As someone who spent 25 years of my life in Marin County, I know it is an incredible place to live and work. Still, what I found most startling from a closer look at the results of a recent business survey conducted by the Business Journal and Bank of Marin is that it appears fewer and fewer people actually live and work in Marin County. A lot of people who work in Marin County don’t live here. And a great many people who live in Marin County don’t work here.

These findings came from 200 companies based in Marin — about 8 percent of 2,300 businesses contacted for the survey. Two-thirds of responding employers said less than 75 percent of their employees live in Marin County. Their employees come primarily from Sonoma County, as well as Alameda and Solano counties.

What about working professionals who are fortunate enough to live in Marin County? Unless they are owners of local businesses or professional services firms, they tend to work in San Francisco and points south down to Silicon Valley.

But here’s the clincher: nearly a quarter of those Marin companies surveyed have open positions they cannot fill. What’s going on here?

For one, I would wager that younger people find less and less to attract them to Marin County. As part of my talent acquisition business, I speak almost every day with professionals. The younger single ones want to be in San Francisco where there are more job opportunities and salaries are 20-30 percent higher. The ones with families look further north for the lifestyle and more affordable housing. Small wonder the population of Marin is graying.

Why does this matter? Young professionals are a vital component of the economic engine: they are the ones who spend the most money on products, services, and housing.

In the same survey, more than half of the companies also indicated they believe it is “necessary” to leave Marin County to expand. Gauging by past history, successful companies have tended to move north, east, or out of state to grow. Businesses say they can’t expand in Marin County because of prohibitively steep property costs, lack of affordable housing, and difficulty attracting qualified talent.

We all know that the factors driving Marin’s higher property values and housing costs are not going to change anytime soon. The majority of the workforce cannot afford to work and live in Marin County into the foreseeable future. Marin-based employers just have to get over that. The real question is: How can Marin County attract and retain the talent companies need?

I do not believe there’s a lack of qualified talent. Every day I talk to well-qualified professionals in the North Bay who are looking for positions yet are having a tough time finding them. The workforce is here. The talent is here. Marin County employers who cannot fill open positions are experiencing more of a disconnect than a dearth.

As inviting as Marin County’s natural beauty and healthy lifestyle is, employers must recognize that coming here to work, much less live, amounts to financial risk for upwardly mobile professionals. It is not enough to offer “competitive” compensation. To attract and retain exceptional talent, employers in Marin County must offer premium compensation packages. By premium I mean: higher than competitive. This includes those companies with the “cool factor” whose name alone used to be enough to attract talented professionals willing to exchange lower salaries for the opportunity.

Marin companies might also consider getting more innovative with office time and telecommuting policies. If less than a quarter of your employees live in the community your company is located, that means a lot of your current talent is spending a significant part of their workday in transit. And since we’re talking about the North Bay, I’m willing to bet most of them drive. Let’s be honest about this. Commuting is almost always uncompensated time your employees sacrifice to work for you. They incur significant expenses between gas and wear and tear on their vehicles. It’s not a healthy or sustainable lifestyle in the long term, either. I’ve mentioned in past columns how highly the next generation of professionals values lifestyle issues in making career decisions. Commuting takes a toll on the productivity and longevity of the most critical resource companies need to execute their missions and flourish: human capital.

There’s no question that improving the business environment in Marin County to attract new companies and hang on to established ones must happen. But Marin companies must also be willing to pay a premium to attract and retain the top talent needed to ensure their own success and growth.

Let me share a recent message I received from a client (with her permission), who owns and runs a small company:

“Jennifer, if I wasn’t sure before what you meant about having blinders on, it is painfully clear to me now. I just lost the most senior member of my team. She quit very abruptly and unexpectedly, without any notice. I am devastated because I have known her a long time as a professional colleague – long before she came to work for me. I was so thrilled when she came on board, I put a lot of time and effort into training her. I literally taught her everything she knows about this business. She learned quickly and became very productive, independent, and successful. She was also extremely loyal, so I trusted her completely and took her into my confidence. She brought in so much business, I treated her like a partner.

