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Posts Tagged retirement

who’s retiring when?

Posted by Catriona in Research on November 25th, 2010

New research from the National Centre for Vocational Education Research and ANU provides more of a breakdown of who’s retiring when – according to the type of workers who remained in the workforce beyond the retirement age of 65 in the past 10 years. As reported in the Australian, there are two distinct groups who are ignoring the retirement age and remaining in the workforce; the most educated and the least educated.

Why the most educated?

  • they enjoy work and the social interaction
  • attractive employment conditions
  • they need to recoup an investment in education

Why the least educated?

  • the financial considerations of cash flow
  • less accumulated wealth
  • limited access to good retirement arrangements with super

We’re with Chris Ryan – author of the research:

I think there are positive things about keeping experienced, capable people working longer. I think there will be more people working at 70 than there are now, but they will have more choices with superannuation and pay more attention to their financial position as they age.

Organisations who actively support their employees in late career will benefit.

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advancing age management

Posted by Alison in What we're up to on October 14th, 2010

From awareness to action and now to the advancement of age management. This was the theme of the 2010 ageing workforce conference convened yesterday by the Department of Premier and Cabinet, Office for Ageing and IPAA NSW, with SageCo’s Alison Monroe as conference Chair for the day.

Having bounced back from a brief spell of retirement himself, Brendan O’Reilly DPC’s Director General was the perfect sage to provide an opening address to the 110 delegates present, including representatives from NSW Public Sector agencies, Local Government, and Industry.

Brendan opened the inaugural ageing workforce conference held in 2006 and by his own admission “did not expect to be here 4 years later!” but gave his support and advocacy to the mission stating;

This conference provides an opportunity to share knowledge, discuss the challenges and create strategies to tackle workforce ageing

Delegates heard from a range of speakers on policy development, program implementation and best practise case studies from the transport and health sector.

A few key themes arising from the day;

  1. know your data and create the story around it. present a sound business case for action
  2. executive support and advocacy is critical in positioning ageing workforce as a priority
  3. measure project outcomes and present back to the business
  4. continuity and consistency is key. this is not a ‘tick a box’ challenge.

One aim of the conference is to ignite the age management journey for those contemplating the enormity of the task. We look forward to seeing delegates from yesterday up on the speakers podium in years to come sharing their stories and successes.

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ageing with grace

Posted by Catriona in Commentary on July 12th, 2010

RobertButlerWe want to acknowledge the passing of Robert Butler, a Pulitzer prize-winning author and psychiatrist who coined the term ”ageism”.

Butler helped create the modern notion that ageing is a time of choice, of opportunity, of growth. He is recognised as having conducted one of the first long term studies of older people in 1955.

Some of the groundbreaking findings of that study were that senility is not an inevitable consequence of age and that psychiatric care is not wasted on the elderly, as was commonly believed. It also found that older people were more contented and tended to live longer when their lives were filled with goals, structure and a sense of purpose.

His work has certainly contributed to the core values and philosophy of SageCo’s programs for redirecting retirement.

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the dangers of retirement: a word from Aristotle

Posted by Catriona in Commentary on June 30th, 2010

We love this quote from the write up of Jeffrey Smart’s (aged 89) latest exhibition.

Life, happiness and activity, as Aristotle suggests, are all the same thing. There is a higher experience of transcendent joy, but happiness in general consists in being active; that is, exercising agency and initiative, fulfilling our vocation, acquiring and practising skills, enjoying the freedom to think and to make.

This is why retirement is so dangerous. People imagine they want more leisure, but they confuse leisure with idleness. The former is a state of freedom from material necessity that should allow one to pursue activities of intrinsic interest; but idleness is a lack of activity, and even the dull routines of work are more energising than having nothing to do.

Rethink retirement. If not a dangerous concept, it is at best outdated.

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What would influence your decision to work longer?

Posted by Catriona in Research on June 17th, 2010

Ageing workforce specialists SageCo recently asked more than 300 mature employees, “What would influence your decision to work longer?” More than 60 percent said that the opportunity to work the same role but on a more flexible basis would be a reason to stay. In the same vein, over half said that working in a similar role but with reduced hours and less responsibility would see them working beyond the traditional retirement date.

“The trick to the age management puzzle is slowing the rate of retirement” says SageCo MD, Alison Monroe. “Use your workforce planning data to determine the risk of not only how many you are losing, but also who you are losing.”

Extending the working life of our baby boomer generation is a key strategy for ensuring a future workforce. By 2016 we have more people leaving the workforce than entering it;  something has to shift. But how?

The results of this survey suggest that managers and HR professionals need to build a high level of competency in redesigning roles, applying flexible work arrangements and dealing with the more granular tasks of remuneration and superannuation.

While flexible work opportunities were the clear winner here, respondents showed strong support for an organisation’s alumni program to provide contracting opportunities and the means to contribute knowledge to special projects.

“SageCo sees a strong argument for the reinvention of the alumni model.” says Catriona Byrne, SageCo Director and Product Development Lead. “Up till now, most alumni programs simply provide a means for past employees to keep in touch annually.

We are having early discussions with a few progressive organisations who have tapped into the opportunity of using their alumni program as a way to resource the future. The new alumni model is a living, breathing knowledge database and a talent pool of experienced, contingent employees who can hit the ground running.”

None of these interventions will make a difference unless organisations have a baseline of good people management. However, it is clear that new practices must be put in place to influence retiring employees.

“The results also indicate that organisations need to actively support late career employees in their decisions about work and retirement.” suggests Alison Monroe “The mindset shift required by employees and employers alike won’t happen left to chance.”

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