As many of you know, for the last dozen years I’ve been involved with overseas Rotary projects putting technology and training into schools in developing countries. Maybe it’s because my mom was a teacher but I feel education is the answer to economic growth and income equality (without taking from the successful to give to others).
It’s not just overseas. Look at these two statements.
- Business owner one – $25 million in sales, about 100 employees, “The only thing holding back our growth is finding capable employees.”
- Business owner two – fast growing manufacturing company, “We can’t find good people. I lot of them can’t pass a background check.”
It’s tough because more and more jobs require:
- Some kind of technical skill. Just ask the owner of a small machine shop who can’t find people to program the CNC machines.
- People skills. Even in this technology centric world, those with people skills always find a way to be successful.
- Problem solving. Technology, robots, and similar don’t solve all problems. In fact, they create their own set of problems.
What I’m saying is, the more emphasis we put on educating (young) people the better off we all will be. They’ll make better choices, add to the economy, and create a better place to live.
A recent news story covered apprentice programs in the construction industry. Those disappeared for a long-time. I guess it’s time a lot of things like this come back.
“Mothers say to me, ‘My son is 34 and he’s not getting married’; I don’t know what to do. So I tell them, ‘Don’t iron his shirts anymore.'” Pope Francis
* With apologies to The Kinks (Where have all the good times gone) and Paula Cole (Where have all the cowboys gone).