According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the workforce is getting older, more ethnic, more temporary, less unionized, and more sophisticated. The BLS expects the highest growth in the areas of private educational services (2.4%), health care and social systems (2.3%), professional and business services (2.1%), and construction (1.7%). All other sectors had less than 1% growth expected during the next nine years.
What really matters is the workforce trends that relate to your business. For example, if you’re in the utility industry, which is expecting a negative growth rate, how will you be able to attract talent? If, on the other hand, you’re in health services, how will you retain your highly valuable employees?
Prudent business owners and HR executives should consider how these trends will impact them during the next five years. I believe that the single most important trend you will face is the continued fading of control as a management model in today’s workplace. It’s difficult to control bright people when they can easily work for themselves should they choose to do so.