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posted by Fnord666 on Tuesday June 30 2020, @02:34PM   Printer-friendly
from the good-news-for-graybeards dept.

Employers can't afford to ax mature workers, say researchers:

In a new article in the Australian Journal of Management, researchers warn employers not to make hasty decisions in either dismissing or discounting the input of older workers.

"Employers are well known for targeting mature workers when downsizing their workforce—but this might be a costly mistake," says Dr. Valerie Caines.

She notes that governments can also overlook the value of older workers, as shown by the SA Government recently pulling its funding to DOME (the Don't Overlook Mature Experience training organization), which provided valuable support services to mature job seekers.

"A common mistake is to think of mature workers as all being the same," says Dr. Caines. "There is huge variation among mature workers' motivations, capabilities and needs. Their experience is especially valuable now, because mature workers can offer considerable value to an organization during a crisis and play an important role in helping a business progress to the 'next normal.'"

Dr. Caines says older workers may also hold the solution for filling employment gaps in organizations, due to diverse skill sets they have developed through their working life.

"Mature adults demonstrate considerable resilience," she says. "The aspect of role modeling resilience is an especially important influence on younger workers. It includes mature coping strategies, emotional intelligence and empathy—and these attributes have never been more important in the workforce."

Journal Reference:
Valerie Dawn Caines et al. Older workers: Past, present and future, Australian Journal of Management (2020). DOI: 10.1177/0312896220918912


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  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @03:12PM (13 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @03:12PM (#1014519)

    Just don't ever call me "mature". If I've got grey hair and urinate in an absorbent pad taped to my underwear, have the decency to call me "old". I can see your brain gears whirring as you try to sugar coat what you perceive as my embarrassment - honey, relax. When you finish your little monologue I'll be right here still waiting to get started.

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  • (Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Tuesday June 30 2020, @04:29PM (1 child)

    by nitehawk214 (1304) on Tuesday June 30 2020, @04:29PM (#1014561)

    My dad always says "You have to get old, you don't have to grow up."

    --
    "Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @06:58PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @06:58PM (#1014642)
      You don't have to get old. Just follow those young guys on youtube and try to do stuff like pull ups while dangling off the top of tall buildings...

      Young guys use YOLO as an excuse to do stupid dangerous stuff.

      Old guys use YOLO as an excuse to not do stupid dangerous stuff. That and we probably still haven't recovered from the last stupid stuff we did. Like erm just cough/sneeze while bending? ;)
  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by DannyB on Tuesday June 30 2020, @04:32PM (10 children)

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday June 30 2020, @04:32PM (#1014562) Journal

    I hope I don't come to that, but I'm not getting any younger.

    The fun thing is, everyone is going to get old. Even the young people. Yes, really. I was young once. The very idea of getting old seemed so far off in the future.

    Fun fact: The older you get the faster time seems to pass. Remember when you were a kid and the time between Christmas or Birthday seemed like forever. I was told when starting high school, and I told my own daughter when starting high school that these four years would whiz right by. It did. And my daughter said the same thing. Then you have your own kids, they seem to grow up so fast. Before you know it they start kindergarten. Then 1st grade, my that first year went by quick! Before you know it you're 40, then rather quickly 50.

    Clue: men who have a midlife crisis about 40 do so because they suddenly realize that all the dreams they had at age 20 are not going to happen. All the things they wanted to do, plans they made, they won't have time for all of those. They suddenly realize their mortality is a real thing. So they selfishly need a newer faster car, or a newer faster wife, etc. And technology changes, making some of your prior plans irrelevant. Or someone else has now built that one idea of yours.

    I digress. Point is: the young people are going to get old. And faster than they think. Their body will betray them and start failing in various ways. Various common ailments. Some of it becomes perceptible by age 40.

    All the code you will write. Products you will build. Probably are not going to change the world. So think carefully about how you spend your time. You can never get it back. It's more valuable than money.

    --
    People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
    • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday June 30 2020, @05:56PM (6 children)

      by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday June 30 2020, @05:56PM (#1014602) Journal

      Clue: men who have a midlife crisis about 40 do so because they suddenly realize that all the dreams they had at age 20 are not going to happen.

      Life is vastly different for those who go DO what they are dreaming about, when they are 20. My list of "to do" things? I worked on them early in life. I wanted to see the Arctic Circle, so I went to see it. I wanted to see the Suez Canal, so I went there. I wanted to do a lot of things, so I went, and did them.

      It's hard to relate with those who hope to visit Paris "some day", and never make it. They work for 30, 40, 50 years of their lives, dreaming about Paris. They reach retirement - and bad health puts the nix to all their plans.

      If I have any advice for young people, it would be, "Get off the couch, get out the door, and LIVE LIFE!!"

      Want to see the Mojave desert, to see if it's as pretty as all the pictures? Don't wait until you can afford it. Walk outside your door, step onto Moebius Highway, and take your ass to the Mojave. Yeah, it's as pretty as any picture - and far deadlier than any picture. Ditto for the Badlands, and many other places in the US. Then, there are all the places outside the US.

      If you want to see it, go see it! Now! You're not getting any younger, after all!

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @07:45PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @07:45PM (#1014664)

        If you want to see it, go see it! Now! You're not getting any younger, after all!

        Good idea, but we can't. Governments have locked us down.

      • (Score: 2) by krishnoid on Tuesday June 30 2020, @07:52PM

        by krishnoid (1156) on Tuesday June 30 2020, @07:52PM (#1014669)

        I'll adapt your life experience and wisdom to the following: Go ahead and stay on the couch and watch TV. Just bring them both to the places you want to go, and do it *there*. "Yeah, I wanted to go to the Mojave, and I did it! I think I saw a few scorpions and a coyote during the commercials."

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @10:11PM (3 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @10:11PM (#1014734)

        Life is vastly different for those who go DO what they are dreaming about, when they are 20.

        And that's easy to do if your dreams are within easy financial reach in your 20s. If you ever dreamt bigger than "go to place", or you weren't born to relatively well-off parents, you might have to wait until your 40s to be able to afford pursuing your dreams, if you ever can.

        You did well out of the birth lottery, good for you.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 01 2020, @01:22AM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 01 2020, @01:22AM (#1014817)

          If you have children (and aren't irresponsible or rich), it's pretty much mandatory to have to downgrade from "chasing your dreams" to "having a hobby".

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 01 2020, @10:10PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 01 2020, @10:10PM (#1015170)

            Call the whaaaaaambulance!

        • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday July 01 2020, @02:20AM

          by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday July 01 2020, @02:20AM (#1014840) Journal

          Not so much the birth lottery, as making people want to PAY ME to go see those places. :^)

          So, I didn't get rich on it, but I made a living.

    • (Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Tuesday June 30 2020, @06:41PM

      by fustakrakich (6150) on Tuesday June 30 2020, @06:41PM (#1014636) Journal

      The older you get the faster time seems to pass.

      Time is logarithmic.

      --
      La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @07:09PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @07:09PM (#1014649)

      The fun thing is, everyone is going to get old

      You sound young. Normally older people know that not everyone lives long enough to get old.

      • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday June 30 2020, @07:29PM

        by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday June 30 2020, @07:29PM (#1014658) Journal

        I'm young enough to code, study, learn new things eagerly. Yet I know where all the bodies are buried in my organization for the past four decades. Started this job when I got out of school. In a time when a BIG hard drive was 40 MB. And just a couple years earlier, on a minicomputer, a 40 MB hard drive was $35,000.

        --
        People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.