This is something that many of us older folks don’t get, but we should be thinking about much more. I think many of us who work in the technology, legal, or eDiscovery sectors can lose sight of how demanding careers in these industries are. We are quick to scoff at the idea that we should maybe figure out how to make them a little less demanding, or at least more friendly for diverse candidates who can’t simply work all night, or be on call 24 hours a day for our clients because that’s just the way it’s done in our industry. We tend to think that because all of the jobs in the industry are like that, we don’t have to worry about competitors offering something else to our employees.

We are not considering how many people we drive out of the industry completely, especially young people. There is a staffing shortage in these industries, and the companies struggling to find enough talent are not losing out to some other mysterious company in the industry who can pick and choose, we’re all in the same boat because the boat is leaking people every single day. People are making the choice to do something else because what we offer isn’t cutting it.