Mature-age workers the "white knights" of the economic crisis

23 January 2009 8:37am

"Smart" employers are looking to mature-age workers to fill contract positions during the economic slowdown, to reap the benefits of their experience in challenging times, according to SageCo director, Alison Monroe.

She says highly experienced mature-age workers are proving to be the "white knights" of the current financial situation, and employers making wholesale redundancies and losing their knowledge base in the process are likely to find themselves on the back foot when the economy improves.

Smart employers are hanging on to their mature workers because they offer experience in tough times, Monroe told HR Daily. "They're using them as gurus to help them navigate the crisis."

Older workers, she says, have "been there before", and usually have the skills and poise to make prudent decisions during crises.

"Short sighted" retrenchments could see businesses lose this experience and skill.

And organisations will be judged for many years to come on how they treat employees now, Monroe warns. Employers that fail to explore alternatives to retrenchments and retain their "knowledge" will find it tough to attract talent when the economy turns.

The downturn is only providing short-term relief from the skills shortage, she says. With an ageing workforce the shortage is likely to become more chronic as financial conditions improve.

Attracting wisdom workers

According to Monroe, many employers are currently looking to increase contract and project headcount as opposed to filling or creating full-time roles.

At the same time, older workers are seeking flexible options such as part-time work or job-sharing, autonomy over start and finish times and the opportunity to work from home.

"It's a good fit," she says.

Employers can benefit from the wisdom of experienced workers, and mature workers have the opportunity to tailor their working lives around other commitments and needs.

However, organisations should adopt a "helicopter view" and employ or redress certain strategies across a number of key areas in order to make the "fit" possible and to lure or keep mature staff, she says.

These include:

branding - employers should reflect and be open to a broad candidate pool, Monroe says.

The overuse of youthful images, for instance, on a website or in advertising material, can "alienate potential candidates and give the organisation a reputation for not being age positive";

recruitment - older candidates are often "screened out" by recruitment agencies before potential employers have a chance to meet with them, Monroe says.

Also, mature-age workers are often far less experienced than "prime-age" candidates in the contemporary recruitment process and are therefore more likely to be unsuccessful in the preliminary stages.

Employers and recruiters should be conscious of and address such potential inequities, she says; and

culture and environment - whether in the workplace or in the perception of the public and potential clients.

Flexibility and other worker-friendly practices can attract a broad worker demographic, and that broad demographic can, in turn, create an organisational culture that clients see as positive or accessible.

"Mature customers don't always want to deal with 22-year-olds," Monroe says.

Case study

According to a CGU Insurance spokeswoman, mature-age employees of CGU are attracted to and use the opportunity to take career breaks or work flexible hours.

"CGU has a suite of flexible work options that apply to all of our employees that are designed to accommodate people at different stages of their life journey," the spokeswoman says.

Attracting mature talent, she says, has helped build an employee base with the life experience to better relate to customers, and resulted in a drop in absenteeism and turnover.

One CGU business unit, for example, has 700 employees with an average of more than 11 years of service per person, she says.

Dispelling the myths

Mature-age workers in white-collar industries are far less likely to fall sick or be injured than workers from Generation Y, Monroe says.

The perception that mature-age workers take longer to recover from injury or illness than younger workers is also a myth, she says.

In addition, older workers are far more likely to stick around and be loyal to an organisation than Gen-Y workers, with their tenure rates, on average, double that of younger colleagues.

However, stereotypes or prejudices against older workers are far less common now than in the past, Monroe says.

"Employers are really valuing their older 'wisdom workers'," she says.

"This could see the pendulum swing from coveted 'prime-age candidates' to their more mature colleagues."

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