Maybe it’s because I’m turning 40 in a few months, but I’ve been thinking an awful lot about my future, the relevance of our organization and where our communities are headed.

Each meeting I attend as the chamber director — whether it be on economic development, community projects, workforce needs, education issues or municipal politics — one thing is abundantly clear: quite often I’m the youngest leader in the room.

If you have heard the term “Silver Tsunami” of “Gray Tsunami” that is exactly what it’s referring to, our aging population. Our aging workforce is becoming the family secret that we just don’t talk enough about — like the overweight relative who just won’t eat right, or the relative in failing health who still smokes a pack a day — yet we don’t talk about it because it’s easier just to keep doing what we always do.

We know it’s coming. There is a cliff for our workforce. We know if we continue doing work as normal and not planning for the future, we’ll continue to age out of the workforce and that a rash of retirements will cripple some businesses — and perhaps entire industries.

This should be the number one thing we are discussing. However, there are so many other important topics that seem more relevant and more immediate that grab our focus.

Unfortunately, while our attention gets paid to these other pressing needs, we’re aging by the day and the year, and if we don’t look at this now, in five or 10 years it may be too late. Nationally, 18 percent of our workforce is over 65, and in Maine the number is closer to 25 percent.

There is a very important gubernatorial election coming up this November. These strong candidates will be going county to county and community to community discussing the relevant topics facing our state. Health care is a priority, and good paying jobs, and opioid addiction, and having safe communities, and dozens of other things.

But if we don’t address the need for young people and more young leaders, we’ll have no one in place to make the decisions in the next five to 10 years. Or worse, the people in those positions will be ill-equipped to hold them.

Many candidates have spoken about recruiting young professionals to Maine, and in some cases bringing some home-grown talent back home to raise a family — and that’s without a doubt a key piece to our survival as a thriving state. However, that’s a solution that requires time, planning and a focused effort of recruitment to entice those people to move here, or move back here.

There is a more immediate decision people can make today — and that is to develop our young leaders who are already here. Rotarians know this, and so do some Elks and Legion members around the state — the two most popular hair colors at the meetings are white or none at all. What active role are we taking to help mentor and train the leaders of tomorrow to become leaders today?

This is my challenge to all business leaders: find your successor and begin to take them under your wing today. Instead of going to the dinner meeting by yourself, buy the extra ticket and bring a young colleague with you. Insist that the young leaders in your companies take time away from work to volunteer with local organizations and perhaps compensate them if you can.

The Southern Midcoast Maine Chamber is kicking off new committees this fall and several new ones have already been restarted including a Marketing Team, an Ambassador Team, the Women In Local Leadership planning team and several more. Main Street Bath and the Brunswick Downtown Association are always looking for help planning and executing their large community events. Big Brothers/Big Sisters and the United Way always have outreach needs and know ways to connect with people in your communities. The historical societies, the museums, the Rotary Clubs, the fraternal organizations — all of them have projects that need assistance.

And when these young employees get engaged and become a part of these teams, they develop the networking and leadership skills to be more successful in your company. But it won’t happen overnight.

If you need some pointers, I suggest you jump on YouTube and look up a gentleman by the name of Simon Sinek. He is a world-class keynote speaker on leadership skills and there are number of anecdotes, tips and practical applications that business people can learn from his videos to help better connect and communicate with their young leaders.

You may have heard of him from his 15-minute presentation about the “Millennials in the Workplace,” which received tens of millions of views worldwide and explains where the disconnect is — and that the disconnect is no one’s fault.

In one particularly effective video, he compares building leaders to working out at the gym and talks about how long it takes to develop leaders. He points out that if you start going to the gym and look in the mirror after the first workout — you see no change. After the second day — you see no change. Or the third. Or the fourth. You could reasonably say after four days there is no evidence that this is effective and abandon it.

But if you work out regularly for six months you will see a change — and that is how leaders are built. It’s not one seminar, or one singular experience — it’s being present at multiple experiences, consistently over time that builds the character and the comradery.

That is what is incumbent upon us today. Those that will lead our companies five years from now need to begin being molded for that today. If you wait five years, they won’t be ready. And we desperately need them to be ready. They are our future leaders. They are our future, and also our best legacy to the communities we love.