“Looking back now, I realize I failed to see the signs. I was in denial. While I may have treated her like a partner, the fact is, she was not. Two years ago, she had asked to be made a partner. For personal and professional reasons at the time, I told her there was no way that could happen. She never brought up the issue again and continued to excel in her work, so I thought I everything was fine.

“To say that her departure is a setback is an understatement. On top of dealing with a sudden and significant loss of revenue, I now have to devote considerable energy to finding and training a new person. She was such an exemplary asset, replacing her could easily take a year or more. I’ve always thought of myself as a pretty shrewd business person, but I was naïve and ignorant. I thought it would go on forever.”

Every business owner or manager recognizes that a certain amount of employee turnover comes with the territory. Still, the sudden and unexpected departure of a person who is core to your company’s business is another matter altogether – particularly for smaller businesses. It does happen.

As you can imagine, my client is doing a lot of reflecting and processing. Not only has she identified the many signs she missed, but she’s also recognized mistakes she made as an employer, gleaning some corollary lessons to strengthen her management skills and business planning.

How might you know that a key person is thinking about moving on? Here are some of the signs:

**Spending a lot of time on the phone and on non-work-related issues.
**A change in attitude or even disinterest in the business, the company, or you. People become distant and not as engaged to avoid revealing too much.
**Not showing up for or constantly rescheduling meetings, taking a lot of time off, and/or being out of the office frequently, yet always having a plausible reason or excuse.
**A notable change of attire. They begin dressing very nicely and professionally a lot more often.
**Changes in their social media profiles, such as following other companies but not yours, or participating in industry-related activities that you should know about but don’t.

Lessons learned for employers to take away:

Discuss goals regularly—your company’s, yours, and your employees’—and have a plan in place to help employees grow professionally. Most people want to advance and if they are not able to, you can be certain they will eventually move on. Everyone needs to do what is best for themselves. It’s not always about money, either. Are you doing everything you can to keep your key team members and employees happy? Are you valuing and nurturing them or are you taking them for granted? Checking their public social media profiles occasionally can be one good indicator. For one reason or another, my client had stopped discussing goals with a key contributor to her company’s success. In failing to recognize and address this individual’s desire for professional advancement, my client ultimately hurt herself.

Clarify and firm up all agreements that affect your business. Make sure the ground rules and expectations about your business relationships are clearly articulated and mutually understood, whether through a formal contract or an informal agreement. Require a non-disclosure agreement for anyone who gains proprietary information or knowledge that could put your business at risk strategically or financially – employees, consultants, independent contractors, service providers, business partners – even people who attend company meetings or interview for jobs. Without a signed NDA in place, there is nothing to prevent or at least impose a grace period on a departing employee or former business partner using your company resources and doing business with your existing clients.

Create a disaster recovery plan. Beyond new opportunities or more money, there are plenty of other life changes that lead to the sudden departure of key employees: illness, relocation, family changes, even death. Do you have relationships with consultants who can step in and fill the gaps? This should be part of your strategic workforce planning yet hardly any business does this. And just as we all know the wisdom of keeping a well-stocked home emergency kit and stashing enough personal savings to cover 6-9 months of living expenses, consider banking several months of hiring expenses for your business.

Never stop looking for good people to add to your team. Constantly be developing relationships with individuals you would want to bring into your fold, especially for strategic positions connected to your business’s core competencies. Don’t get complacent; keep working your connections the same way job candidates do. This is never wasted effort. Networking exposes you to new ideas and keeps you learning.

The beginning of the year is a natural time of transition. Now that the frenzy of the holiday season has passed, it’s a time of re-focusing and getting back down to business. Whether or not you’ve made (or already broken) New Year’s resolutions, this is a good time to re-assess your goals for your business or career and perhaps set new ones. Did you meet your goals for last year? Did your business grow? If not, why? What do you want to accomplish this year? How about in the first 90 days of 2013?

