Cleaning out a desk drawer (something I do with distressing irregularity) helped me rediscover a quote from Patricia Galagan, then executive editor for the American Society of Training & Development‘s journal.

She says:

Knowledge skills, attitudes and experiences are possessions which people acquire for themselves, not gifts which a company or a college can bestow.

I’m not sure about dating this quote. Pat and I have been around this profession for a long time, and the stuff in the drawer wasn’t exactly “new.” But it’s a good quote for today because it points out the dramatic shift we’re seeing in how people become able to do their jobs and where the responsibility for that lies. Just a few years ago, we assumed that “training” was something companies decided was necessary for their employees, and which was peremptorily imposed upon them. The end result was that something got done better or quicker or less expensively. And … this is important … the benefactor was the company.

Today, two things intrude on this old, traditional view of training.

First, although companies are still quick to identify skill deficiencies in their workforce, they are reluctant to invest in expensive training. Why? The employee with all these new skills quickly shops it for a better job and salary down the street. Thus, companies have begun to do more skill hiring than skill creation.

And so, secondly, individual workers have increasingly seen themselves as the determiner of skill acquisition. They seek out companies with liberal training and tuition assistance benefits, and acquire the skills they think are most marketable.

So to get back to Pat’s quote, companies are no longer doing training to workers. Workers are doing it to themselves, and they are at least the initial benefactors.

That’s why we’ve been saying lately that success is no longer about who you know, it’s about what you know. In a portable job market, companies want to know what you can do for them NOW. They want to know what knowledge, skills, attitudes, and experiences you’re bringing with you that can get the job done today, before you leave tomorrow.

It’s what you know!

Tom
www.lc.edu/cl

My calendar has been very “green” this week … that is to say, much of my time and energy has been occupied with correctly positioning the college’s efforts on green initiatives and sustainability. If there is anything that is clear to me about “green”, it is that all of us–colleges, businesses, and individuals–are walking a fine line right now between “this is great for our society” and “show me the money.”

It’s that way at the start of any great shifts in the way the world works. Computers, cars, electricity, radio, airplanes–all seemed foreign and uncertain and vapory to the people watching them emerge. Today, they’re ubiquitous. It will be like that with “green.” Ten years or so from now, we’ll look around at a world dramatically changed by a conciousness that mandates a renewable and sustainable way of living on our planet. Twenty years from now, the changes will be as entrenched as the computer has become in the way we think and work and live.

I’m not a good enough prophet to forecast those changes. I can tell you where the “the money’s at” right now:

• Photovoltaic solar pannels are a solid economic investment with a calculatable payoff curve.
• Same with geothermal heating and cooling.
• Businesses can contact the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center (www.istc.illinois.edu) for help with energy and waste audits.
• Finally, waste reduction is really beginning to take hold in both homes and businesses. Did you know pound of aluminum cans is now worth 85 cents?

It’s what you know.

I attended COCA’s Fall Safety Conference this week.  Looks like OSHA under a new administration will be seriously re-focusing on enforcement.  130 new compliance officers.  45 additional whistleblower investigators.  A push for penalties applied at the maximum extent of current statute.

“OSHA will get back in the business of issuing standards that protect workers and strong enforcement of those standards.”    –Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis

What does that mean to local companies?

• Expect larger penalties for “willful” and “repeat” citations.
• A renewed emphasis on recordkeeping.
• Emphasis on PSM (process safety management).
• A focus on the recently created PPE standard.

It’s what you know!

Tom
www.lc.edu/ccl

Manufacturing as a percentage of GDP

• 1999: 17.0%
• 2008: 11.5%

Manufacturing Workers

• 1999: 17,303,000
• 2009: 11,771,000

Machine Tool Production

• Japan 2008: $15.8 billion (first place annually)
• US 2008: $3.8 billion (seventh place globally)

US machine Tool Consumption

• July 2007: $334 million
• July 2008: $150 million

US Production of Solar Photovoltaics

• 414 megawatts, or 5.6% of global output

His solution? It’s a battle between low-wage unskilled workers and higher wage knowledge workers. He says we’ll win!

It’s what you know.

Tom
www.lc.edu/ccl