Attracting and retaining talent
by Sasenarine Singh
I AM very convinced that one of the scarce resources for the future is talent. Business and government leaders in Guyana are finding it increasingly hard, as their business grows and need for technocrats grows, to find a number of people they need who are talented. Talented people need to have a sort of an instinctive understanding of how to effectively market a product or service, and have that sense of open-mindedness and desire to experiment and try new things, and all that. If we look at the job market in Guyana deeply, we would realise that talented people are leaving the country or those that remain are recycled to keep the wheels of production rolling and the offices afloat. When I look back, more than half of the students from the Queen's College class of 1989, which I was a part of, are out of Guyana. When you think about succession you wonder where is the second tier to replace the Yesu Persauds when they decide to call it a day. This is a real issue that needs to be addressed by the government, the private sector and all other stakeholders of our Guyanese society. Young people are suckers for opportunity and the stakeholders need to intensify their effort at creating more opportunities for them at home so that the lure of going abroad can be minimised. In America, there is so much opportunity for young people now - the world of internets and startups and dot-coms and 28-year-olds making US$50 million overnight and all that. This is the predicament and challenges Third World Countries, like Guyana, are facing and we must find ways to figure out how to keep talented people long enough in Guyana until they are ready to become CEOs. Most talented young Guyanese have tons of opportunity in the world. In developed countries these people have the opportunities to go to dot-com and other cutting edge companies and make decisions that ordinarily they wouldn't get to make in Guyana until they were 15 years into their career. Our leaders would have to be more creative these days about how to find these talented resources and make them want to give you a part of their brain and their thinking on terms favourable to both parties. There are 24-year-olds coming out of graduate school that are far brighter and have a far greater perspective of the world than anybody did in the 70s and 80s. There's got to be a way to get these people into some traditional activities, such as the public service. It's a question of how you attract that talent. And then if you attract it, how you retain it. All stakeholders will have the responsibility to do this if we are to intensify our efforts at nation building. That is why the dynamic decision of President Bharrat Jagdeo to appoint some young and talented Permanent Secretaries was in keeping with the world trends - talent must be rewarded. Anything else could lead to further marginalisation in this new global village. Just think of the calibre of CEOs and leaders that can be created if talented young people can be given the opportunity to function in responsible positions today. They're going to be better trained than any university could ever train them because the university of life and work has that special technique to produce useful experts once the person is gainfully utilised.  Follow the goings-on in Guyana
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