If you’re part of a small company — like more than 80 percent of businesses in the North Bay — and you don’t have a formal performance review process in place, setting goals is an essential step for translating your business plan into a road map. Good leaders must be able to communicate where they want to go and inspire others to join them in making it happen. But goal setting accomplishes more than direction. It opens the lines of communication about expectations, yours and others’. Unexpressed expectations inevitably cause problems within organizations of all sizes. The funny thing about expectations is that often we don’t realize we have them until they’re not being met. Or, as someone once put it to me, the definition of expectations is “pre-meditated resentments.”

People working in smaller companies and organizations tend to wear a lot of hats because there are simply fewer bodies to do everything that needs to get done. It can be very easy to get lost in the minutiae of pressing tasks. How do you know whether your work is meeting your boss’s expectations and contributing to the company’s success? Creating and communicating shorter term, 90-day or 180-day goals helps continually define everyone’s responsibilities clearly and keep everyone’s expectations aligned.

If you are the owner or boss, goal setting leads quite naturally to re-assessing the team you have in place, as it should. I advise my clients to reassess their teams annually. Actually, I recommend doing a workforce audit at least once, which is a much more comprehensive undertaking, and developing a workforce plan. Once you have that plan in place, you can reassess your team annually and make adjustments for business shifts and new goals. The purpose of all is this is to ensure that you continue to have the right team in place to achieve your business goals. This requires taking stock periodically to identify potential gaps or redundancies, similar to taking inventory annually.

Talking about this objectively makes it all sound so simple and straightforward but of course this isn’t merely “inventory.” We’re talking about people’s careers and livelihoods — people you know and work alongside every day. In reality, it’s pretty difficult to be objective. For this reason, it may be more effective to bring in a third-party service, someone external who specializes in organizational development and workforce planning to help you remove your blinders and identify the changes needed. This is true for companies of all sizes, even companies large enough to have human resources staff, and simply more of a practical necessity for smaller companies. Either way, you have to be willing to make the investment in your business.

You also have to be willing to accept discomfort. Making changes is one of the hardest things to do. Most of us have an aversion to change because it’s not safe and comfortable, as we tend to prefer. Change is painful. Change also involves a fair amount fear.

If you are a small business owner juggling many balls, one of the changes you may need to consider involves your own expectations and workload. Perhaps the best thing you can do for the success of your business may be to delegate more of your work by adding a new position or engaging a third-party service. As a small business owner myself, last year I worked with a business coach who helped me identify how to make better use of my time and where to make needed changes to achieve my goals and grow my business. That’s why I can say with authority how uncomfortable this process can be. One of the outcomes of this scrutiny was the decision to hire a virtual assistant, bookkeeping service and social media consultant which freed up more of my time to seek new business. I thought I was being practical and cost effective but the business consultant helped me realize that managing administrative tasks was not the best use of my time as company president and not at all aligned with achieving my business goals. In fact, now I see that I need to delegate even more.

In which areas might you be wearing blinders? What are you avoiding to remain comfortable or failing to see out of complacency or fear of change? I encourage you to do these three things as a business owner or manager during the first quarter of 2013 to identify where you may be drifting off course so that you can make adjustments for continued growth and success:

Review your business plan.
Set new or renewed goals for this year.
Take stock of your team/workforce. Get outside help — it’s well worth it.
Speaking of blinders, how do you know when the time has come as a professional to move on in your career? I invite you to contact. Send me your thoughts. I’ll cover this in a future column.

ROHNERT PARK — Sonoma County’s economic recession that led to more than 25,000 jobs lost is mostly over, as job growth through most of last year outpaced that of the Bay Area, state and nation as well as nearly matching national growth leader North Dakota, an economist with the closely watched UCLA Anderson Forecast told an annual gathering of civic and business leaders in the county.

Jerry Nickelsburg

Surprising job growth in the county is in the industry sectors that are growing nationwide, according to Jerry Nickelsburg, Ph.D., senior economist of UCLA’s Anderson School of Management, told several hundred at the Doubletree hotel.

“In Sonoma County, almost all the recession is over with,” Dr. Nickelsburg said.

California job growth of nearly 2 percent in 2012 through November compared with the same pace the year before was the 10th best in the country, but Sonoma County’s payroll growth of more than 5 percent through much of the year bested growth in other regions of the state, according to Dr. Nickelsburg.

