Getting the culture right to catch em and keep em

I’m pretty good at reviewing books I haven't finished reading – see my recent article on storytelling books. I have yet to review a book I have not read and I’m not going to start. But there’s a book out there with an important message that I feel I have to mention, even though I do not yet have it in bookshelf.

The book is Catch Them If You Can!: How Any Manager Can Win the War for Talent in the Global Labor Shortage'>Catch Them if You Can!: How Any Manager Can Win the War for Talent in the Global Labor Shortage Greg Ford and Dr. Sullivan. As you may have guessed from the title, it’s about the worker shortage we will face as the baby boom generation retires. The US Department of Labor predicts a shortfall of 10 million workers by 2010; one in 13 jobs will be vacant.

Actually I lie; I have read a couple of chapters of the book. Greg is a friend and I had the pleasure of a pre-publish peak.

Greg and John have written a book to help managers understand the need to aggressively go after the top talent. They provide practical strategies that can be easily implemented, including a step-by-step recruiting plan that the reader can take away and apply immediately.

But there’s a strong message in this book beyond recruitment, namely that we need to ensure an engaged and vibrant culture to prosper. The world has changed - employees are no longer lining up to work in our organizations. If we want to hire the best then we had better make sure our cultures are open, aligned and full of opportunity.

A lot of people my age have trouble reconciling the attitude of youngsters coming into the workplace today. They see them as entitled. I don’t. I see a very realistic attitude. This is a group of people who knows when they are good and they are not going to stick around and do boring, irrelevant work for 10 years until the boss retires.