Local businesses were warned of a labour shortage headed their way.
It is already being felt across the country, said Michael Denham, president and CEO of the Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC), and companies in this area were already taking steps to ease the effects.
Denham was speaking before a breakfast crowd of the region's business leaders co-hosted by the local BDC branch and the Northern Regional Construction Association. The BDC is a federal Crown corporation focused on the financial needs of entrepreneurs, and a big part of that is research on behalf of business. Their latest studies showed a major hurdle hurting business from coast to coast to coast, and that was a labour shortage.
"The reasons are threefold," Denham told The Citizen following the breakfast discussion. "One is the Canadian economy continues to grow. Second is we have an aging workforce and people are retiring. And thirdly there just aren't enough people - Canadians and immigrants - entering the workforce. So as a result of this, we forecast Canada is going to have literally zero per cent increase in its working population over the next seven to 10 years."
A lack of people to do a company's work means that company has to cut back on what it can do, even if all other factors are in their favour. That will slow down the local economies of towns and communities across Canada. Larger companies might have a chance to attract the workers they need, hot sectors can perhaps attract the workers needed, but eventually there will be no one to do the work of everyday Canada at the grassroots level.
"It's not a cyclical thing. It's a structural characteristic of Canada that we need to come to terms with," Denham said.
He pointed to two Prince George examples of how a company at a local level can shield itself from the shortage of skilled workers.
One was the industrial business Wolftek headquartered in P.G. It specializes in mill supplies and construction, employing about 40 people.
Wolftek went to Ireland to recruit a machinist through the Immigrant Worker Program, as one solution, and invested in technology to automate areas of the business for which they could not find suitable employees.
The other example Denham found locally was Krell Wellness. Prioprietors Tina Krell and Mike Voltz implemented a set of in-house social programs to keep employees engaged. The retention rate of existing employees went up to the point they haven't lost any staff in the past two years, allowing them to now expand to a second location.
There are four key antidotes, Denham listed.
One is find employees within pockets of Canada's demographics that are under-employed: calling retirees back into the workforce, unleash Aboriginal populations, draw in the immigrants who are on Canadian soil but not in gainful jobs, accommodate students on their school-focused schedules, and reach out to the so-called disabled population.
"There are probably about a half-million Canadians," available for recruitment in that manner, said Denham, plus the option of attracting immigrants from other countries directly to your operation.
Retention is another main strategy, as with Krell Wellness, whereby employers make the job so satisfying that employees don't want to go elsewhere.
Thirdly, invest heavily in work processes, so workers and innovative tools are used to maximum effect, as was the Wolftek case.
"And the fourth strategy is to work as a community," Denham said. "In Prince George, you are all in this together, and rather than try to solve this company by company, think about Prince George as a whole, finding sources of talent either within or from outside of Canada, and as a community find the machinists, the welders, the millwrights up here."
It also speaks to community capacity, meaning the lifestyle, social characteristics, and cultural infrastructure that make a place welcoming to someone so they aren't looking to leave their employment for outside opportunities.
Denham said this message is one the BDC is trying to amplify all across Canada, and if Prince George businesses feel themselves facing this challenge, or their bottom line is not responding as well as hoped, then call the local branch because one of the main services they offer, in addition to financing, is consultation. They have staff that can look your operation over and make recommendations.