“You all are up there with North Dakota, but people actually live here,” he said.

Sonoma County’s nonfarm job growth ranks barely behind that of North Dakota, the fastest-growing state in the U.S. (courtesy of UCLA Anderson Forecast)

Annual job growth off the farm or vineyard in Sonoma County, at almost 5 percent, was barely behind that of North Dakota.

U.S. gross domestic product growth has been mostly between 1 percent to 3 percent since 2009 and is expected to maintain that slow pace until mid-2014, Dr. Nickelsburg predicted.

California’s economic growth should slow this year and pick up next year, with the state’s unemployment rate lowering to the nation’s rate by the end of 2014. The state lost 1.5 million jobs in the recession and has regained less than half so far.

Sonoma County’s employment growth has been spread across a number of industries, notably manufacturing, tourism and wine, according to Ben Stone, executive director of the Sonoma County Economic Development Board, which hosted the State of the County event.

Sonoma County’s job growth bested other California regions last year. (Courtesy of UCLA Anderson Forecast)

“It’s a real testament to how we’ve been able to bounce back,” Mr. Stone said.

The county business-confidence index, tabulated from surveys of local businesses recently, was 6.3 for winter 2012, almost back to the level of 2006, according to Mr. Stone. That’s when a falloff in home sales started to erode the local economy.

About half the local executives surveyed said they planned to increase purchases of equipment this year, and more than 40 percent would increase hiring.

A looming pressure on the county’s job growth potential is what Mr. Stone called a coming “silver tsunami,” in which 40,000 would reach retirement age in the next 10 years. That would be almost 23 percent of the average county workforce of 170,000.

After losing 25,000 jobs in the recession, Sonoma County has regained 17,000 through strong job growth. (Courtesy of UCLA Anderson Forecast)

Sonoma County

Sonoma County jobs vs. job growth, January 2001-December 2012 (click to enlarge)

While Sonoma County’s jobless rate remained unchanged between November and December, at 7.7 percent, it was lower than last year’s rate of 9 percent, according to the Employment Development Department.

Over the year, the county easily outpaced others in the region with positive job growth. Annual growth was 4.7 percent and 8,100 jobs in a number of industries in December.

Sonoma County manufacturing jobs vs job growth, January 2001-December 2012 (click to enlarge)

Significant gains occurred in manufacturing, which added 1,400 jobs, education and health services, adding 1,300, trade, transportation and utilities, adding 1,100.

The government sector added 1,200 jobs. Professional and business services and construction added 900 and 800 jobs, respectively, while financial activities posted 300 over the year. The county’s workforce across all industries grew by 4.7 percent over the year.

Solano County

Solano County jobs vs. job growth, January 2001-December 2012 (click to enlarge)

In Solano County, the December rate was 9.3 percent, unchanged from November but below last year’s rate of 10.4 percent.

The county added 1,900 jobs over the year, a growth rate of 1.6 percent. Hospitality as well as trade, transportation and utilities led the way with 700 more jobs apiece, while education and health services added 600. Construction and professional services each added 300 jobs, while the government sector shed 800 positions over the year.

Napa County

Napa County jobs vs job growth, January 2001-December 2012 (click to enlarge)

Napa County’s rate in December edged up to 7.9 percent from a revised 7.5 percent in November, below last year’s estimate of 8.8 percent.

Over the year, the county lost 200 jobs, though some industries posted small yearly gains, among them: manufacturing, which added 200, and information, leisure and hospitality, and construction, all of which added 100 jobs a piece.

Manufacturing, which includes wine production, shed 200 positions between November and December in Napa County.

Marin County

Marin County continued to post the lowest unemployment rate in California, at 5.5 percent.

Industry specifics aren’t yet available for Marin, which is part of a three-county region that includes San Mateo and San Francisco counties.

Mendocino County

Mendocino County jobs vs job growth, January 2001-December 2012 (click to enlarge)

Mendocino County’s jobless rate edged upward to 9.5 percent in December from 9.1 percent in November, but fell over the year from 10.2 percent. The December rate, however, was the lowest the county posted since 2008, when it was 8.7 percent.

