Employees Are Different Today. Embrace It.

Employees today are different than they used to be. People are different. It used to be that employees remained with a single employer for years and years. Even a lifetime. Heck, employers used to be around for years and years, too.

But things are different now. The pace of change is ferocious. Companies come and go. Employees come and go. Employees have incredible mobility. They aren't afraid to change employers. This is characterized by many as a lack of loyalty, rooted in a basic lack of character. I disagree.

Employees are just as loyal today as they were 50 years ago. And their loyalties remain where they have always been - to themselves and their families. But in the old days, staying loyal to an employer often paid off! The ticket to comfort was sticking with a big company and earning a pension. Today, with companies rising and falling more quickly, and companies ready and willing to lay off people to respond to competition or an economic downturn, employees must be much more careful, much more selfish.

Tom Peters, author of In Search of Excellence and "father of the post-modern corporation" (according to the Los Angeles Times), urges us in his new book Re-Imagine! to accept that employees are different today. So embrace it. Don't fight it.

Your task, as an employer, is to attract talented individuals, now called knowledge workers. They are less employees and more businesses in and of themselves. They have certain specialized skills and experiences and are available for hire under certain terms and conditions. When we need their particular skill and contribution, our task is to engage them on an arm's-length basis. Each party gets what it needs. When the project is over, both go their separate ways. If the project is ongoing, a long-term relationship can be negotiated.

On the locker room door of the New York Jets, Bill Parsells placed his motto, which he asks his players to live by, and says that all "A players":

Blame No One.

Expect Nothing.

Do Something.

As an owner, you can lament the quality of today's labor force and the lack of employer loyalty. But the truth is, all employers pull from the same pool. Your job is to become better than your competitors at identifying, attracting, retaining and using talent.

So stop blaming and expecting. Do something.