Issue Archive: November/December 2008

Prepping Your Company for the Baby Boomer Exodus

This is not simply a question of replacing boomers with younger workers. After all, Generation Y, born between 1979 and 1994, has population numbers nearly equal to the Boomers. But the loss of their expertise and anecdotal knowledge - the intuitive, undocumented, "how we make it work" information - could be catastrophic to American business. Some call it wisdom withdrawal.

So what steps can companies take to retain and transfer the knowledge and experience that will walk out the door as these workers retire? One tactic is to find ways to keep older workers engaged, perhaps offering flexible schedules and consultant contracts for workers who want to cut back but aren't ready for full retirement.

But the fundamental issue is training as Boomers move out of roles they may have held for years or even decades. The smartest companies are already planning for this as the next major challenge in the workforce. They are creating comprehensive plans to include longtime workers in training, coaching, and mentoring of younger workers, capturing the knowledge that is essential to the continuity of their business.

Defining a Plan
A preparedness plan begins with an assessment. The assessment defines key areas of expertise, impact of potential retirements, and specific skills and knowledge the corporation needs to retrain. How important is it to retain key expertise and for how long? Does the company need to plan to incent workers to defer retirement, or switch to part time status? What training needs to take place and in what formats to most effectively engage the Gen Xers and Gen Yers? The assessment must be thorough, detailed, and open.

Executive support is vital at this early stage. Senior managers must accurately assess their risk and take appropriate steps to mitigate it. Further, if approached correctly, this step sends an important message to all workers, that the company values long-term and new staff, and that successful knowledge transfer is integral to the company's continued performance and growth.

The deliverables from the assessment phase are both a detailed assessment of the current situation and recommendations for the future. Based on these, the next step is a transition plan. A thorough plan starts with clear, measurable objectives and defines a plan to meet these objectives, while measuring success along the way. Objectives may be both general and specific. For example, a general objective for an accounting company might be to ensure that all lines of business have sufficient experienced staff and processes to support them. A specific objective to support that might be to develop a training plan that includes interviews with the most experienced practitioners for each line of business and development of a product-specific training plan based on their input. This is a very simple example; the idea is to pinpoint and prioritize areas of risk, and develop plans to mitigate it.

The resulting transition plan should include a detailed process to ensure that the company has the knowledge it needs to remain viable and competitive. It should include a method to track skills, and identify future professional, managerial, and technical requirements. Documenting these elements provides a baseline for an organization's knowledge retention strategy, and helps answer the following questions:

• How do we conduct replacement planning for key employees?
• How do we ensure their successors are adequately prepared to fill their positions
• Does our culture support ongoing knowledge retention?
• How can we encourage highly skilled employees to assist us with this mission?

Essentially, leaders must adapt their organizations to the changing dynamics of retirement. They must also identify employees most likely to retire and capture their critical knowledge using audio, video, electronic, or hard copy documentation. This documentation contributes to a skills database that gives the company access to processes and procedures when veteran workers are not available.

A New York City-based transit organization recently found an innovative new way to transfer knowledge from senior technicians slated for retirement. The solution consisted of hiring a videographer and an e-learning developer to create digitized video instruction that provides step-by-step examples of how experienced technicians approach key maintenance problems. The e-learning developer then converted the video to a training module on a portable device. The new technician carried the device, a mentor in a pocket, when out on repairs. Corresponding, printed job aids were also developed to capture the key steps of each procedure. These laminated checklists are designed to fit in maintenance tool kits and act as on-site reference materials. This process has two benefits: it codifies the practices of the agency's most experienced mechanics into a database of procedures and demonstrations, and it recognizes the value these skilled individuals provide to the organization. The latter had the unexpected bonus of improving morale as employees were recognized for their expertise.

Getting Started
Here are a few ideas your company might implement to capture on-the-job expertise:

Pair skilled workers with instructional designers who can convert workers' specific knowledge into the appropriate training materials.

• Use videographers to capture specific manufacturing of technical procedures, and incorporate these into training.
• Sponsor programs for long-term workers to mentor less experienced employees. These should include specific objectives and incentives.
• Educate veteran workers about retirement planning. The information workers gain during these meetings may give them a clearer picture of when they can retire and how much they will need to work following retirement. Develop flexible plans for worker retention if desired.
• Publicize phased retirement as an option. Once your company has a retention plan in place, let mature workers know they can talk to someone about flexible work schedules or arrangements.

Businesses can also retain workers' expertise by improving storage practices. Some businesses today are developing web-based repositories and lessons-learned databases. Others are providing skilled workers with electronic notebooks so they can immediately capture notes on work flow and procedures.

Don't Wait!
In your environment, the first step must be to assess the potential knowledge gap, whatever it might be. Then you can determine how best to prepare for and manage the impending "brain drain."

Companies of all sizes can implement some form of knowledge capture, whether it's simple job aids or video-taped procedures. The goal is to prepare and act now. The skill and expertise of 76 million Baby Boomers are too critical to waste.

Ken Ball follows workforce issues for TechProse, a Lafayette, Calif.-based consulting firm that specializes in technical writing, training, planning and analysis, and change management. He can be reached at (925)299-3900 ext. 107 or via e-mail at ken@techprose.com.