Elsevier

Organizational Dynamics

Volume 40, Issue 2, April–June 2011, Pages 136-143
Organizational Dynamics

Sustainable careers: Lifecycle engagement in work

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.orgdyn.2011.01.008Get rights and content

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Demographics and employment

The Boomer generation is the healthiest in history, with life expectancies into their 80s. They are energetic and want to be engaged in work, family, and community in meaningful yet flexible ways.

YourEncore, founded in 2003, is a new, successful firm that has arisen to meet the needs for retired Boomers to stay engaged in leading companies such as Proctor & Gamble, Boeing, and General Mills on a flexible basis. With over 6000 of the best and brightest retired subject matter experts associated

The aging advantage

Contrary to common beliefs, older employees are not stubborn, rigid, low performing liabilities. Numerous researchers find older workers to be more engaged, more loyal, less likely to quit, less likely to be absent voluntarily, more willing to work hard, and just as adaptable when given the opportunity, compared with their younger colleagues. This is especially true for jobs in which the physical requirements of work are not a limiting factor.

Older employees are better qualified, more

Boomers and Gen Y

While sustainable careers will help employers address challenges of an aging labor force, they will also help employers create an attractive work environment for the youngest generation of employees. Gen Y employees, those born after about 1980, seek meaning, growth, and balance in their work. They crave mentoring, coaching, and guidance. They are different from Boomers in their trust of authority – Boomers had a notorious distrust of authority in their youth (never trust anyone over 30), while

Adult development and career development

Careers are viewed in many ways – as a series of jobs, as a cumulative set of experiences, as vehicles for self-expression, and a process of adult development. In the 1960s and 1970s the last of these was popular. Matching organization-based career progress to adult development was in vogue. Books about career stages and mid-life crises were popular (e.g., Passages by Sheehy and The Seasons of a Man's Life by Levinson and his colleagues). In addition, scholars developed their own ideas about

Sustainable careers

It is not the strongest species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the ones most responsive to change.

— Charles Darwin

Sustainability implies preserving and enhancing human capital rather than depleting it. It implies restoring and maintaining balance. To be sustainable throughout life, careers must have three features. They must include renewal opportunities, times when employees pause briefly to reinvigorate themselves. They must be flexible and adaptable. Half of what we think we

Implications

The aging Baby Boom generation and its large shadow, Gen Y, present an opportunity to reinvent our personal and organizational career strategies. For 40 years we have made incremental changes around the edges of traditional career practices in response to more women in the workplace, advances in information technology, and the rise of knowledge-based work. Our existing practices show it. We still have vestiges of old assumptions – employment policies that punish or prohibit flexible work;

Conclusions

The sheer size of the Baby Boom and Gen Y cohorts will force changes in talent management practices. Sustainable careers represent a viable, attractive future that will benefit employers and employees alike. The desire for flexibility dovetails nicely with the changing needs of employers for talent over time. Boomers do not want promotions when they age, but they do want meaning in their work. They may not need big salaries and significant responsibilities in their later years, but they

Selected bibliography

An excellent academic resource for careers is H. P. Gunz and M. A. Peiperl (eds.) Handbook of Career Studies (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2007). Career and adult development classics include D. T. Hall, Careers in Organizations (Glenview, IL: Scott Foresman, 1976) and Career Development in Organizations (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1986), G. Sheehy, Passages: Predictable Crises of Adult Life (New York: Dutton, 1976), D. J. Levinson, et al., The Seasons of a Man's Life (New York: Knopf, 1978) and

Karen L. Newman (Ph.D.) is a professor of management at the University of Denver (Daniels). She has been on the faculty at Georgetown University (McDonough School) and Dean at the University of Richmond and at DU. Her research current interests are careers for a changing population and large scale organizational change (Daniels College of Business, Department of Management, University of Denver, Denver, CO 80208, United States. Tel.: +1 303 871 2249; e-mail: [email protected]).

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Karen L. Newman (Ph.D.) is a professor of management at the University of Denver (Daniels). She has been on the faculty at Georgetown University (McDonough School) and Dean at the University of Richmond and at DU. Her research current interests are careers for a changing population and large scale organizational change (Daniels College of Business, Department of Management, University of Denver, Denver, CO 80208, United States. Tel.: +1 303 871 2249; e-mail: [email protected]).

This work is supported by a grant from the Rose Community Foundation of Denver, Colorado, as part of its Boomers Leading Change Program. Thanks also to Caela Farren of MasteryWorks, Inc. for hours of informative conversation about this topic.

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