 |
|
Back to Articles/Press
Panelists at ALA's Workforce Summit Exchange Solutions to Growing Labor Shortage
Panelist: Bio Tech Industry Needs Second G.I. Bill to Address Labor Issues
CHICAGO – In much the same way the initial G.I. bill helped spur the development of the post-World War II economy, a second G.I. bill is needed now to ensure that the American life sciences industry remains globally competitive, according to one panelist at ALA's Emerging Trends in the Laboratory Technology Workforce Summit. The summit was part of LabAutomation2006, the world's leading conference and exhibition on laboratory science and emerging technologies held from January 21-25 in Palm Springs, Calif.
David Finegold, professor of strategy and organization at the Keck Graduate Institute of Applied Sciences in Claremont, Calif. recited an appropriate passage from Tom Friedman's book "The World is Flat" to describe the global economy.
"When I was a kid, my mom use to tell me to eat my peas because there were starving children in China and India. When I talk to my 10 and 12 year olds I tell them to do their homework because kids in China and India are hungry for their jobs."
Finegold said the country needs a second G.I. bill to ensure American workers are equipped with the basic skills needed to compete in a knowledge-based economy.
The panel drew bio tech experts from academic, industry, government, and human resource areas to discuss the issues and trends for the labor force in the automated and technological laboratory of today and tomorrow.
Pearl Freier, president of Cambridge BioPartners, Cambridge, Mass. an executive search firm and specialist in workforce strategy, stressed that bio tech companies need to be more efficient when recruiting potential employees.
"Companies are taking six months to more than a year to fill a position that should take only two-to-three months if they had built a pipeline of candidates along the way," she said. Freier stressed that the bio tech industry needs more industry leadership on best hiring practices and salary surveys.
"Laboratory automation is such a broad field that it is really difficult for employers to have a sense of salaries and when students graduate, they don't really have a sense of which companies to target," she said.
Mary Glanville, vice president, Human Capital, Anadys Pharmaceutical, San Diego, recommended that other bio tech communities look at the Biotech Employee Development Coalition (BEDC) as a potential model for addressing labor pool problems.
"The BEDC was developed to allow smaller companies the opportunity to develop better benefits to attract and retain better employees," she said, putting them on a more even playing field with larger pharmaceutical companies.
Glanville also said BEDC provides five, $5,000 scholarships per year to interns who have worked in the bio tech industry and have been nominated by their supervisors.
"The scholarship allows them to continue in the life sciences industry and provide for that next pool of candidates that are going to be available to our organizations," she said.
Elaine Johnson, director of Bio-Link, the National Science Foundation Advanced Technological Education Center for Biotechnology at City College of San Francisco, said that community colleges offer a potential solution to workforce shortages in some bio tech positions. Johnson explained that her college has developed a program called Bridge to Bio Technology that provides math, language, and hands-on skills for people who didn't learn these skills in the schools they attended.
"For example, a large group of Russian students have benefited from Bio-Link's Bridge to Bio Technology Program. They have a lot of math and science skills, but their English is limited," she said. Johnson also pointed out that while many of the people in this program have a M.D. or Ph.D.. 30 percent of the students have no science background at all.
Mark Cafferty, director of workforce development for BIOCOM, the San Diego California affiliate for the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO), suggested that companies can also play a significant role, helping to tailor educational programs to the needs of employees.
"When Genentech came to San Diego, we did not have a community college system that was training manufacturing workers. Genentech invested in building a state-of-the-art laboratory at a local community college and ended up recruiting many of these students into these manufacturing jobs," he said.
All panelists agreed there is a growing need for the technical work force in the laboratory. Freier summed up this situation by challenging employers to develop solutions to address the labor shortage we face and to bridge the gaps that exist between the advertised job descriptions and the actual qualities and credentials of the successful employees in those jobs. They, as well as human resources professionals will need to work more closely with academic institutions to forecast their hiring needs and to build a pipeline of talent. She also stressed that it will be essential for human resources professionals to work with directors in the laboratory field to better understand what personnel issues are important.
"ALA helped bring these issues to the forefront and with their new career initiatives have taken a leadership role in helping the industry develop solutions," she said.
Back to Articles/Press
|
| |
|
|
