The Challenges, and the Opportunities The approaching demographic shift presents plenty of challenges. Organizations will need people, and they will desperately need experienced, knowledgeable people. Employees will have many other employment choices, so retaining employees will become essential. Employee engagement will be a necessity, not a frill. Every employer will need to assess and plan for ways in which it can: • Keep all employees enthused, excited, and wanting to remain with the employer; • Ensure that essential knowledge gets transferred from employees before they retire; and • Minimize, as much as possible, and deal with future labour shortages. Given that the demographic changes won’t become critical for a few years, many employers may think they can wait to deal with the coming changes. However, the time delay creates a significant opportunity for employers who are willing to be proactive. Organizations that take the coming transformation of the workforce seriously, and that begin planning now, can position themselves to be ahead of the pack. Organizations that foresee and prepare for these new challenges stand to reap substantial benefits – deep talent pipelines, staffing flexibility, desired retention levels, and more motivated workforces. Organizations that fail to prepare, on the other hand, face a future of worker shortages, skill deficiencies, and lost organizational know-how. Extending Boomers’ Effective Work Life The demographic shift will need to be accompanied by an equally large shift in attitudes, along with the policies that reflect those attitudes. For example, for many decades Canadian society as a whole, as well as many individual organizations, have supported and even encouraged early retirement. The result is that the average retirement age in 2005 was 61.4, rather than 64.9 as it was in 1976. In light of the coming workforce shortages, the early-retirement trend needs to be re-thought. Perhaps retiring early is not desirable or necessary, if employees can obtain and maintain work-life balance as their needs and interests change over time. Furthermore, retirement need not mean the end of all paid work, for many people. Employers will need to foster a different environment where employees are welcome and encouraged to continue contributing to the organization for as long as they wish and are capable of doing so, regardless of age. |
