Welcome to the August 29, 2007 issue of The Total View

Published by Success Performance Solutions, Written by Ira S. Wolfe

Visit our Human Resources Blog and Perfect Labor Storm Blog where we can post daily (and more often) human resource updates, news, and Perfect Labor Storm facts. 

New White Paper!

Performance Management: 10 Steps to Bridge Strategy and Execution

Unlocking the potential of your organization requires discipline of definition, communication and alignment. Without these disciplines, your business "plans" will become at best, broken dreams and unfilled "hopes." The following 10 steps will guide your organization on the disciplined path to a successful future.

Download Performance Management: 10 Steps to Bridge Strategy and Execution

What's Inside:

1.  What's That Giant Sucking Sound? The Worker Squeeze is On.

"What size Coke would you like with your jumbo fries?" the young employee speaks into her headset.

Anyone who has crept through a fast-food drive-through line traditionally experienced three common problems: garbled communications, slow lines, and botched orders. Thanks to gargantuan advances in telecommunications, a McDonald's franchisee who just happened to be having a problem with hiring and keeping workers found a unique solution. 

What makes this story fascinating is that the young employee above wasn't speaking into her headset from just few feet away at the drive-through window but at a computer screen nearly 900 miles away in Colorado?  This McDonald franchisee outsourced his order taking to a call center.  Who would have thunk?  Now that's innovation!

I had to experience this myself when I visited a client in Cape Girardeau, MO a few years ago.  Just outside the parking area of my motel off Interstate 55 was a McDonald's. Ironically on my flight to Missouri, I stumbled across a reference in The World is Flat  to this particular McDonalds.   

Although I'm not a frequent visitor to McDonalds, I couldn't resist a visit this time. I had to see for myself how operators in Colorado could take my order and cashiers in Missouri were able to pair my photo with my order. The result for me and thousands of other customers: less order mistakes, fewer complaints, and faster service.

The system cut order times by 30 seconds - monumental in an industry where success is measured by 5 second improvements.  It reduced errors by 50 percent and saved labor costs through efficiency even though the call center workers were paid more than the line workers.

Who would have guessed that this system would work?

In an Associated Press story this past weekend, the story popped up again.  This time the fast-food restaurant was in Montana but the orders were being taken in Texas.  Similar stories keep popping up.  A customer's order in Honolulu is taken by a call center in California.  Within two minutes the call center agent also speaks with customers in Gulfport, Miss and Gillette, WY.

As was the case in Cape Girardeau, this outsourcing was not just about money.  Unemployment in many parts of the United States remains low.  With the exception of individuals with less than a high school education where unemployment is over 7 percent, workers with high school, some college, or four-year degrees are few and far between.  In other words, workers with at least some post-high school training or a degree and a minimum of basic skills are working.  If the skilled and the educated want a job, they likely already have it and are at risk for being recruited away.

In places like Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, and Utah, mining, oil and logging field jobs - once low-paying, unskilled jobs - are now soaking up all the eligible employees.  Like technology jobs in the 1990s - which are now on the comeback - high demand-low supply compresses the available pool for low-paying jobs.  Higher pay jobs allow more workers to build and furnish homes.  That means the construction industry needs more workers, creating high demand in this industry. Construction workers need vehicles which feeds growth in auto and truck sales and service.

To attract workers, these industries increase wages, offer more benefits, and entice with bonuses.  With a limited pool of available workers, the workers at the low-end of the wage chain - fast-food worker, nurse assistant, retail cashier and so on - are swept up by these higher wage jobs. That giant sucking sound employers hear are growing industries vacuuming up workers from every nook and cranny.

The effects are everywhere.  The AP story reports that logging equipment is sitting idle because the companies have no one to run it.  A shortage of lifeguards has forced the closing of some pools.  Hospitality workers at posh resorts are being asked to work longer because vacancies abound.  Once filled by foreign workers, this year there just weren't enough.  This same story was heard over and over again from employers in the beach communities of New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland.

On a local level, a mere microcosm of what is happening in other communities, this morning's newspaper reported that the city school district's director of human resource abruptly resigned to accept another job as supervisor of human resources for another district: a pay increase of over $14,000 for a lesser title.  In isolation this move may not be seen as a trend.  But this follows the resignation of the fourth superintendent in nine years plus a revolving door of principals, teachers and managers. Notwithstanding that this school district has a big problem, not unlike the revolving door in many businesses, the real problem runs deep.  

Skilled workers have options and they are exercising them. The fact that so many workers are begin recruited away means only one thing - other employers have openings and they are willing to offer opportunity and money to get them. And unlike the late 1990s when the worker vacuum was located over the U.S., it is now one-big global sucker.  Booming economies like India and China are beginning to share stories about skilled workers shortages.  

The skilled worker squeeze is on. Workers qualified to fill higher wage jobs are in the cat-bird seat. As a result lesser skilled and/or experienced workers have more options. In today's market they too are unwilling to accept jobs with low wages.

Do you know where your next workers are coming from?

To discuss how to evaluate your workforce or leadership preparedness, call us at 800.803.4303 or 717.291.4640.

2. Perfect Labor Storm Indicators

Jobs are changing.

     Workforce growth is slowing.

           Educational attainment levels are lagging.

