Learning how to get a better workforce.

IT seems absolutely amazing to me that a business owner should have to be concerned about getting enough workers that smell good--yes smell good.

Such a base concern is perhaps the best illustration of one of the most serious problems facing local companies today, the one of getting enough workers trained sufficiently to do the many jobs at area firms.

Language skills maybe, but hygiene? Yes, some owners report that our local workforce is so poor that some don't even know proper hygiene. Yikes, that's bad. But the good part about it is maybe it will get our attention about the educational system in our local area and throughout the country.

Bottom line for businesses and us all--our economy can't survive bad education.

Our special section in this issue of the Business Journal is designed to put a focus on the job skills crisis we are having in our economy and a look at the many job training opportunities available locally.

It's a fixable problem, but like with health insurance where many small business owners have several options available to them but just don't know they are available, many don't know there are places to go for job training for their employees.

Hopefully, this special report will bring a lot of new information to owners of companies of all sizes.

So, how did we get into this situation where in a metropolitan area of millions and millions of people even some of the smallest firms still can't find a few competent employees?

Gov. Schwarzenegger will say it's due to bad teachers--and get rid of them.

Still others blame our lenient and permissive society over the past few decades where people have not been held as accountable as they should for making mistakes--in 5th grade and at 50 years old.

Sure, a lot of programs being offered to rectify the problem are simply English as a Second Language classes, but it's deeper than that.

There's not a lot of learning going on out there. Too many kids don't finish high school, and yes facilities and resources at some of the public schools are so bad that teachers (some of them good, some of them bad) spend too much time Wing to just make do instead-of teaching to their fullest potential.

But that doesn't explain bad hygiene. That's parental. I'm not a parent so I'm not going to get into that.

It's good to have the community colleges, however, to try to rectify some of the problems. Community colleges are the unsung heroes of our economy but not enough business owners know about the many resources they offer, however. Hopefully this special report will help get the word out.

Challenges ahead

I didn't write a look-ahead 2005 column in our last issue but there are still a few things that are happening in mid-January that I can chew on and discuss in terms of what's in store this year.

It's do or die time in Sacramento. It's time to make the really tough decisions that our elected officials have been putting off for years.

Gov. Schwarzenegger talks tough and claims that he's going to force changes in the way state government operates this year. This, in turn, he believes will make it operate more efficiently and thus not be so expensive. But the governor. although effective to a certain extent since taking office, up to now has wanted to be liked too much and I feel hasn't hit as hard as he can to solve the severe problems we have.

He's compromised too much and simply took out more loans to pay the bills in the state.

Now's the time when he should stop talking tough and act like a statesman by seriously pushing a restructuring of the way the state is run.

Some say that his proposal to strip lawmakers of the power to create their own districts. instead giving it to a panel of retired judges, is not that important right now. The governor should pay attention to the financial problems California is having, they say.

I disagree, and say Arnold go deep.

A big reason we have such a difficult time keeping to reasonable spending levels in this state is due to the fact that there is no reason to compromise--there are too many safe seats for the Legislature in this state so there's no reason to work hard to compromise and be realistic about how things can be. Wild decisions are made. There's no reason to run the state responsibly. Just pander to the special interests in your district.

This is fundamental stuff and our budget will never be any good on any given year until we get the Legislature to make responsible decisions.

As with legislative districts, the across-the-board budget cuts that he proposes when spending outpaces revenues, is necessary. Spending is out of control and drastic measures are needed-at least temporarily.

Codifying these cuts which would be necessary by voter ratification would make them publicly accepted.

A major PR blitz would be necessary, but Schwarzenegger's a popular actor and he really needs to cash that in now to get some things done.

One thing to remember as long as Schwarzenegger is in office--he was voted in because he's a celebrity. It wasn't until he got in there that we found out he had some good ideas, ways of doing business and leadership abilities.

So he needs to use his celebrity status to do some things that other normal politicians couldn't do.

Go to the people and have them vote on some hard decisions if the Legislature does nothing but try to justify their existence by pleasing people rather than running the state.

He's the only guy that can do this right now and it's desperately needed for him to step up to the plate.

So far, he has. But he needs to keep it up.

Business Journal Editor Jason Schaff can be reached at [phone] or at [e-mail].