The Department of Labor forecasts a nearly 50% increase in the number of workers reaching retirement ages from 2004 to 2014 while 22 million workers over the age of 55 will leave the workforce during this time period. This will have a significant impact on your company’s ability to attract and retain talent. Companies will want to find ways to re-engage two sources of talent that are relatively untapped today: parents leaving the workforce to care for family and retirement age Baby Boomers wanting more time off.
This article defines and provides case examples for using flexible work arrangements and on-ramp recruiting as a means to engage these talent pools.
Benefits and Flexibility Defined
A key tool for retaining and recruiting employees is flexible work arrangements. According to a Families and Work Institute report, 67% of employees report high levels of job satisfaction in organizations with high levels of workplace flexibility. Higher flexibility in turn leads to improved company performance, higher shareholder valuation, and higher job engagement and retention. Lack of flexibility is also one of the top cited factors why people leave a job.
Flexibility can mean many things to different audiences. Most people think about women leaving the workforce for work-life balance. Flexibility applies to other audiences as well: men find flexibility important though see taking advantage of flexibility as a stigma, Generation Y workers highly value their personal life, and aging Boomers enjoy the challenges found from working but are at a point in their careers where they want to make room to enjoy life. Flexibility can run the gamut in terms of structure. Options include flexible full time schedules, telecommuting, job sharing, seasonal schedules and part time and consulting arrangements. Donna Klein, President of Corporate Voices and previously Vice President of Workforce Effectiveness at Marriott says that the challenge in setting up flexibility programs is not seeing this as an accommodation or a solution for women, but seeing this as a core business practice for retaining talented, trained workers and setting a culture of flexibility.
Flexibility impacts three areas of a company’s performance: human capital outcomes, talent management and financial performance. First, flexibility increases employee satisfaction and commitment to the organization, and decreases stress, often a component in health related costs. Second, studies show that flexibility programs help retain and attract employees. Third, flexibility increases productivity and financial performance.
For example, IBM found that work-life balance was the second leading reason cited why employees leave; for mothers, it was the top reason. A client of mine has learned that they can best recruit experienced domain expertise by being open to hiring remote employees that telecommute, an arrangement that offers the candidates a great deal of flexibility. Deloitte quantified the costs of turnover of employees who would have left if they did not have flexible work and determined the company saved $41.5 million in one year alone by keeping seasoned talent.
Flexibility Starts at the Top
Setting a culture for flexibility starts from the top. It includes empathy and mutual respect, management for employees and vice versa. The CEO and executive team needs to not only set the policy but also set the example. In moderating a group of senior level executives, one VP of a Fortune 100 company leading a division with over 1,000 employees was a single mom. She shared that in executive level meetings she would say, “I have to leave; it is 5:30 and I need to pick up my son or go to his game. It was hard to do the first few times but people got used to it.”
Implementing Flexibility
There are many programs for increasing flexibility in the workplace. Employers in Silicon Valley have embraced flexibility in many forms. Here are a number of different programs to consider:
- Telecommuting
- Flexible work day start/end times
- Phased return from maternity leave
- Job share
- Part time roles
On-Ramp Recruiting
On-ramp recruiting is the practice of recruiting people who have previously stepped out of the workforce, whether because of a family need for flexibility to care for children or parents, a retiree wanting to travel, or other reasons. How do you develop recruiting programs to target talent that has previously opted out of the workforce? What were reasons they opted out in the first place and how do you set a culture of flexibility to address the concerns?
Here are examples of programs that allow companies to reach out to employees who have opted out:
- Alumni Networking and Consulting Programs – Companies recognize the value of trained employees and keep in close contact. Deloitte and Touche has a Personal Pursuits Program and Booz Allen Hamilton offers an Adjunct program. At a low cost, these programs allow companies to communicate with valuable former employees and keep the door open if they would like to return.
- On-Ramp Recruiting – Lehman Brothers, with Goldman Sachs and others following their lead, has a program that targets top women who have opted out of their careers. They hold regional events, inviting women to learn about the latest trends and network. In less than a year, Lehman hired 15 senior women through this program; Goldman Sachs hired 5 through a similar program.
Increased flexibility, beyond telecommuting and flexible hours, are powerful tools to effectively attract and retain talent in today’s changing workforce. Studies show that both men and women are increasingly following non-linear career paths. Developing ways to help careers progress with flexibility and along non-linear career paths will result in improved job satisfaction, recruiting, retention, and overall company performance.