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OPINION
The great talent vanishing act
Facing a talent shortage exacerbated by baby boomers’ exodus from the workforce, AEC firms must innovate to succeed.
E ver feel like finding a unicorn would be easier than finding a top-notch professional these days? You’re not alone. In boardrooms and virtual happy hours alike, the echoed sentiments are the same from CPAs to attorneys, HR managers, and administrative assistants – good people are hard to find. But it’s not just water cooler talk. The stats from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics tell a tale that’s hard to ignore, especially in the professional and business services industry. We’re not just reminiscing about a bygone era; data for the last decade and forecasts for the next point to a very real talent crisis.
Stuart McLendon
The Professional and Business Services supersector, a fancy term for the collection of NAICS codes 54, 55, and 56, is the primary industry group for credentialed pros like accountants, lawyers, engineers, and the managerial crew. Picture this: In 2022, this sector employed about 18 percent of all workers designated as a “manager” in the U.S economy. So this data set provides very real insights into what is happening in law offices, architectural firms, ad agencies, and the rest of the business support infrastructure that is critical to other business segments in getting products on shelves and services to consumers. Looking backward from September 2023 to 2013,
new hires and separations played a game of tag, with 144.35 million hires barely inching past 139.24 million separations. As businesses scrambled to fill positions, the average number of monthly open and unfilled job postings nearly tripled, from 765,000 in 2013 to a peak of 2,136,000 through 2022. That’s a 12.1 percent compound annual growth rate. For comparison, the S&P 500 returned roughly 11.6 percent during that same period, and I don’t think that is a coincidence. These professionals play two core functions in creating business value: fueling growth and decreasing risk. Business has become increasingly
See STUART MCLENDON, page 4
THE ZWEIG LETTER MARCH 11, 2024, ISSUE 1528
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