Monthly Archives: June 2007

Encore Careers

Marc Freedman is one of our heroes. In the midst of sound and fury about the boomers, his is a steady, reassuring voice of hope and reason. In his new book, Encore: Finding Work That Matters in the Second Half of Life, Freedman wastes no time in painting two starkly contrasting visions of the future. In one, boomers — ‘greedy geezers’ — on an endless, subsidized vacation, have sabotaged the economy, tipping the nation into decline. In the other, ‘boomer labor power’ fueled by Encore Careers — what he calls ‘purpose-driven jobs’ — makes life more meaningful, fulfilling and financially sustainable, not only for boomers themselves, but for generations to come.

Freedman, 49, founder and ceo of Civic Ventures, a think tank and incubator dedicated to “generating ideas and inventing programs to achieve the greatest return on experience,” shies away from the emphasis on voluntarism that characterized his earlier book, Prime Time: How the Baby Boomers Will Revolutionize Retirement and Transform America. He believes that, given the right policy decisions and bold new initiatives to address the ‘experience dividend,’ millions of boomers will make a virtue of the necessity to generate an income later in life, and enter into a new phase of work that may be shorter in duration, but ‘weight more’ in impact.

What is needed, he writes, is a new social contract with older people that directs them not toward the outdated ‘freedom from work’ of an earlier generation and time, but ‘freedom to work.’ To illustrate, five ‘Encore Pioneers’ tell their stories and show what is possible when you don’t accept the status quo. Former car salesman, Robert Chambers, now provides low-interest loans and fuel-efficient cars to the rural pool in New Hampshire. After thirty years as a truant officer, Jacqueline Kahn began to train in her early fifties for her new career as a critical care nurse (see her featured in Time Magazine).

“In choosing work that is aimed at making a better world, these leading-edge baby boomers are challenging the definition of success for all Americans,” writes Marc Freedman. In the future he envisions, these examples of Encore Careers will be commonplace and the dire forecasts of those who saw inevitable social collapse caused by an aging society, will seem as absurd as Y2K.

Read this book and light your own fire. The Appendix, Your Encore, is packed with resources to help you find your way and keep the flame burning.  And there is an Encore website.  “The future is calling,” Freedman concludes. “What are we waiting for?”

Knock, Knock. Who’s There?

Some week ago, I was asked by a colleague in the aging field to consider serving on a panel on the use of the Internet by the older population, specifically, on how the Internet is creating a new ‘space’ for electronic elders, a la My Space.

No doubt people are jumping into that space. There was considerable buzz about the launch of Eons.com, the social networking site dedicated to people 50+ (or, it was, but the last time I checked, it was 49+). The zippy slogan, ‘loving the flip side of 50,’ certainly is a grabber, and anything that Monster.com founder, Jeff Taylor, would create, gets my attention. Eons was attracting money, too: $22M in the most recent round of financing. But from my own experience of writing a newsletter for the age group, I really wondered if there was a need for an age-segmented social networking site.

I signed up for Eons anyway (284 days ago, according to my profile), and joined five different groups — careers for the 50+, home-based business, books, yoga and long-distance grand-parenting — and after some interaction with other group members, I have to wonder along with Howard Rheingold, author of Smart Mobs and expert on the social implications of communications technology: “Is being over 50 years old strong enough affinity? I’m not so sure.”

Maybe this is an idea before its time. New research published in Business Week suggests that may be the case. Among the Older Boomers (age 51-61), 8% are involved in social networking, for Seniors (62+), the figure is 6%. A huge generation gap. Yet, 61% and 70% of these same groups, respectively, are ‘on line,’ reading blogs and gathering information. Just not active in social networking. If this describes you, and you want to get your feet wet and see what the hubbub is all about, you might start with Social Networking 101.

And if you are among those entrepreneurs of a certain age who want to connect with your age group for whatever purpose, you could interpret these stats as an opportunity disguised as a problem. In the words of oft-quoted management guru, Peter Drucker: The best way to predict the future is to create it.