This book outlines why the skills of the U.S. workforce have become the single most important factor in the competitiveness, not only of individual companies, but of national economies. It documents the widening gap between the need for highly skilled workers and their availability, and it points out the chilling consequences that may occur if the skill gap continues to widen--an economy in which high-tech jobs go unfilled while millions of unskilled workers lack jobs. The book advocates establishment of a Workforce Education Triad that lays out the basic building blocks for a new business learning system and provides an interdisciplinary Human Capital Return on Investment (ROI) worksheet to calculate an accurate ROI for education and training. The book provides sophisticated systems of measurement, concrete benchmarks, and the key policy concepts companies need to prepare their employees for the future of work. Its 3 sections contain 10 chapters that focus on the following topics: measuring human capital development, improving productivity and performance, and developing people. The book includes 82 figures, 8 boxes, and a table. (KC)