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This paper discusses the pending "boomer brain drain" that will hit IT departments when Baby Boomer professionals begin retiring in a few years. This impact may be especially strong in organizations where older and complex "legacy" systems continue in operation as key elements of the corporate technology infrastructure. The potential roles of social software (e.g., blogs) and "expertise management systems" are discussed as ways to ameliorate some of the potential problems created by these impending retirements.

1:1 magazine had a piece about the importance of speed in winning customer loyalty.
   
 I was struck by one comment from their survey in particular:

Seventy percent of respondents want knowledgeable and personalized service, and nearly 70 percent say that first-contact resolution, whether by phone, email, or the Web is also a primary driver of customer satisfaction

I have blogged before about how improved decision-making can make your staff seem more knowledgeable and how it can personalize service. Indeed, speed is one of the dimensions of decision yield for this reason (although the emphasis in Decision Yield is on precision, consistency, agility, speed and cost as a set). First-contact resolution also requires decision automation - only decision automation gives you the control you need while still empowering front-line staff with decision-making power. You get strategic alignment along with front-line automation and speed while ensuring consistency and precision across all your touchpoints. 

Good CRM and good self-service need EDM. 

Workers are human beings. That may seem obvious to you, but because of that simple fact, we've got decades of behavioral science research that can help us understand what they want.
   
 Here are ten things that workers want from you.  

They want to know what you expect. If they don't know, they'll either guess or decide not to act until they know. Neither of those is a choice you want them to make. Lay out your expectations individually and for the group.  

They want you to be reasonable. Your workers want you to set reasonable performance targets and give them the resources they need to hit those targets.  

They want to know how they're doing. So tell them. Give your workers frequent feedback on their performance and how it compares to expectations.  

They want to know how to do better. Tell them that, too. Your feedback should help your workers meet the expectations that you set. Remember that lots of small course corrections are almost always better and more effective than fewer, bigger corrections.  

Workers want you to treat them. Behavior and performance should have consequences. The two should match up. Good behavior and performance should generate good consequences. Poor behavior or performance should generate negative consequences. Consistently. 

They want work that is interesting. For some people, the challenge of doing excellent work is enough. For others, the specific job they have is interesting. For others, you have to help make things interesting by helping people grow and develop and by setting up competitions and comparisons.  

They want work that is meaningful. Tell the people who work for you how their work helps the team succeed. Tell them how the team's work helps the company succeed.  

They want to work in a safe and congenial place. Workers want to be physically safe. They also want to be safe from harassment or unreasonable demands or punishments.  

They want you to deal with the slackers and attitude poisoners. You're the boss, so it's your responsibility. Identify the malcontents and malingerers. Give them the opportunity to mend their ways. If they don't, get rid of them.  

They want as much control as possible over their work life. Give people as much freedom as possible to make the decisions about how and when and where they'll work.  

Take a look back over the list. Most of the items probably seem like common sense. They are. Because we're human, too, we probably want the same things.  

Most of the items probably seem easy to do. They are. There's nothing on the list that requires massive effort or significant budget expenditure.  

Most supervisors will do some of these things easily and naturally. The trick is to do them all, day after day, with unremitting diligence. Then you get a cumulative effect. Taken together these simple acts can transform your team into a place where morale is high and the work is excellent.