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Posts Tagged knowledge

Solutions for mature age workforce participation

Posted by Catriona in Commentary, Research on March 13th, 2012

The Australian Human Resources Institute have just released a their  pulse survey findings about mature age workforce participation. It’s a neat snapshot of the sentiments of 1212 AHRI members. No surprises, but it confirms Sageco’s findings over the last seven years.

Here are some of the key points with our ideas for solutions:

  • Just under half the respondents said the departure of older workers from their workplace has caused a loss of key knowledge or skills.
  • Approximately 20% report that the departure of older workers has caused the organisation to be less competitive.
  • More than 80% would like to see steps taken to retain older workers.

(Sageco’s Exchange program provides a strong framework for transferring knowledge between workforce generations and developing older workers as knowledge coaches. It distils the critical knowledge requirements, bolsters natural knowledge sharing and enables the intentional transfer of knowledge before older workers choose to retire. In fact, older workers may choose to continue working albeit differently – with a key component of their role as a knowledge coach.)

  • Over two thirds or respondents believe the retention of older workers would benefit productivity.
  • More than 75% see retaining older workers as a necessary precaution against the sudden loss of essential knowledge and skills.

(Sageco’s Envisage program is a visible, tangible way to support mature workers making work and retirement decisions. If you seriously want to retain mature workers, you need to support them as they plan for their career, their finances, health and relationships. Help them answer the question, “If not retirement, then what else?” Help your mature workers create a positive and productive future.)

Thank you to AHRI for providing the snapshot about this much discussed issue. This data cannot be ignored. Compare the cost of proactive investment in your current mature employees to the cost of recruiting, replacing, losing knowledge and losing competitiveness. Take action now.

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A privileged perspective – knowledge exchange

Posted by Catriona in Musings, What we're up to on February 15th, 2012

Michael Hollingworth

Facilitator and coach

This week Sageco facilitator and coach, Michael Hollingworth shares what it’s like facilitating the ‘sages’ in the Sageco Exchange program.

At Sageco, the men and women we call ‘sages’ are the experts and most senior executives in organisations, who have spent a lifetime – or at least a very long time (measured in decades) – learning, leading and applying their knowledge in the specialist areas they direct.

Facilitating them in the process of capturing and transferring their expert knowledge is an unusual and fascinating privilege. Their stories are unique, and in telling them you get some glimpses (often totally unexpected) into the complexities of how our very complex society works.

Stories are told in every technical and management realm:

  • How to locate an inexplicable leak causing lower pressure in some small corner of a city’s huge water mains network.
  • What can be done to ensure safety and balance the clearly conflicting demands of a railway line and its road overpass, built in unavoidably unstable terrain.
  • The secret skills of negotiation that keep a large public utility operating and profitable, while avoiding strikes and meeting the increasing pay needs and conditions of its workers.

All those involved in capturing their stories and handing on the skills of the sages learn and grow: the people who will take over their work from the sages, colleagues from other areas linked to their output, administrators who keep the workforce operating. Often the sages themselves learn all over again lessons they had forgotten – or knew by intuition or implicitly.
And perhaps the most satisfying aspect is to see the sages thanked and acknowledged by colleagues who understand, often for the first time, how much they contribute to keeping the wheels turning.

For over seven years the Sageco Exchange program has been used by organisations as a catalyst for knowledge transfer. Contact Sageco to find out more.

 

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Branson talks Experience

Posted by Alison in Commentary, Musings on August 29th, 2011

When Richard Branson speaks, people tend to listen. You don’t become a billionaire for nothing!

And once again he demonstrates his ‘deep smarts’ by sharing advice for promoting your business’s best asset – your experienced workers.

Q: How do you help ageing workers embrace a changing environment and adapt to new ways of doing things, and how can employers better utilize their more senior employees?

A: As an ageing worker myself, I will attempt to answer on behalf of my contemporaries.

When people ask how old I am, my favorite response is,

Younger than Mick Jagger!

No disrespect intended to Mick, who is a friend of mine, but seeing him onstage certainly shows how big a disconnect there can be between doing what you do best and acting your age.