                Skill gaps are rising. 

The Perfect Labor Storm is imminent.

Where Have All Your Workers Gone?  Learn more about The Perfect Labor Storm: why skilled worker shortages, aging populations, education and skills gaps will change the way all people do business.  

Watch these brief Perfect Labor Storm videos now:  

Where Have All The Workers Gone? Skills Gaps  (6:33)
Where Have All The Workers Gone? Skilled Worker Crisis  (5:19)
Then please forward these links to co-workers, colleagues, bosses, reports, and customers.  Thanks.  

The videos are also available on The Perfect Labor Storm website.  

Comments? Please leave comments on the YouTube.com site or email: comments@perfectlaborstorm.com

3.  Wake Up Everybody! New DIVERSITY video online

Diversity is no longer just a black and white problem. The diversity of diversity issues is astounding: race, regional origin, gender, skin color, religion, hair style (or lack of it), stature (tall/short/fat/thin), generations and so on.     

Last week SPS was the gold sponsor for Diversity Day, sponsored by The Lancaster Chamber of Commerce & Industry. To kick off the event, I created the following video, Diversity: Wake Up Everybody! The response was great and several companies requested copies.  I posted it on YouTube for everyone to view but if anyone is interested in purchasing a copy, please send us an email.

4.  Perfect Labor Storm 2.0 (soft and hard cover versions) now on sale. (Delivery date on or about September 20, 2007.)  Order today and save 25%.  

NEW Chapters!  Generational Conflicts in the Workplace, Managing the Future Workforce, Attracting Young Employees in a Seller's Job Market plus hundreds of new facts, trends and stats.

View Table of Contents  

Read what one reader has said:  

Perfect Labor Storm 2.0  will be one of the most quoted books over the next decades. Ira did his homework on this one. Anyone who depends on having a strong workforce for the next twenty years better heed his warnings and prepare accordingly.

Bobby Foster
The Organizer Plus Co., LLC

Save 25% off retail by ordering now.

Hard Cover: $29.99         Soft Cover: $19.99  

Your Price: $22.49           Your Price: $14.99

To order Perfect Labor Storm 2.0, call 800.803.4303.  Discounts for orders of 10 or more.  Specify hard or soft cover.

Read the pre-publication reviews:  

Below you will find just a sampling of the trends, stats, and facts that will change the way you do business.

If you took every single job in the U.S. today and shipped it to China . . .       

                                                                                                       .......China would still have a labor surplus.  

China's Generation Y accounts for nearly one-sixth of the Chinese population, equivalent to two-thirds of the entire U.S. population.   

By 2025 more than 75% of the workforce in India will be from Generation Y and younger generations.  

In the United States, Gen Y and younger will make up just less than 60%.

Trends and stats like this are just an inkling of the information you'll find in the revised, updated and expanded Perfect Labor Storm 2.0, including several chapters about managing generational clashes.  

Keep reading future issues of this newsletter for more announcements about the book release and updated Perfect Storm Indicators.  

Perfect Labor Storm e-book published earlier this year is still available.

You can order a download copy of PLS, a great value at $9.95. 

5. Less Pain, More Gain Performance Appraisals

Introducing KeyneLinktm Performance Management System

KeyneLink is a revolutionary performance management system that links your organization's vision, values and operating objectives with the daily activities of your people.   

KeyneLink is part process, part software, part roadmap, and all about successful performance.  

KeyneLink motivates your employees to align with your organization's operating objectives, achieving results and heading off performance problems before they become problems or distractions.  

For more information visit KeyneLink Performance Management System or call 800.803.4303 to schedule a web meeting demo.

6. CriteriaOne Certification Workshop: October 31-November 2, 2007

Learn to build a competency-based selection and performance management system to align employees with the right skills to meet the competitive demands of your business.

"Light years ahead of the competition" says one CriteriaOne participant.

"A must for anyone interested in lowering turnover and improving productivity," says another.

Don't miss the only certification workshop in 2007.

Click here to learn more about CriteriaOne Competency Modeling Certification, the whole person approach to selecting and managing employees.

7. Speaking Schedule: Ira S Wolfe  

2007:  

September 14 - ISA Worldwide (New York City)

September 18 - 2007 Material Handling & Logistics Conference (Salt Lake City) October 16 - Shumaker Williams PC (Camp Hill PA)

October 17 - Associated Builders and Contractors (Lancaster PA)

November 13 - Carlisle (PA) Chamber of Commerce  

2008:  

January 21 - Institute of Management Consultants (Dallas, TX)

January 22 - Optimance (Dallas, TX)  

Call 717.291.4640 to schedule Ira for your next meeting or conference.

8. Quotes from Hire Authorities

"We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them."

Albert Einstein

Permission is granted to consultants, managers, business owners and HR professionals to reproduce content from this newsletter for your internal publications, or to distribute copies to your workforce, on the condition that you reproduce the credits and contact information as follows: "Reprinted with permission from Ira S Wolfe and Success Performance Solutions. Copyright 2007 Ira S Wolfe." We also hope you will forward the newsletter in its entirety and recommend to others that they subscribe.

Ira S. Wolfe Copyright 2007 - All Rights Reserved. Reprints and other distribution by permission