The Secret Behind An Interchangeable Workforce

Posted on May 13, 2010 | 2 comments

How many times have you been hit with the following scenario?

Your business needs to expand so you decide to hire a new team member. After many hours of interviews you find who you consider to be the best possible candidate. You hire her. And then the fun really begins.

For the first three to six months, your work life actually gets harder because you’re doing two jobs. You have to take care of your normal responsibilities but you also are training your new hire. You look forward to the day when your new staff member is fully up and running on her own.

Finally, the transition point arrives when she understands how your company works and she has plugged into daily operations. You are now free to focus solely on your own responsibilities. Whew, finally!

The next day you head into the office like any other day. Knock, knock. The knock at your door is your now self-sustaining team member who you have spent months to train. She informs you that she has decided to take another opportunity. BAM! Overnight you are back to square one.

Does this story sound familiar?

The other day I was waiting at the airline terminal to board my flight. Two pilots were already standing at the door to the jet way when a crew of flight attendants walked up. The pilots and the crew spent a few minutes introducing themselves to one another and making small conversation.

In only a few more minutes, this team of pilots and crew who didn’t even know each other would be transporting people 35,000 feet in the air across 1,000 miles. How is this possible? How can pilots, crew, and airplanes be interchanged with one another yet you lose a single team member and are forced to start the 3-6 month hiring and training process all over? The answer is systems.

The airline industry relies on systems in which the workforce can be interchanged. Yes, there is extensive training of pilots and crew members but it is the underlying pre-flight, flight, and post-flight systems that enable consistency, repeatability, and an interchangeable workforce to be utilized.