Year-over-year job growth occurred in hospitality, which added 80 jobs, professional and business services, which added 40, and private education and health services, which added 30. Those gains were offset by yearly losses in trade, transportation and utilities, which lost 130 and government, which lost 110.

Lake County

Lake County jobs vs job growth, January 2001-December 2012 (clilck to enlarge)

Lake County’s rate in December crept up to 15.1 percent, from November’s rate of 14.6 percent, but was well below last year’s estimate of 16 percent.

Yearly losses occurred in government, which shed 700 positions, hospitality, at 100, construction at 30, and professional and business services, at 10. Slight gains were posted in trade, transportation and utilities and health and education services, at 10 apiece, and other services, at 20.

Statewide, the unemployment rate was 9.8 percent, the same as the previous month. The state gained 225,900 jobs over the year with the largest gains reported in leisure and hospitality and information.

Nationally, the jobless rate was 7.6 in December.

Unemployment rates for North Bay counties
County December
2011 revised
November
2012 prelim.
December
2012 State rank
(out of 58)
Lake 16.0% 14.6% 15.1% 50
Marin 5.8% 6.4% 5.5% 1
Mendocino 10.8% 9.1% 9.5% 20
Napa 8.8% 7.5% 7.9% 9
Solano 10.4% 9.3% 9.3% 18
Sonoma 9.0% 7.7% 7.7% 8
California 11.2% 9.8% 9.8% –
U.S. 8.5% 7.8% 7.6% –
Source: California Employment Development Department and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

If you’re a business owner or manager, how do you acknowledge and express your appreciation for your employees, the people who carry out your mission daily? Larger companies often rely on a formal performance review process to evaluate employees. Top producers are recognized and rewarded with raises or year-end bonuses. Underperformers are motivated and equipped to do better.

In the North Bay, however, 80 percent of businesses are small employers with fewer than 50 employees. We have a reputation for incubating successful, trail blazing start-ups, but smaller employers don’t always have the resources to support a formal review process. There are other means of accomplishing this, though. Self-evaluation can be a highly effective way to engage with your employees about not only their job performance but also their attitudes and aspirations.

In a self-evaluation, employees respond to a series of questions to help them assess their own performance. This guides employees through a process that allows them to focus on various aspects and nuances of their work, including all the components of the job itself, their goals and achievements, where they seem themselves falling short, and any professional development they may need.

One of my clients, Paul, was referred to me a few years ago because his career was stagnating with his current employer, a successful start-up technology company. When he was hired with five years of manufacturing engineering experience under his belt, he was told that as the company grew he would have opportunities to advance into management. Over the next three years the company did grow but Paul did not move into management. What happened? I discovered that this company had no formal review processes in place, nor any career development programs. Why is that important? We all need constructive feedback on a regular basis to acknowledge our accomplishments and areas for improvement to continue to grow as professionals.

The self-evaluation process can foster candid, constructive dialog between employees and management. Instead of the boss filling out a form and essentially passing judgment on an employee, the act of self-evaluation leads to introspection on the part of the employee to honestly assess his or her own performance, convey accomplishments and challenges, and express career growth interests. Rather than performance evaluation being just another management chore to be checked off, self-evaluation can become the catalyst for improved internal communication while empowering employees to take greater responsibility for their job satisfaction.

In Paul’s case, we worked together to put a self-evaluation process in place and he started on the journey of evaluating his performance with co-workers and management. He was able to identify his strengths and weaknesses and together we developed an action plan for him. The good news is that Paul made the move into a manufacturing management position with increased compensation – but with a different company that recruited him. The bad news is that his former company lost a valuable asset, a costly mistake which could have been avoided.

By the way, self-evaluation should include management. If you’re an owner or manager, how do you rate yourself as a leader and a professional? It’s important to hold yourself to the same and higher standards as you do your employees. And if you’re really game to open the lines of communication, ask your employees to evaluate you. Whatever your role, it’s important to keep bettering yourself professionally and to make yourself as marketable as possible to be able to adapt to changing business needs and circumstances.

