The workforce development system has been shifting to supply more trained employees to meet demand, but this effort takes time.
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Workforce shortages are nothing new, especially for many of our more traditional industries. Manufacturers have been ringing the bell for years over a lack of qualified applicants. Other professions and industry sectors have suffered as the training and education system in Central Massachusetts, the state, and the country just wasn’t geared toward producing a pipeline of available and qualified workers, like CNC machinists or master electricians. The workforce development system has been shifting to supply more trained employees to meet demand, but this effort takes time.
What has been new over the past two years is those workforce shortages now are hitting nearly every industry. Businesses that previously had little difficulty finding available workers now have to go on the hunt to find the employees they need, often offering one-time bonuses and a significant spike in salary and benefits. To see an example of the power workers now wield, look no further than the unionization of graduate students at Clark University, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, and UMass Chan Medical School. As Staff Writer Timothy Doyle details on page 12 in his “Graduate unions” story, this traditionally low-cost transient labor for colleges and universities is seeking greater voice and agency for what has traditionally been seen as an apprenticeship.
Beyond the tried and true methods of offering higher pay and better benefits, employers are getting creative in finding new ways to attract employees: flexible work schedules, work-from-home options, working remotely from a completely different geographic region, paying for training and advanced college degrees. Eventually, the labor shortages are going to calm down and lessen, hopefully for most industries. Even if you’re one of the fortunate to not have to deal with a lack of a qualified workforce a year from now, it’s important to stick with both the old and new methods of attracting workers. And it’s key to keep good people happy in their roles and at your company, regardless of how many new applicants you have beating down the door.
The good news is the workforce shortages might dissipate some, with the evidence that Greater Worcester colleges and universities are seeing a spike in applicants this school year, a positive as more younger students will be entering the job market a few years down the road. The last couple years have changed much about the economy and the way businesses have to operate. There’s no returning to the ways things were before the coronavirus pandemic, but it’ll fall to the best businesses to figure out how to take the lessons learned from this bumpy road to build a team to create a more prosperous future.
