Mind the (mindset) gap!

Over the past half dozen years, there's been an enormous amount of hand-wringing over the looming shortage of talent in the logistics and supply chain profession. So much so that it's hard to recall a major industry conference that hasn't had some manner of presentation on issues surrounding what's come to be known as the "workforce of the future."

Let's put aside for a moment the conundrum of a lack of qualified bodies for logistics and supply chain-related jobs at a time of historically high unemployment among young adults. It would seem to be more an issue of raising awareness of career tracks and compensation levels than a shortage of candidates. But that's a debate for another day. Instead, let's focus for a moment on understanding the young people who will constitute tomorrow's workforce. What's their perspective? Where are they coming from? How differently do they view things than, say, a 45-year-old supply chain professional does?

One of the best places to find answers to such questions is the annual "Mindset List," which has been published just before Labor Day every year since 1998 by two staff members at Beloit College in Beloit, Wis. According to its authors, the annual list is an attempt to "provid[e] a look at the cultural touchstones that shape the lives of students entering college this fall." Originally created as a tongue-in-cheek reminder to Beloit's faculty to beware of dated references, the Mindset List has evolved over the past 15 years into what the authors call an "internationally monitored catalog of the changing worldview of each new college generation."

So as members of the class of 2017 (and potential constituents of the "workforce of the future") take their seats and begin their college careers, here are just a few of the observations the folks at Beloit College have shared about these students, mostly born in 1995:

• While they've grown up with a World Trade Organization, they have never known an Interstate Commerce Commission.
• Dean Martin, Mickey Mantle, and Jerry Garcia have always been dead.
• As they started to crawl, so did the news across the bottom of the television screen.
• Eminem and LL Cool J could just as well show up at parents' weekend as be the headliners at a springtime campus concert.
• Having a chat has seldom involved talking.
• They could always get rid of their outdated toys on eBay.
• They are more familiar with the term PayPal than pen pal.
• Rites of passage have more to do with having their own cell phone and Skype accounts than with getting a driver's license and car.
• A tablet is no longer something you take in the morning.
• Plasma has never been just a bodily fluid.
• Spray paint has never been legally sold in Chicago.
• With GPS, they have never needed directions to get someplace, just an address.
• Java has never been just a cup of coffee.
• They have never attended a concert in a smoke-filled arena.
• Don Shula has always been a fine steak house.
• Their favorite feature films have always been largely, if not totally, computer generated.
• They have never seen the Bruins at Boston Garden, the Trailblazers at Memorial Coliseum, the Supersonics in Key Arena, or the Canucks at the Pacific Coliseum.
• Washington, D.C., tour buses have never been able to drive in front of the White House.
• Their parents' car CD player is so ancient that it is embarrassing.

Pay attention to them, and get to know them. These college freshmen are a big part of our future. In fact, some of them just might end up working for you someday.