In the business of entrepreneurship, past experience is particularly helpful, since building a business is an art. There’s really no right or wrong way to do it, but the more you practice, the more skilled you become.

Read the full response from Richard on Entrepreneur.com

 

 

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One size does not fit all

Posted by Alison in What we're up to on August 16th, 2011

A very impressive line up of speakers generously shared their time, knowledge and insights at today’s 5th annual ageing workforce conference convened by Department of Premier and Cabinet, IPAA NSW and SageCo.

With over 100 attendees and held at Customs House, the agenda explored a wide range of topics under the umbrella of ‘targeting and aligning workforce strategies’.

Peter Duncan, Deputy Director General, Government Coordination and Corporate Administration, provided the opening address, stating some of the key ageing workforce objectives as;

  • greater levels of labour force participation
  • continual development of mature workers
  • managing the transfer of critical knowledge
  • implementing talent management systems to fill capability gaps

Geoff Gilfillan from the Productivity Commission in Canberra provided an overview of the Research Paper on Labour Force Participation Rates of Women 45+ with delegates then given an opportunity to work on a hypothetical challenging them to visualise “The Year 2020″ and what it would take to achieve ‘best practice accreditation’ for the employment of mature age women.

Output from the facilitated interactive session included tailored health and wellbeing interventions for mature women; equal representation of mature women in senior leadership and executive roles; redesign of the working day and the working week (from Part Time to Part Year?!); training in non traditional roles; carers leave extended to cater for elder and grandchild caregiving; and the debate on gender bias becoming obsolete as it will be a ‘non issue’ by 2020.

Chair Alison Monroe conducted an interview with Professor Philip Taylor of Monash University to gain an international perspective on age management and a ‘judges’ view of the AARP Best Employers Award for 50+ . Philip challenged Australian employers to look again at the opportunity to train, develop and upskill mature workers to enable them to remain employable, marketable and productive.

A lively session followed presented by John Cross, Assistant Executive Director of Workforce Planning at State Services Authority VIC, who challenged some traditional views and shared with delegates his framework for robust age management and workforce planning;

  1. Accountability – shared between organisational leaders, frontline managers and HR
  2. Appetite – assessing ageing workforce challenges through the risk lens and speak the language of the business
  3. Design – job redesign and evolution over time, learning and development models that address future skill gaps
  4. Data – the role of HR in collecting, collating and communicating the data story to the business, to which John added;

look at the ripples created by the rock, not just the rock itself as it is thrown into the water!

Case Studies were shared by Hunter Water, Department of Trade and Investment NSW and National Australia Bank – with a common thread seeming to be conversations and culture.

A jam packed agenda and one that resulted in delegates walking away with new knowledge and a variety of next steps. Each continuing on their individual and organisational journey, where one size does not fit all.

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7586 years

Posted by Alison in What we're up to on June 8th, 2011

7586. That is how many years of experience and knowledge were in the room on Tuesday morning at Parliament House.

250 senior executives and sages from the NSW Public Sector met for the inaugural mature professionals breakfast convened by Department of Premiers and Cabinet, IPAA NSW and SageCo.

Opening the breakfast, Director General of DPC, Chris Eccles said;

You all possess knowledge that has influenced and will continue to influence how we will do things in the Sector going forward. Every day this rich knowledge is harnessed to deliver services. This knowledge is not in policy guidelines and manuals…it goes beyond the ‘what’ to the ‘how’ and the ‘why’…

The Director General went on to encourage a return to the Master and Apprentice model, adding;

When you share knowledge, the very act allows you to gain unique insights and develop new knowledge from others. Share it and it will multiply.

We also heard from Ken, a retiree with 43 years service in the Public Sector. A ‘master’ who, with a colleague, wrote a software system that is now sold in over 100 countries around the World. Ken has worked with his ‘apprentices’ to identify and share his unique knowledge since 2008.

Participants at the breakfast engaged in conversation, created new connections, and identified their areas of specialist ‘mastery‘ – a very tangible first step in igniting a knowledge sharing culture within the Sector.

Hats off to DPC for leading the way in tackling the very real risk of knowledge loss in NSW.

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