photo by: Joselyn King
Erikka Storch, left, external affairs manager for Appalachian Power, and Marshall County Administrator Betsy Frohnapfel participate in a panel discussion during the Women for Economic Leadership Development conference Friday on the Wheeling University campus.
WHEELING — Experienced employees are getting older, and it’s getting tougher to hire and retain new workers, local job providers say.
Employers in health care, child care, government and development spoke on the issue during a panel discussion Friday at a conference sponsored by Women For Economic Leadership Development (WELD) at the Wheeling Hospital Operations Support Center building at Wheeling University.
Former Delegate Erikka Storch, R-Ohio, now the external affairs manager for Appalachian Power, moderated the discussion.
On the panel were Marshall County Administrator Betsy Frohnapfel; Josh Jefferson, president of the Regional Economic Development Partnership (RED-P); Jamie Remp, executive director of Kings Daughters Child Care Center;and Douglass Harrison, North Region President for WVU Medicine,
Harrison suggested the biggest employment challenge facing West Virginia is that the state continues to lead the nation in having the lowest number of those eligible to work actually participating in the workforce.
He also noted how hospitals look at employment now is much different than they did five years ago, and noted WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital is employing more and more traveling nurses to fill job vacancies.
Harrison indicated that likely has an effect on overall patient care.
“We’ve had some exodus from our workforce, and we bring on travelers who are not committed to our community – not committed to our hospital,” he explained. “It has changed the dynamic of care delivery. Those folks are in it for a paycheck. They will follow basic rules and protocols that we outline, but they are basically there for the paycheck and then they are out.
“That has certainly changed our workforce. How do you integrate those people into an existing workforce that has committed to living in a community and providing care?”
Jefferson expounded on Harrison’s words, and he spoke about employees needing to be “adaptable” to the culture in a workplace.
Jefferson explained he has discovered that when employees feel they can have a say in their workplace – whether it is a small or large business – they are more willing to do more training and take on more jobs. This is a commonality at both small and large companies, according to Jefferson.
“If you can get that employee to have ownership of the company … have the employee be engaged and be part of the company, that’s part of being adaptable,” he said. “You bring that person on, and give them some opportunity to have some opportunity to say what is good for the company is good for us.
“From the employer’s standpoint, there needs to be some shared benefit to those employees. If they buy in, they become more adaptable if you need them to have different skillsets or have different training.”
Remp said she has seen many employees love what they do at their job – but they don’t necessarily love the job.
“We all don’t love going to work everyday, but I love children and am very passionate about what I do,” she continued. “My kids are at the center of what I do. We’re very passionate about longevity at our center … But with everything we do, it is hard to get the buy-in from our staff.
“You have to love children. You can’t not love children and work with us.”
Frohnapfel said she believes those entering the workforce today are in need of more soft skills – most notably the ability to communicate and listen to people.
“People don’t know how to have conversations. People don’t know how to deliver messages,” she continued. “People don’t know how to listen. People always hear, but they don’t know how to listen.
“It took us a year to hire a custodian because we could not find somebody we thought we could let loose in the three buildings the county owns to clean. They assured us they could do it on their own … It was really difficult and eye opening, so I think those soft skills are needed.”
Frohnapfel suggested mentorship programs might keep young people on the job for the long-term. She doesn’t understand, though, why young employees continually want to bounce from one job to the next and don’t stay with one employer very long.
“Job hopping from job to job like the younger people do – I don’t know yet what it does for them, but it doesn’t do anything for us as employers,” she said. “If we can nurture those soft skills and nurture ownership in our employees, that would go a long way.”