January 2023 saw louder signals emerging - reinforcing the global demographic trend towards ageing populations. We need to overturn the institutionalised view that an ageing population is a social and economic negative and instead explore how an older demography can be a source of opportunity and value.

Reconciling ‘organisation fit’ with diversity and inclusion practices is challenging.

Whilst diversity suggests workforce difference, ‘organisation fit’ emphasises workforce sameness.

For some time now many large organisations have complicated the hiring process by not just being satisfied with an evidence-based analysis of a person’s skill sets and ability to apply them, but adding highly subjective labels including ‘potential’ and ‘organisation fit’ into the recruitment decision-making process. Does this improve hiring decisions?

The corporate equivalent of a Goldilocks and the three bears scenario seems to exist, in which younger workers have too little experience, older workers have the wrong experience, with those workers between the mid-20s and 40s having just the right experience. Yet, in the worlds of…

Employers believe that the cut-back in Government-sponsored skilled migration programme is the primary cause of our labour crises. Yet, the potential recruiting of younger and older workers as part of the solution remains overlooked.

Another misconception about older workers is the characterisation of older workers as “hard to get along with” and “lacking resilience”.

As we have learnt in our articles exploring older worker misconceptions, false impressions abound which ignore the research evidence about the positive business opportunity represented by the older worker.

Welcome to our EncourAGEEQUALITY quiz. What do instant noodles, bifocal glasses, the Victa lawnmower, KFC and Roget’s Thesaurus all have in common?

Lost in the translation is the complexity of work roles older workers may be performing, the experience needed to perform these roles, the belief that older workers retain significant labour market bargaining power and the disregard off business cost offsets the older worker provides.

There is a large gap between the perception of older workers as stuck in an ‘ancient world’ and the reality of their change capabilities and behaviours. Once more empirical research is helping paint a far more accurate picture of the older worker which is a world away from the change-resistant myth dragging down their workforce reputation.

Talkback: Is now the perfect time to end workplace ageism?
With Hilary Harper on Life Matters

If you’ve ever hit the job market later in life, you’ll know it’s not an easy experience to have to go through. But with unemployment rates low, and many businesses crying out for workers, are there new opportunities for older jobseekers?

Are older workers less productive than younger workers? A very popular myth is that older workers can’t compete with younger workers when it comes to productivity and delivering results. However, research evidence reveals this myth as either greatly exaggerated or completely wrong. Want to find out more about how you can bust through the Productivity Myth in your organisation?

The term ‘talent’ is one of such ubiquity these days that it seems now both simultaneously generic and meaningless. Yet, despite the hollowness of the term, most businesspeople are convinced that ‘talent’ is a critical ingredient in the recipe for organisation success.

How we allow ourselves to be classified these days has major implications for our status and opportunity in the world. Recruiters consistently recommend we think of ourselves as brands with a compelling brand proposition. But what happens when our personal brand is hijacked by potential employers who add their own beliefs to it and in the process radically change our brand’s perceived value?

In our post-modern world with its laser like focus on addressing social injustice, the word ‘privilege’ automatically rings alarm bells, with those groups feeling excluded from ‘privilege’ believing themselves marginalised, powerless and discriminated against. In the areas of gender, ethnicity and sexual orientation this has become increasingly evident over the past 30 plus years, but younger people feeling everyday discrimination or disadvantage from older, more senior and presumably white workers appears a relatively new development.

The Queen is not letting her 95 years of age define herself. There is no fading away for this oldie. And doesn’t everyone love the fact. Her dissing of politicians as potential non-attendees at the Glasgow Climate Change Summit has won universal praise and attracted much favourable media coverage. Now, she has also declined to accept her country’s ‘Oldie of the Year’ award stating that she doesn’t believe she meets the criteria. Someone’s not following the older person script and just quietly fading away from public view.

Companies have enthusiastically embraced talent management initiatives in the belief talent represents a major source of competitive advantage, but they have failed to significantly improve workplace diversity. The question is now whether the unquestioned belief in the talent mantra is becoming a roadblock to improving business innovation and productivity?