Worried about a brain drain?

Organizations are starting to ramp up for a wave of boomer retirements. That’s according to a joint poll released yesterday by the SHRM and AARP.

U.S. employers are focused on closing the skills gap that will be left when Baby Boomers retire.  They’re also working on employee benefit programs aimed at retaining and recruiting older workers.

Nearly three-quarters (72%) of HR professionals described the loss of talented older workers as problematic for their organizations.

In response, nearly half have increased training and cross-training efforts (45%), and roughly a third have developed succession planning (38%) or hired retired employees as consultants or temporary workers (30%).  Others are offering flexible work arrangements (27%) or designing part-time positions to attract older workers (24%).

HR professionals were also asked human resource professionals to identify the greatest skills gaps between workers age 31 and younger compared with workers age 50 and older.

Approximately half said writing, grammar and spelling were the top “basic” skills observed in older workers but lacking in younger employees.  Roughly the same number cited professionalism and work ethic as the biggest gap among “applied” skills.

Retirements by the Number. Data from the Pew Research Center indicating that 10,000 Baby Boomers will reach age 65 every day during the next two decades. Already, in 2011, the oldest of the 77 million Baby Boomers began turning age 65—the traditional retirement age.

Strategic Planning Lacking.  Despite the proactive steps being taken, the SHRM-AARP poll finds that many U.S. organizations are largely unprepared. Roughly 71% of those polled still have not conducted a strategic workforce planning assessment to analyze the impact of workers 50 and older who will leave their organizations.

AARP offers a free online Workforce Assessment Tool to assess how retiring workers will affect your organization and how certain programs can attract qualified employees of all ages.