Rank and File

Tough times make managers take a hard look at the rank and file, and many don’t like what they see. In a survey of 200 executives by Accenture, three-quarters of the respondents said their companies had increased or maintained their human resources and training-and-development budgets during the past year. But only 17 percent reported that they are very satisfied with the programs’ success, and only one in four said they believe that most of their employees have the skills to execute their jobs at industry-leading levels.