One of those stories that make you go, yeah, darnit, those kids should shape up.
You’re standing at a checkout counter, ready to pay, and the twentysomething behind the register is talking on her cell phone. So you wait, and wait, and wait, and when the clerk finally finishes her conversation, she offers not an apology, but a grimace that suggests you’ve interrupted.Sound familiar? It has a name: the Service Gap.
Urrgh. Bet she has tattoos. And an exagerrated sense of self-esteem, courtesy our sociotherapeutic school system.
Bet she even responds to your thank you with an affectless “no problem.”
Grousing aside, the U.S. economy suffers from a “skills gap,” the lack of employees with the skills to succeed in a high-tech (manufacturing) economy. If the technical skills are missing, and then the basic social skills are missing, what the heck’s left?
Robots. Courteous, obliging robots.
December 30th, 2007 on 12:29 am
As always, there is no service gap at NAM, especially when it comes to ShopFloor.org. But, when worrying about the skills gap, let’s not forget about the nearly 250,000 courageous and well-trained men and women who complete their service to our military every year. Military.com has a terrific web page for employers looking for top-notch talent. http://www.military.com/Careers/EmployerPage/0,14544,,00.html
My collegue, Cal Cunningham, is serving his second tour of duty in Iraq and is blogging about his experiences. His writing gives a pretty good insight into the quality of the talent pool.
http://thefocalpoints.blogspot.com/