retiring. Here is the challenge for savvy businesses. If you have a workforce highly dependent on the intellectual capital of people who are going to retire. If that workplace is finding it hard or impossible to replace those individuals in the interim, then the workplace has to create incentives and structures that entice these potential retirees to remain or continue to contribute in a limited capacity. The challenge for most businesses is structure and reward. Most businesses are structured around advancement. If you do well, you will move up. If you move up you take on more responsibility. If you take on more responsibility, you will receive greater reward. It is a virtuous cycle, supposedly. The new world order is closer to a loose network of contracted experts who only do specific tasks or assignments based on defined needs. This contractual arrangement is much like outsourcing on a local scale, with a core group of full-time employees acting as what I would term, “scopists.” Scopists are people who work with individuals inside the organization to identify resource needs, then create the project scope and determine its worth and costs. A budget is created and the project is posted for bidding by the network or passed directly to members of the “alumni.” The trick is to make the project interesting enough to attract talent. There are any number of ways to retain and attract talent. First off, you will need a talent bank that identifies all the skills available and who possesses them. Next, you will need incentives. This is why it is important to highlight the costs of the scoped project. Once you know the costs, you can estimate the worth of the project to the organization and price it accordingly. Back to your original concern regarding the transition of knowledge. What I didn’t mention was the value of both mentoring and knowledge management. If you have a good approach to mentoring, then you are developing the next generation to take the reigns of the organization. But, I would argue, since we are all living longer and since we all want to contribute continuously, expect to see Alumni Talent Management as an HR function someday soon. Also, because of the difficulty in capturing institutional knowledge, expect to see that same talent manager scoping out work and negotiating with the retirees for “gigs.” The good news is that healthy, talented and energetic people who still wish to be involved in making contributions to the organizations or fields of work they are passionate about will continue to have an opportunity to do so. The bad news is that retirement dinners will never be the same and that watch you were expecting at your retirement might end up being a BlackBerry. e a: Your question is one that will impact a large number of companies in the next few years. The first of the baby boom generation just reached the age of Social Security eligibility and soon will reach the traditional retirement age of 65. On their heels are another 30 or 40 million Boomers. According to The Economist, there will be a management talent shortage by 2012 that will continue for a few subsequent years as more and more managers leave the workplace. While this sounds dire, if you look at it in more detail, you might see it more as an opportunity than a threat. I would first like to start with this issue of “retirement.” The concept of the golden years in retirement was and remains largely a construct. It was first marketed to the public by the housing developer Dell Webb as a way to sell homes in “Sun City” community model. The idea stuck and became rooted in the American psyche. At the time, the organizational “man” dreamed of the day when he or she would be able to say goodbye to work for good. Thus, the concept of retirement became the ultimate brass ring. The reality is a bit different. do you have a workplace question you want answered? What do you want to know to make work a better place? Send your questions to deSantisCP@aol.com to get Chris deSantis’ two cents as to what he thinks you might want to do. 14 VOLUME 9 n ISSUE 2 n WInTER 2009

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of The Leading Edge - Winter 2009

The Leading Edge - Winter 2009 Contents Stay on the Climb New Business Often Hinges on an Exceptional Proposal 2009: What’s Ahead and What's Behind for Businesses, Consumers and More Top 10 Misconceptions of Doing Business in Canada In a Nutshell: Q&A The Leading Edge Alliance

The Leading Edge - Winter 2009

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