Attend almost any gathering of business people and the topic is sure to come up: finding good workers. After more than a decade of economic growth that has featured strong hiring and steadily falling unemployment rates, labor markets across the country and certainly across Montana are tight.

For some businesses, the trickle of suitable workers for their openings has shrunk to the point where they are questioning how they can continue to fill orders, let alone capitalize on new opportunities.

By Patrick Barkey