Capitalism and Feudal Employment

From an email sent to a friend yesterday:

Getting work today is a bit of a catch 22, isn't it? Big firms have their internal hiring mechanisms and tend to be pretty good at proactively finding talent to meet their HR needs. It's the small-to-medium employers and franchisees that are the best bet for people without inside contacts to find work.
The problem is, these employers aren't necessarily the ones willing to take any risk by bringing on folk they aren't already familiar with. Plus, given the glut of bodies on the market, there's no particular incentive for them to hire up; the competition is pretty much one-sided in their favour. It's the students out of school who will work for relatively low wages and longer hours that are more likely to land jobs - people with experience, some age and familial responsibilities are the new expectant mothers in how they're being stigmatized.

In the defense of these small/medium employers, it's hard to invest in highly qualified/experienced labour for the lower-wage positions they can afford; employers can only assume that these types of folk will leave as soon as something better comes along, leaving them in the lurch after having invested in training. This doesn't help the qualified job-seekers desperate to find means to feed, clothe and house their families, though.

Crafty employees take advantage of this reality and turn to a kind of occupational feudalism; they might offer their space and brand to prospective employees, but the expectation is that those people have to create and sell their own business, with the would-be employer taking their tithe. If these people don't have the skill or experience to close a deal, their indebtedness mounts, leading to an emotional indentured servitude.

For those who do land salaried/contact positions, how often are they being told that they must develop new lines of business, convince employers they have value, then create products/services and sell them - but without adding risk to the employer's brand?

This is what an increasingly polraized and competitive market is doing - it allows for the most aggressive to get ahead and dominate those who are less so, regardless of where skills lie.  Think Rob Ford.  The incentive here is not to care about anything but one's own interests. It's the same in politics - Parties are circling the wagons and putting internal partisan interests ahead of social interests, resulting in an increasingly fractured society. Ayn Rand would be proud.

It's no wonder we have an occupational mental health crisis.

The way out of this workplace morass isn't more brow beating or straight-up charity, but the provision of opportunity, mentorship, collaboration and accomodation. Leaders, Parties, Government, the Private Sector, companies and employers have to realize it's their action, not inaction, that will make or break our economy. Hoarding resources is just fueling a tragedy of the commons.

This kind of pro-social approach isn't going to happen on its own. Lord knows Flaherty has had no luck shaming the Private Sector into hiring. Shame, fear and micro-management lead people to close off, not expand. It takes hopeful, inspirational leadership to do that.

It's promising that the Federal + Ontario leadership races are shaping up to be hopeful affairs, but they need to add incentive for business to follow suit.

This is where the real opportunity lies; there is more than enough evidence out there about how you can motivate innovation and increase employee productivity through environmental and mental health supports. It's killing two birds with one stone, adding a solution to the mental health crisis and positioning the workforce for success in the knowledge economy all at the same time.

The big question is - do our would-be leaders see this?