I mentioned year-end bonuses previously but the reality is that not everyone receives bonuses, nor are many companies in strong enough financial position to give out bonuses. On top of this, if yours is one of the companies that have had to impose work furloughs or pay reductions to stay afloat, no doubt this has created some resentment in the ranks. For those who have had to make such sacrifices, it’s harder to feel thankful. But maybe this is all the more reason to make sure you acknowledge employees, co-workers, and bosses. You can certainly express your appreciation for their part in weathering tough times and pulling together.

After all, a bonus is, by definition, an unexpected extra. It’s not a given. So if you are neither giving nor getting a holiday bonus, maybe this can be the year you do something for yourself. Find a way to show yourself a little appreciation for your accomplishments of the past year.

And whatever you do, enjoy the Christmas party — but don’t over do it.

A: Even though the economy certainly seems to be in recovery mode and people are hungry for work, the hunt for technical talent is turning out to be more challenging than expected. There are some demographic trends that may be contributing to the difficulties your company is encountering.

Relative to the rest of the Bay Area, are North Bay wages and compensation competitive?
Yes (21%, 8 votes)
No (76%, 29 votes)
Don’t know (3%, 1 votes)
Total voters: 38

This NBBJ Pulse Poll ends Oct. 9. In addition to voting, you can leave your thoughts in the comments section below.

View all polls.

Most significantly, there is a growing availability gap in skilled professionals due to a wave of retiring baby boomers, and this trend only promises to intensify over the next 10 to 20 years. Of course, a newer, younger generation of talent is coming into the job market but because they have very different expectations, they are changing the game.

The way you refer to finding qualified people makes me want to ask how your company is seeking engineering candidates. Are you relying solely on online advertising? If you were my client, I would ask to meet with your hiring manager to assess your recruiting practices and process. I would also need to become familiar with your company’s mission, culture and goals, and then I would recommend developing best-fit profiles for your immediate openings as well as a strategic workforce plan for fulfilling your overall company goals — if you don’t already have these.

Short of gaining this deeper knowledge and understanding of your company, let me tell you about another North Bay high-tech company we have been working with recently, because its experience seems to parallel yours. We are recruiting specialized engineers to design and develop next-generation communication systems. Because of the limited supply of technical professionals here in the North Bay with the skills needed, we had to source candidates nationwide and even from Canada.

Plenty of talented professionals are interested in coming here to the North Bay to work, play and live because of our natural beauty, great weather and wine country lifestyle, although these are always weighed against certain risks — and this is where the demographic trend I referred to earlier comes into play. Younger, single professionals may not necessarily be as motivated by the North Bay lifestyle because they often prefer the energy of big-city life, where there is always an abundance of opportunities in close proximity and, frankly, where they can make a lot more money.

My firm has had more success attracting professionals outside of California with families — both couples with children for whom quality-of-life amenities are essential and empty-nesters who are freer to make such a change. For those with families, however, relocating to an area where there is a limited supply of other companies — should the new arrangement not work out — makes the risks more complex. Often, the spouse also has to land a new job, and of course, their kids must change schools. Finding the right housing is always a challenge for young, growing families. Fortunately, housing in the North Bay has become more affordable during the economic downturn, with more available inventory and record low interest rates.

My point is that for top professionals to be willing to take all these risks associated with a major job transition, your offer better be worth it. The crux of attracting and retaining top talent to North Bay companies like yours comes down to three main things: compensation, compensation and compensation. OK, so it’s really one main thing that I’ve written about before in this column.

Salaries in the North Bay tend to be 20 percent to 30 percent below the greater Bay Area. This puts companies like yours at a distinct disadvantage in what I call the war for talent. You say your employment offers are “strong,” but do you know how your salaries compare to your competitors’? Are you prepared to offer above-market compensation packages for top professionals and perks for their families to attract them to come here? Does your company have plans for keeping your technical talent happy once you win them, so you can protect your assets from your competitors?

For talent needs as mission critical as yours, I would encourage you to pursue professional staffing services, particularly if you can’t answer those questions. Like many companies, you may be reluctant to make a financial commitment to acquire talent, but the fact is, you already have. The issue is how to get the most value from your investment, especially since the cost of even one bad hire can wind up costing your company far more than time.

