Recruiters and HR consultants see utilities taking an increasingly comprehensive approach to addressing tomorrow’s personnel challenges.
Michael T. Burr is Fortnightly’s editor-at-large. E-mail him at burr@pur.com.
One lesson that has emerged from the baby boomer retirement situation is simply this: In the future, utilities will need to manage their human resources more carefully and deliberately. This truism translates into some important realities for electric and gas utilities.
First, talent is a scarce resource in the best of times, and from a hiring perspective, the worst of times are nearly upon us. Human resources costs are rising across a wide range of job roles, and they will rise substantially more before they level off.
Second, attracting and retaining talent from among the available pool will require companies to be more flexible, creative, and aggressive than most have been in the past. In the search for talent, successful companies will adapt their policies and develop innovative programs that serve their long-term personnel strategies.
Third, utilities increasingly find their recruitment and retention strategies must address the people whose talent they need, and they must do so throughout their full life-cycle, from grade school through retirement and beyond.
To learn how personnel markets are changing, and how utilities are handling those changes, Public Utilities Fortnightly interviewed several leading HR consultants, including:
• Steve Nissenfeld, vice president and director of energy consulting, the Hay Group, Jersey City, N.J.