A new joint poll released by the Society for Human Resource Management and AARP shows that U.S. employers are ramping up skills training and employee benefits aimed at closing skills gaps left when baby boomers retire, and at retaining and recruiting older workers.

More than seven in 10 of the human resource professionals polled described the loss of talented older workers as "a problem" or "a potential problem" for their organizations.

Human-resource managers said that the actions their organizations have taken to prepare for the loss of talented older workers who retire include the following: increased training and cross-training (45 percent); developed succession planning (38 percent); hired retired employees as consultants or temporary workers (30 percent); offered flexible work arrangements (27 percent); and designed part-time positions to attract older workers (24 percent).

The poll, which focused on strategic workforce planning, also asked human resource professionals to identify the greatest "basic skills" and "applied skills" gaps between workers age 31 and younger compared with workers age 50 and older.

In the area of basic skills, 51 percent of human resource managers indicated they find older workers to have stronger writing, grammar, and spelling skills in English. In applied skills, 52 percent of human resource managers said older workers exhibit stronger professionalism/work ethic.

As background to the poll, SHRM and AARP took note of data from the Pew Research Center indicating that 10,000 baby boomers will reach age 65 every day during the next two decades. Already, in 2011, the oldest of the 77 million baby boomers began turning age 65—the traditional retirement age.

Despite the proactive steps being taken, the SHRM-AARP poll suggests that many U.S. organizations are largely unprepared for the brain drain and skills void that retiring older workers will leave, an SHRM executive asserts. Roughly 71 percent of those polled still haven't conducted a strategic workforce planning assessment to analyze the impact of workers 50 and older who will leave their organizations.

"Although we are encouraged to see that many organizations across the country are preparing for the challenge of baby boomer retirements, much more work needs to be done in both the short and long term," says SHRM President and CEO Hank Jackson, in a press release about the poll. "That is why we are working together with AARP to provide organizations and their HR professionals with the tools they need to retain and engage their older, experienced talent."

"Older workers bring unique talents and skills to the workforce, and are a great asset to employers," says Jean Setzfand, AARP's vice president for financial security. "We are pleased to be joining forces with SHRM in providing resources to assist employers in determining their workforce needs."

To help U.S. businesses and organizations, the two organizations offer a number of resources through their partnership. One of those is AARP's free, online Workforce Assessment Tool which provides a snapshot of an organization's workforce and demographics and analyzes its programs to leverage the talents of its older workers. More than 3,000 organizations have used the tool.

Another resource is the SHRM-AARP Partnership Resource Page on SHRM's website. The resource page includes poll and survey findings, articles, and links to the assessment tool, among others.

The SHRM-AARP poll surveyed 430 randomly selected human-resource professionals from SHRM's membership. The poll is one of several projects marking the SHRM-AARP partnership to raise awareness about older worker issues.