What do you stand for? The answer will shape your workplace culture and your success as a leader. As demographic changes generate talent shortages and the business environment becomes increasingly complex, leaders of the future will need five key traits.

Job candidates ask about it more than any other topic. Fortune magazine calls it the greatest competitive tool of America's best employers. Analyst Josh Bersin calls it the hottest topic in business today.

I was recently invited to speak with guest host, Cheryl Casone, on Fox Business "Money with Melissa Francis" about the seismic shift coming in the workforce (Click here to watch the video).

New Gallup research finds that older baby boomers are retiring in large numbers and predicts a possible shortage of U.S. workers. This makes sense. Ten thousand baby boomers turn 65 every day, and, according to the Stanford Center on Longevity, the crucial pool of workers age 45-54 is shrinking as a percentage of the workforce. With fewer highly experienced employees to replace those who retire, businesses need to get serious about succession planning.

A new survey from the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) highlights how little most employers have prepared for the aging workforce. Ten thousand baby boomers reach retirement age every day, yet few employers have adapted to the realities of the new talent landscape. In the SHRM survey, one-third or less of respondents indicated that the increasing age of their organization's workforce had prompted changes in general management policy/practices (28%), retention practices (33%), and recruiting practices (35%) to "some" or "a great extent.

A recent Pew Reserach survey finds that about four in 10 Americans believe there's a double standard for women seeking to climb to the highest levels of either politics or business, where they have to do more than their male counterparts to prove themselves. These findings come on the heels of a New York Times column by Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant on the career perils of "speaking while female."

Over the holidays I had the pleasure of playing a round of golf on the Blue Monster at Trump National Doral in Miami. I first played the course as a second-year golfer and shot a 96. This time, with an additional five years of practice, I shot a 102. Ouch.

If 2015 finds you dreaming of a career change, you're not alone.  Eighty-six percent of job seekers who are already employed are looking for work outside their current occupations, according to research reported by Fortune, and a 2013 Harris poll found that more than half of U.S. workers want to change careers.  While the timing can never be perfect for a major life transition, the job market is improving and unemployment is at its lowest level since mid-2008.  Why not consider a change?

"You have to be the employer of choice every day," Yahoo Chairman Maynard Webb recently told The New York Times.

After a recession that left Americans pessimistic five years into recovery, the job market has begun to turn to the advantage of executive talent.