The much-lauded federal retirement tsunami is upon us. More than a third of career federal employees will to be eligible to collect their end-of-career benefits by September 2017, compared to just 14 percent at the same time in 2012.
The impending knowledge gap is going to be tremendous — thousands of career feds leaving the government and taking their institutional knowledge with them. We have to find innovative ways to stem the tide.
One way to do that? Training.
The White House agrees. Three years ago Congress and President Obama implemented a “phased-retirement” program that allows federal employees to work part-time after the age of retirement while receiving partial annuities and continuing to pay toward their benefits. Those workers would be required to to spend at least 20 percent of their part-time employment on mentoring their replacements. But now time is running out.
To address this issue, we need to build a network of learning in government where future leaders are inspired to collaborate across agencies and divisions.
In order to help enable learning, GovLoop, in collaboration with agency level professional networking groups like NextGen@Census, HUD’s Under 5 and EPA’s Emerging Leader Network, has created a six part guide to building a learning network in government, NextGen Guide to Building Your Network.
The guide focuses on how you can build a professional learning networking group, or improve the one already in place at your agency/office/city/department. It walks you through helpful tips, case studies, common roadblocks and ideas to get you on your way to NextGen networking stardom.
If that isn’t enough, GovLoop and Young Government Leaders are hosting their annual Next Generation of Government Training Summit on July 20th and 21st at the Renaissance Hotel in DC.
Since 2010, the two-day summit has enhanced the working and personal lives of 3,000+ government employees with new skills, best practices and motivation to be change ambassadors for positive growth in government.
We need to make sure we are giving our future leaders the tools they need to do their jobs. Training is the first step.
The full Next Generation of Government Networking Guide can be downloaded here.