Time is going by so fast and keeps marching on. There's nothing we can do about it. And yet, few of us are planning adequately for the future, particularly business owners. We are witnessing the loss of skills needed by our society, because we are not mentoring our skillsets to the upcoming generation. Several reasons can attribute to this phenomena including lack of interest by the generation to come, but perhaps we have not properly set the stage to explain our trade and the excitement or base of our living standard to support our families.
For many of my columns I have consulted Generation Z (under 27 years old) people to ensure no generation gap exists long before this idea came to print. This thrills me to know, I have reached out to a younger generation before discovering some amazing research by LinkedIn. A recent study discovered only one in five members of Generation Z have spoken to someone over the age of fifty at work in the past year. Even more alarming, 44 percent of Baby Boomers, or over 55s, have avoided conversations with the youngest work generation. With this generation gap, how are we expected to pass down our training, experience and knowledge to those continuing to produce our products and services needed by our society?
Most of the owners of businesses have prepared by considering what many call succession planning, whereby much thought, training and mentoring is instituted to continue the business after the original owner or owners retire. But, a major consideration is being missed by not thinking of the skillsets at the middle management level necessary to make the business a continued success. Emphasis should be placed on these skills and acceptable apprenticeships should be selected and encouraged with adequate pay and remuneration to develop this younger generation coming behind the older generation. Otherwise, we can anticipate a nosedive sometime in the future and the crystal ball is not needed to see this coming.
Items to ponder with this process: A. The apprentice should keep in mind that the only constant is change in an organization, so knowledge the mentor is instructing is only a base to grow from, B. The best plan for the organization has to be elastic in order to evolve with the new technology that is changing ever so fast, and C. Life is fragile so contingency plans are imperative.
Our grandparents tried their best to build adequate futures for us. It is now our time and up to us.
Standard contributor Don Alexander can be contacted at dalexander@southernstandard.com
