If you feel like there are fewer workers to be found these days, rest assured, you are correct.

A decrease in the rate of births, declining since the 1970s, coupled with decreasing labour market participation, more job openings, a shortfall of immigrants, and a surge of retirements, is creating a workforce problem that is hard to ignore.

Although we continue to experience the challenge, many of us still cling to the flawed idea that continuing to do what we've always done will somehow, some way, finally yield positive results. Let's take a look at the data, create some urgency around why you need to make some changes and then talk about potential new and effective approaches to recruiting.

The numbers don't lie

We need over 2 million more people in the labour force to recover to the 63.4 percent labour force participation rate we had in February 2020, just prior to the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. We also need 175 million more people in the labour force to just bring us back to the number of people who were working at that time.

The labour force participation rate is only a measure of currently employed individuals and people actively seeking work (unemployed). If you're sitting on the sidelines, as an estimated 40 percent of our total population is right now, and you've chosen not to work or have just given up looking for a job, you are no longer being counted as unemployed. So, what are the most common reasons people are on the sidelines? The major ones are as follows: retirement, school, family caretaking, and being unable to work.

Employment opportunities are plentiful

The job market is currently booming, with millions more jobs available than there were prior to COVID-19. As I write this, there are just over 10 million job openings (an increase of 3 million jobs from February 2020).

The takeaways here should be evident. Your opening is not only competing with others in your industry but also with all the interests, skills, and talents one person has that overlap with every open position. There are many more opportunities to change career paths and just try something new. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average term workers stay with their respective job is four years. However, for those younger than 35, that average drops to 2.8 years.

Immigration may not be a long-term solution

Many companies are looking to immigration to help offset their labour challenges. It is a hedged bet, however, and one that may help only in the short run. Plus, there's the fact that net international migration is decreasing.

Birth rates in many countries people emigrate from are slowing, and unemployment is low. The onset of COVID-19 and the advancement of restrictive immigration policies resulted in a sudden drop in immigration numbers. At the beginning of 2022, the U.S. was running 2 million immigrants short of the trend taking place prior to 2019, the restaffing of immigration offices has allowed us to make up much of the lost ground. However, the past two years have shown the fragility of planning on immigration to close workforce gaps.

Retirements can't be overlooked

The other workforce pressure we find ourselves experiencing is the growing retirement rates. Quite simply, it is something many of us knew was coming. However, it is also something for which many of us have not adequately prepared.

The combined forces of fewer people, more jobs, uncertain immigration, and a high level of retirements created a perfect environment for changing how we look at recruiting. After all, as we have learned, doing what we have always done is not even getting us what we use to get.

Recruitment efforts must change

Let's approach recruitment with two ideas in mind: who's available and willing to work, and of that group, who's not represented in our workforce. This can be easily done by segmenting the workforce into population pools and determining the availability of each of the population pools. If you recruit from the mainstream pools you always use, you recruit from the pool with the maximum competition.