In a recently published article Where Have All the Leaders Gone? Forbes comments on the looming talent crunch for CEOs and other big-chiefs as if that is something we should be particularly concerned about. While the situation described by Forbes should give us pause for concern, I believe the shortage of nurses and teachers and welders may have greater social impact over time than the anticipated contraction among Forbes’ readership. That said, as a potential advertiser in Forbes I do read the article with some alarm.
There are over 70 million American baby boomers born between 1946 and 1964. Based on this fact, more than 40% of the U.S. labor force will reach the traditional retirement age by 2010. Contrast this with the number of workers between the ages of 35 to 44 – expected to shrivel by another 7% over this period – and the failure of our education system to produce the skill sets anticipated to be in most demand like technical, engineering, CEOs and so on – and we can begin to see a picture emerging post 2010 – interestingly the year beyond which the U.S. Department of Labor has been unable to forecast with any regularity – where technocrats, leaders and cronies are the only ones who can enjoy the comforts of modern society. Not unlike Russia during its Soviet heyday, or North Korea today perhaps. While this might sound alarmist, consider the implications of what the well-worn phrase “talent shortage” actually means. Unless Mexico has a trick up her sleeve secretly producing the next generation of CEOs to do the jobs Americans can’t or won’t do, then manicured lawns and fresh-picked tomatoes may become a thing of the past as we struggle with a general economic implosion.
Another esteemed publication widely read along the corridors of power and in executive bathrooms worldwide is the Economist. They have partnered with self-appointed thought leaders DDI and just published a coffee table how-to, The CEO’s Role in Talent Management. Reading the perennial gloom forecast in the Spherion Emerging Workforce Study as a primer, one hopes that in their last few years on the job, today’s CEOs can finally figure out what they should have done eons ago.
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