Employers across many industries continue to experience difficulty finding, attracting and maintaining talent to create value and grow businesses. In fact, next to rising costs, the biggest complaint from American businesses is the shortage of workers.1 While the reasons for this labor shortage are many and varied, the most vital question the energy industry needs to ask and get answered is how to promote itself as an employer with tremendous opportunity, both short- and long-term, for both established employees with decades of experience as well as newer, younger professionals looking to jumpstart meaningful careers.

Energy employers first need to consider today’s employment challenges from multiple and different perspectives.2 It is no longer enough to post job ads and hope for and wait for applications to come streaming in. Instead, we must recognize that younger professionals WANT and NEED: 1) the promise of career advancement, 2) new technologies that they can leverage to drive growth, and 3) ongoing education and training to promote skill set development. In essence, it’s just as important, if not more so, for the energy employer to present itself in such a way that attracts new talent because, ultimately, the prospective employees are now the ones interviewing you!

It is also important to recognize that “brain drain” – defined as, due to employee attrition, the ongoing and increasing loss of knowledge, understanding, and expertise specific to and vital for the energy industry – is a real trend and must be addressed. The energy industry is staffed with extremely knowledgeable and skilled professionals, and as these professionals age out of the workforce and retire, the gap they leave behind is only getting bigger. In fact, some workers are leaving the industry altogether to join other, more lucrative or innovative fields.3

One of the key things the energy industry can do to attract and retain new talent is to increase the use of the latest technologies, including automation4 and its application throughout a “day in the life of” its energy professionals. From compliance to cybersecurity, and asset management to forecasting, the use of software automation enables employees to learn and become skilled at the implementation and use of new technologies, create immediate and long-term value for their employers, and focus more on strategic level issues and decisions as part of their responsibilities. And, with these kinds of employment and opportunities, a career in energy becomes sexy again.

One news source reported, “Without action, energy employers face a prolonged or even deepened skills shortage. As tight as the labor market is now, it could get tighter. We found that 43% of energy workers are considering exiting the industry altogether within the next five years.5 A focus on multiple and varied technology use, including the use of software automation, enables energy employers and the industry itself to retain existing and very valuable employees, as well as attract new generations of employees who will help energy “power up” for the ever increasing demands placed upon it.