The client I mentioned previously, which struggled for a long time with hiring the talent they needed, is now quite successful. What happened? Their level of pain became motivating enough to make them willing to invest in professional talent-acquisition services and restructure their compensation and relocation packages to above-market levels. Now, they are prevailing in the war for talent.

Are you collaborative, controlling, creative or competitive?

Q: My company just lost a long-time senior manager. She was a very effective, successful, and well regarded leader. A member of her team has taken the management role on an interim basis. He’s a very capable “company man” but not necessarily the strong leader our company needs for this strategic leadership role.  How can we make sure we find the right fit?

A: I have to answer your question with another question. How will you know who is the right fit for your company? This is a question with many layers. Whether you look within or outside to fill this position, take the time to define what you mean by the “right fit” for the position and for your company. I recommend creating a best fit profile based on your company’s culture, needs, and strategic goals.

How would you describe your company’s culture?

Examples of different kinds of organizational cultures include:

• Collaborative, where the workplace is like an extended family, with emphasis on teamwork, consensus, and cohesion;
• Creative, where the company is a dynamic, entrepreneurial, and creative place to work, and innovation, risk-taking, and individual initiative are encouraged to remain on the leading edge;
• Control focused, where structure, rules, and procedures govern behavior, and efficiency, stability, and predictability are valued;
• Competitive, where results matter most of all, driven by goal setting and productivity.

Your description of the interim manager indicates that he fits well with your company’s particular culture yet also implies there may be a need for other qualities that he does not have.

If you cannot answer the culture question clearly and succinctly, take a step back and ask yourself: what problems are you trying to solve? Is your company looking to grow in a new direction strategically? Is your organization missing critical, needed skills?

Most companies have what I call a “blood line” and they tend to hire people of that same blood type. Regardless of whether this is good or bad, it certainly ensures that your company will continue to attract the same type of individual. This may meet certain needs but it does not promote growth. If you are looking to shake things up, consider attracting talent that is outside of the ordinary. This can be good for everyone in your organization although such change can be very hard to implement successfully without a good strategic workforce plan in place.

Of course an essential part of the “right fit” is a job description that clearly defines short- and long-term goals for this position and also describes the day-to-day responsibilities in terms of priorities, responsibilities, and most pressing concerns. You can then determine the necessary skills, education, and experience for fulfilling those responsibilities and goals.

Beyond those baseline requirements, what “soft skills” and key personality traits you are looking for ideally? These qualities are less likely to be articulated through the traditional recruiting and hiring process yet are absolutely fundamental to determining the “right fit.” The following example is a list of character traits that ESA helped one client identify in their search for a new chief executive officer: “Humility; respectful of others; strong public relations ‘presence,’ high integrity; trustworthy; exemplary leadership abilities, including success with mentoring/coaching others; ability to ‘turnaround’ organizations and be a change leader; collaborative; not a ‘maverick’; commitment to lifelong learning; curiosity; authenticity; empathy; respected by community, peers, etc.; courage to speak from a place of integrity and empathy.”

Where might you find the kind of person you are seeking? Should this be someone who comes from within your company or industry and has deep knowledge about your products and services?  Or should you be looking for someone from outside your industry with expertise in new business areas who can bring fresh perspective? What would motivate someone to leave their present company to come to work with your organization?

Answering these questions leads to crafting a “best-fit” profile that your company can use to search for any position from receptionist to C-level executive. By scoring candidates based on this profile, you can streamline the process and interview only the highest ranking ones. Just realize that no candidate will ever score 100 percent. One mistake that too many hiring managers make is combining two or three distinct roles and skill sets into one position, expecting to find candidates who have all of these. Since this is not realistic, you have to determine how to weigh criteria to qualify a candidate’s overall “fit.”

Inevitably, the quest to identify the “best fit” also requires a little soul searching. Has your company been successful in the past with attracting the “right” talent? Why is this current position open? Did you lose the previous manager to your competition? Are you offering a competitive compensation package that meets or exceeds your industry’s standard?

