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Section 4: Human Resources and Diversity
The fourth section of the questionnaire asks respondents their opinions about the work ethics of Indiana’s labor force, the demand and availability of specific types of workers, employee-related areas of concern, and workplace diversity.
The first question of this section, question #14, asks for evaluation of several specific elements of the state labor pool’s work ethics (Figure 13).
14. Thinking of the labor pool available to your company, please indicate how strong you believe the following work ethics are in the labor pool:
Executives in this survey rate the labor pool’s work ethics as slightly positive, with virtually no difference in the perceived levels of “ambition,” “loyalty,” “motivation,” or “enthusiasm.” Respondents do rate the labor force as being a bit higher on the attribute “hard-working.”
The next two questions ask about the demand for and availability of specific types of workers (Figure 14).
15. In the next five years, how much of a demand do you anticipate your company will have
for the following types of workers?
16. How would you rate the availability of the following types of workers?.
The responses to question #15 regarding demand appear on the horizontal axis while responses to question #16 regarding availability appear on the vertical axis. The presentation of responses to both questions in a single graph provides the ability to simultaneously assess perceptions of demand and availability. However, it is worth emphasizing that the questions are somewhat asymmetrical in that question #15 asks about demand for a type of worker by the respondent’s organization specifically, not demand for that type of worker in general, whereas question #16 implies a more general availability for that type of worker.
The diagonal line represents an exact match between perceptions of demand and availability. Worker types above the line would represent those for which perceptions of availability exceed perceptions of demand, while those below the line indicate the opposite.
It should be apparent that availability for all types of workers is perceived to be relatively high, ranging from means of about 4.3 (bio-tech/life sciences) to about 5.5 (manufacturing). However, there is significantly wider variability in perceived demand, ranging from a low of about 2.0 (bio-tech/life sciences) to a high of about 5.1 (sales/marketing).
For the three types near the diagonal line—administrative/clerical, information technology, and sales/marketing—we may conclude that perceived demand and perceived availability are similar among the respondents. That is, there is perceived to be a “match” between supply and demand.
There is a cluster of three types slightly above the line: para professional, skilled trade, and engineering. For these three types of workers, respondents believe availability will exceed their organization’s demand.
For bio-tech/life sciences workers and manufacturing workers, demand by respondents to this survey is thought to be relatively low while perceived availability is expected to be relatively high. This apparent “mismatch” may be due to a variety of factors including a potential under-representation in our sample of organizations that are likely to employ either of these types of workers. In other words, one should definitely not conclude that within the state as a whole, there will be a surplus of manufacturing or bio-tech/life sciences workers.
The next question, question #17, asks executives to rate their level of concern with each of several issues that might impact the organization and its workforce (Figure 15).
17. Please indicate how concerned you are about the following issues, as they impact your company and its workforce.
Respondents express a wide range of levels of concern with these six issues. The top issue is the acquisition of management talent, a perennial issue of concern throughout the business world. The level of concern does seem to vary by industry, with respondents from health care and logistics expressing higher levels of concern.
The next three issues, “ job satisfaction,” “loyalty in the workforce,” and “turnover or attrition,” all seem to be related to retaining workers. These three issues all have mean scores above the scale mid-point indicating a high level of concern.
The final two issues, “finding skilled trade workers” and “immigration,” are both relatively low on the concern scale. “Finding skilled trade workers” may be low either because the organizations represented in the survey do not require many skilled trade workers, or because the executives expect there to be a large supply of such workers (Figure 14). “Immigration” does not seem to be an issue of concern to these respondents perhaps because it is not seen as a workplace issue by them.
The final question in this section addresses diversity (Figure 16).
18. How much do you agree or disagree with the following statements about diversity?
Respondents express moderate agreement with the top three statements, and slight disagreement with the two lower statements. Collectively, the top three statements seem to indicate respondents believe Indiana organizations are making some progress in terms of diversity, but that they still have a way to go in terms of minority representation at upper levels of management and general perceptions of minority workers. Executives seem to believe it is not easy to attract and retain a diverse workforce in Indiana, and that the situation in Indiana may be slightly worse than in other states in terms of having a diverse workforce.
