A sea change is about to hit the workplace. Are you ready?

VIRGINIA GALT
WORKPLACE REPORTER
Globe & Mail Article

David Shaw scans the horizon from his 30th-floor office in downtown Toronto and warns of a coming "tsunami" that will leave bureaucratic, old-style organizations with a lot of empty desks.

With the majority of baby boomers contemplating retirement in the next decade, and the newest generation of employees placing a premium on work-life balance, employers will need to adjust their recruitment and retention strategies radically, says Mr. Shaw, chief executive officer of Toronto-based Knightsbridge Human Capital Solutions.

And they will be forced to manage their organizations "very differently" in light of what the aging boomers and their entry-level offspring have in common: Attitude.

Many older, experienced employees might be willing to delay retirement if they can continue working "on their own terms," he says.

The same goes for the youngest generation of employees, who are willing to expend a tremendous amount of energy and brainpower -- but again, "on their own terms," says Mr. Shaw, who founded Knightsbridge five years ago after leaving his post as president of Pepsi-Cola Canada Beverages.

"The successful organizations in the future will be those that understand where the [labour] market trends are, and understand the need to be adaptive to the people who work in their organizations."

Those least willing to accommodate the desires of their employees will most likely suffer from labour shortages in the coming years, Mr. Shaw predicts.

Employers do not have the luxury of time in developing new approaches to recruiting and managing talent, he adds. In the public sector, for instance, "every provincial government, in the next five to seven years, is going to lose 60 per cent of their work force.

"I don't think people will recognize the work force between today and 10 years from now in terms of . . . the way we work, the people who are engaged in the work force and the work that people are doing."

To reinforce his point about the challenges facing employers, Mr. Shaw brandishes recent issues of The Economist (cover story: The search for talent. Why it's getting harder to find) and BusinessWeek (cover story: Smashing The Clock. No schedules. No mandatory meetings. Inside Best Buy's radical reshaping of the workplace).

The "results-only work environment" initiative, introduced last year at the Minneapolis headquarters of Best Buy Co. allows employees to decide when, and how, they will work -- their performance is judged on output rather than the number of hours spent in the office. And, according to company executives interviewed by BusinessWeek, productivity is up and turnover is down.

It is a gutsy move by Best Buy, says Mr. Shaw, who applauds the initiative, although "it remains to be seen" how effectively the company can run its North American operations when, for instance, head office employees have the freedom to leave at 2 p.m. to catch a matinee, on the understanding that they will make up the work later.

"At the end of the day, results always count," Mr. Shaw says. "They're taking a lot of risk.
"Still, having the guts and courage to do something like this is invaluable because the people who work in the organization are looking at the leadership and saying: 'You know, at least they are trying to do something that reflects an understanding of who we are and the needs that we have,' " Mr. Shaw says.

What Best Buy has gained, through its flexibility around work schedules, is a highly engaged work force, which will serve the company well in the future when the pool of available labour shrinks and employees have far more choices about how, and for whom, they want to work, he says.

"I think every organization should be looking at doing things very differently . . . knowledge workers can migrate very quickly."

Those most likely to suffer labour shortages will be hierarchical organizations that continue to dictate working hours and methodology in the belief that employees will only work under the watchful eye of a manager, Mr. Shaw says.

Those organizations willing to innovate -- through such initiatives as flexible working hours, telecommuting and phased retirement for older employees who want to cut back their hours -- will attract and retain more employees.

But this will also make the jobs of managers far more complex, he says, because they will still need to ensure that the work gets done.

"This isn't about becoming a complacent, fluffy organization, because results still matter," Mr. Shaw says.

"But the way and the manner in which you achieve those results is very telling in terms of the company that you are . . . and whether people are willing to work in these environments."