Without clear, honest answers to these questions, you cannot define the “right fit” for your company and you are at risk of making a poor, costly hiring decision simply to fill the position. This is what makes professional talent acquisition such a worthwhile investment. Recruiting is never a matter of filling positions; it’s a process, not a transaction, and one that is constantly evolving as your company changes and grows. You must know who you are before you can get the right talent.

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Jennifer Laxton is the president of ESA Consulting, located in Santa Rosa www.esa.com. ESA is a consulting company providing talent acquisition, workforce planning and career coaching services. You can reach her at 707-525-1010 orjklaxton@esa.com.

A: First of all, I want to commend you for having the foresight to think about this. I’ve seen more than a few thriving companies blindsided by the sudden departure of a top executive or senior staff member. Losing such a person ruptures the continuity and relationships that enable your company to perform well. It is a setback in every way: strategically, culturally, and financially.

This is particularly relevant considering that according to recent national survey, 60 percent of employees today say that they are ambivalent about their current jobs and 31 percent of executives are thinking about leaving their current positions.

As we recover from the Great Recession, many employees who felt stuck are finally starting to look around for better opportunities. Not so long ago, fear kept a lot of employees from thinking about a job change or career move. Now, keeping employees engaged is becoming more of a concern for companies as we crawl out of the economic downturn.

Like you, lots of employers are focusing more on executive retention because they recognize the significant cost of losing elite performers and the escalating competition for top talent. This trend suggests that opportunity is already knocking for well-networked executives across all industries and functions, including those who are not currently considering a career move. And because social media has become such an essential tool for connecting online with peers, your executives are much more visible to recruiters now, even if they aren’t actively looking for a new opportunity.

If they are looking, what is driving their restlessness or dissatisfaction? Certainly a competitive salary continues to be the foundation for keeping top talent, but the survey revealed that it’s not all about the money. More business leaders — particularly the up-and-coming next generation ones — are looking at the whole picture: work/life balance, advancement potential, your company’s overall attractiveness in terms of brand and market share, and whether they think they can work well with a prospective new boss and team. It’s true that many executives feel their compensation has not kept pace with increases in cost of living and fixed expenses in recent years, but when it comes to growing their careers, money is not their sole motivation.

Employers have a tendency to direct a lot of attention and resources to their top performers, offering them extra perks, and to the underperformers at the other end of the spectrum, monitoring their deficiencies. What about all those middle performers who make up the vast majority of your workforce? Are you aware that many of them are known as the “popos,” which stands for “passed over and pissed off?”

One of the most telling discoveries from that national survey is that a lot of employees simply feel unappreciated and at times, underutilized and unimportant. If they are unhappy in their current positions, or worse, bored with their jobs, this leads to loss of respect for their bosses and co-workers. They basically do just enough to get by and become, in essence, “retired on the job.” All of this has a detrimental effect on morale and ultimately, your company’s performance or, ability to deliver.

Beyond retaining your top performers, perhaps the larger question is: what can you do as an employer to encourage your middle performers to become top performers and to inspire your underperformers to want to improve? Here are a few recommendations.

Check in with your employees on a regular basis to find out whether they are happy. One method is to conduct “stay interviews” in contrast to “exit interviews.” Ask your employees what they like about their jobs, what they do not like, and what changes they would like to see. Ask them what could entice them to leave the company. Do this on a consistent basis and use their feedback to make adjustments to your company’s management style, work environment, skills training, career development opportunities, etc.

– Remember to say “thank you” to your employees regularly and/or more frequently for their efforts and contributions. Recognize and celebrate milestones with them.

– Sit down with them once or twice a year to discuss their career plans. What can you offer to help them develop professionally?

If you are concerned or skeptical about investing the time these suggestions represent, consider that the departure of just one key executive or senior level staff member can cost your company as much as $500,000.

Recruiting your own best people is one of the top retention tools available to you.

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Jennifer Laxton is the president of ESA Consulting, located in Santa Rosa, www.esa.com. ESA is a consulting company providing talent acquisition, workforce planning and career coaching services. You can reach her at 707-217-4535 orjklaxton@esa.com.