Hey, all you job-seekers, you don't want to work in chemical R&D

From my weekly dose of pain (i.e. a Google Alert for "skills gap"), this wonderful little tidbit from an interview of a Deloitte consulting executive, Duane Dickson:

DC: Does this issue vary from country to country? 

Let’s take R&D in the chemical industry—it’s something I know pretty well. In the United States, no one wants to work in the companies. One of the reasons we have a skills gap is because no one really thinks about it from the start. And I can tell you it’s a big problem, and it’s on the minds of the CEOs of every industry. 

But in the U.S., over time the more mature industries cut costs. As a result, they cut R&D spending. And in the process of making those cuts, they create a spiral of less and less growth. Growth is really what it takes to bring new skills on board. When companies are growing, they have a little bit of surplus capital to invest in the future. When companies are hustling, they’re really just trying to make the numbers every quarter. So that’s the U.S. situation. I would just call it an aging demographic.

Something tells me that there are very few unfilled R&D positions at major chemical companies in the US. 

A huge sign that Accenture does not understand the chemicals industry

Courtesy of my morning ACC Smartbrief, I see that Accenture has put out a report about the shale gas revolution and how the chemicals industry needs to prepare for future economic conditions once the boom is over.

All fine, but the report (PDF here) is marred by horrifyingly amateurish graphics of colored water in flasks, soap bubbles and dry ice in water. If they had put "IGNORE ME, I KNOW NOTHING OF YOUR WORK" in 72-point font across the bottom, the effect could not have been worse.

(Why do people (business majors, really) think about chemistry and chemicals this way? Do they understand a whit of what we do? Why not pointing-hard-hat guy/gal?)