Workforce Planning at Every Level

"There needs to be a significant shift in who’s in charge of driving the labour market. What industry needs is a better fundamental understanding, and then a systematic approach to planning. Then industry will be able to drive the direction of the labour market" (Julie Sloan).

Julie Sloan of JSM management consulting is a well regarded Australian expert in the field of workforce planning.  Author of the book ‘An introduction to Workforce Planning – are you ready for crunch time’?, as well as the principal author of the first ‘Guidelines on Workforce Planning’ for Standards Australia launched in April 2008. 

I asked Sloan how she felt about the call for a National Workforce Planning Strategy.

Sloan "strongly supports" the idea.  "It is vital that this issue is high on the agenda now, with a view to having national standards in place by 2009".

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Water samples taken in the patch from the research vessel Alguita in 2001 revealed the presence of six times more plastic than plankton.

Not long ago I was horrified to hear about something named The Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Claims there was an expanse of garbage floating off the coast of California that was "twice the size of Texas".

Surely, in this age of satellite imaging, if such an abomination existed there would be pictures. I looked and didn't find any.

In the absence of any photographs of a floating garbage pile, I hoped it was just a beat-up. Unfortunately all further enquiries have led me to understand that the real story behind the name is much worse than anything I had imagined.