Coming Jobs War

Drawing on 75 years of Gallup studies and his own perspective as the company’s chairman and CEO, Jim Clifton explains why jobs are the new global currency for leaders. More than peace or money or any other good, the business, government, military, city, and village leaders who can create good jobs will own the future.

The problem is that leaders don’t know how to create jobs ? especially in America. What they should do is recognize that the world is in a war for jobs. It seems that leadership has lost the will to win, especially in America, but this is a competition for our lives.

To win, leaders need to compete. Everyone does. The public school system needs to inculcate kids with the knowledge they’ll need to compete in the jobs war. The business community needs to double the psychological engagement of workers so that it can compete with cheaper labor. The healthcare system must stop wasting the resources that we need to spend on job competition. Society needs to realize that entrepreneurs, not government, are the source of new jobs and put all its energy behind them. Perhaps most importantly, leaders need to recognize universities, mentors, and especially cities as a supercollider for job creation.

If that can be done ? and it can be done; leaders have done it before ? new good jobs will result. There’s not moment to waste: the war has already begun.

Jim Clifton
Chairman and CEO


Since 1988, Jim Clifton has served as CEO of Gallup, a leader in organizational consulting and public opinion research. His most recent innovation, the Gallup World Poll, is designed to give the world’s 6 billion citizens a voice in virtually all key global issues. Mr. Clifton has pledged to continue this effort to collect world opinion for 100 years in 150 countries.

Under Mr. Clifton’s leadership, Gallup has achieved a fifteenfold increase in its billing volume and expanded Gallup from a predominantly U.S.-based company to a worldwide organization with 40 offices in 30 countries and regions.

Mr. Clifton is also the creator of The Gallup Path, a metric-based economic model that establishes the linkages among human nature in the workplace, customer engagement, and business outcomes. This model is used in performance management systems in more than 500 companies worldwide.

Mr. Clifton serves on several boards and is Chairman of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund. He has received honorary degrees from Jackson State, Medgar Evers and Bellevue Universities.