By Bill Wade, Wade & Partners
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports 250,000 new jobs were added to the economy in October. Unemployment dropped to 3.7 percent — a 40-year low. Yearly wages increased 3.1 percent — the biggest gain since the financial meltdown 10 years ago.
The best young employees are starting to job-shop and job-hop. Besides more pay smart ones want:
- A believable and engaging vision, strategy and culture that will reward all stakeholders.
- And, personally: job security, pride, education, growth, all with great team satisfaction.
Twenty years ago, the economy was in good shape as well, the manufacturing industry was booming and the unemployment rate was closer to 5 percent than 10 percent. Tech stories were found primarily in Popular Mechanics.
The same can’t be said now. And unfortunately, it doesn’t look like there are going to be any drastic workforce improvements in the near future. A major skilled labor shortage exists, and it is only going to get worse before it gets better. In particular, there is a severe lack of educational resources available for individuals who want to get involved in either distribution or truck service … and Baby Boomers are retiring at a rate of over 10,000 per day — creating a huge skills gap.
In 1930, famous British economist John Maynard Keynes predicted that incomes would increase massively in the next hundred years and that the higher standard of living would produce an unparalleled era of leisure, where humans would work “three hour shifts or a fifteen-hour week” and “do more things for ourselves.”
With the current state of blue-collar employment, employers are constantly looking for new ways to lure talent. Job boards, recruiting bonuses, social media advertising, job aggregators and traditional employment agencies have all become staples in the human resources diet.
Corporate recruiters and hiring managers use a variety of resources, but we still hear consistent complaints of dwindling sales teams and horror stories of trucks sitting idle. Out of desperation, a few have suspended drug testing.
Heavy-duty specialists reality-check recruiting questions:
Before attempting to stock your pond, ask some of these non-traditional questions:
- Do you offer what the best want?
- If not, do you think that you can only afford to pay “fair” wages for “good” efforts that deliver “decent” service value?
- Isn’t that just applying a commodity service-value to your commodity products?
- If you don’t have winning employees won’t you be stuck competing on “price” in your commodity hell?
This will lead to an aging, coasting workforce and a downward spiral. Are your “fairly paid” employees giving their engaged best? And what new vision, strategy, and culture changes will re-engage them?
It is important to get your team as self-sufficient as possible as soon as possible. Today can be called a ‘boom’ time, but all of us have weathered the wicked fluctuations of the truck parts and service markets.
Although FTR recently upped its 2019 Class 8 truck and trailer forecasts, it also reminded everyone that potential risks exist for next year. FTR senior economist Bill Witte noted that he’s changed his terminology from “potential” trade war with China to “continuing” trade war with China … not good for anyone!
Company leaders across industries are telling Wade CNBC hero Jim Cramer — off the record — that they’re worried about a slowdown in the U.S. economy. He says, “So many CEOs have told me about how quickly things have cooled; so many of them are baffled that we could find ourselves in this late-cycle dilemma that wasn’t supposed to occur so soon.”
This trade situation is creating a lot of uncertainty, and uncertainty by itself is a negative, and a strong negative. The driver shortage is expected to worsen as construction demands rise. With fewer young people entering trucking and vehicle service and an aging workforce rapidly retiring, the shortage will continue unless employers incentivize trade careers.
Yes, those numbers are unnerving, but the market is booming and there are steps you can take to get an edge on the competition to recruit and hire the best candidates.
Always be hiring … or, at least recruiting
Investing in recruiting always pays off — even during the ‘off-season.’ Don’t wait until your shop is full or until you want to open that new branch to find skilled workers, consistently search for candidates that are a skilled fit for your team.
Look everywhere, not just on free internet services
Spread your search far and wide. Attend job fairs, reach out to (and support) technical schools, post an ad in local newspapers and on job boards, etc. There’s more to the skilled candidate search than Craigslist, and if you limit yourself to the free digital classifieds, you’ll end up short in skilled labor.
Highlight your differences
Whether it’s an outstanding safety record, a shop equipped with the latest heavy equipment and technology solutions, continued education, or competitive compensation, highlight the things that set you apart from the competition and make you a great employer.
This is serious. Act now to ‘draft the best athletes.’ In the next decade, we’ll need 890,000 more drivers to keep pace with growth and demand for freight transportation … and at least 150,000 additional techs to keep them rolling.
New truck AND distribution technology will continue to create pressure to find the players you need. Recruitment isn’t a defensive measure — you need to address it constantly as the offensive strategy.
Bill Wade is a partner at Wade & Partners and a heavy-duty aftermarket veteran. He is the author of Aftermarket Innovations. He can be reached at [email protected].
