You might have to burn a little midnight oil to find an experienced leader who can train your young workers.
Recruiting to find EXPERIENCE requires an open mind.
Option One Option Two
- 1. Invite retirees back part-time
- 2. Hire similarly experienced staff
Many retirees are happy to work as consultants, or for specified contract periods, to share their experience with young workers.
Is your software Inclusive? or Exclusive?
Are you willing to throw away the perfect candidate just because he or she puts two spaces after each sentence? Better see what walls you’ve put up.
Shopping for Experience:
Don’t sell Baby Boomers short. Many professionals and upper level workers are on LinkedIn and most retirees keep open some connections to their professional past…nostalgia and decades of friendships make for powerful links. Perhaps you sometimes call your former boss, when you need a little help. Maybe someone in production tracks down “Old Fred” to teach the new line leader how to handle seasonal shifts, or occasional work stoppages.
But if you don’t have anyone in your “Old Fred” folder…what do you do? Do you expect the perfect, seasoned, skilled, problem-solver to be lurking in the bright and shiny waters of the very newest models of a recruiter’s swimming pool? Or might you need to find out where the “Old Fred types” swim and do your fishing there.
Roll up your sleeves: It’s time to do some hard-core recruiting!
Texas Floods – Austin and Corpus Christi – A case in point.
Both Austin and Corpus Christi are located in drought zones, and both occasionally see floods. But the difference in the way the two cities must face brain drain revolves around one rather dramatic issue: hurricanes. While river flooding occurs in Austin most years and in Corpus Christi every few years, a major hurricane hasn’t hit the central gulf coast since 1970. The number of senior-level staff in any of the city’s infrastructure positions who are experienced with hurricanes is ZERO.
Keep your possible hurricanes in mind.