Tag Archives: work

Launching a Business

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Thanks to a link provided by schoolteacher who has been using material from 2young2retire.com in her charter school classroom, we decided to update our page for entrepreneurs.  Here it is:

You may always have dreamed of being your own boss, or you may find yourself driven by an economic climate that opens new doors even while it closes others.   Whatever the motivation, welcome to the club.  You are in excellent company.  While young entrepreneurs tend to be the darlings of the media, the 55 and older cohort of entrepreneurs is growing faster and doing better. Why? Could be life/work experience, some cash from a downsizing, mortgage paid off, kids launched, and an idea that has been incubating for a while. Too Young to Retire: 101 Ways to Start the Rest of Your Life (Plume 2004) is packed with business ideas, from antique restorer to wedding planner. If your big idea isn’t listed here, feel free to drop me a line and tell me about it: marika@2young2retire.com.

Obviously launching a business at any age is a huge undertaking and we can only scratch the surface of the subject here. The good news is, there is plenty of information available to anyone with access to a computer and Internet connection. Beside some fire in the belly and cash, what we all need as entrepreneurs is help from experienced business people who can mentor us through the startup process and direct us to the people and resources that help us grow.

Small Business Resources

As of this writing, Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE) is about to launch a newly designed website that will make it even easier to connect with experienced mentors — 13,00 of them — on line and in a new series of workshops on starting, managing and growing your business. A click will take you to an archive of business columnists SCORE has been around since 1964 offering free and confidential business advice that has helped millions of aspiring entrepreneurs.

Wall Street Journal Small Business is another excellent source of ideas and expert opinion.  The Small Business Guide covers everything from starting a business to selling it.

Another source of good general information for free is the Small Business Administration.   See also the Virtual Business Plan from Bizplanit.

Business Insurance is a handy guide to some basics including legal, marketing and personnel resources with live links to speed you there.

The independent entrepreneurs check out Working Solo (www.workingsolo.com), the terrific site started by Terri Lonier (lone-yay) on the joys of being “boss-free.”  Ilise Benun’s Marketing Mentor is also dedicated to the soloist or small partnership. Get a free consultation, daily newsletter and preview of her books.

You can find lots of help by seeking out trade associations connected with the business you’re considering.  Trade associations can fast-track you right into the action, helping you connect with the people in the know, and perhaps even some financing sources.  When Paul and Sands Belizzi wanted to ranch alpacas in Northern California, they got started in just this way: Alpaca Owners and Breeders Association (U.S.), 800-213-9522.

As the name suggests, the National Business Incubation Association “provides entrepreneurs with the expertise, networks and tools they need to make their ventures successful.”

The U.K. has a model for what is possible when you have a champion.  In this case, the champion is Charles, Prince of Wales, and his organization is Prime-Cymru (Welsh for Wales), www.prime-cymru.co.uk, dedicated to help would-be entrepreneurs 50 and older get a start.  Of the 600 start-ups Prime-Cymru has helped launch, only 6 have failed.

Inn Keeping

Thinking about owning/operating a B&B (who hasn’t)? You might want to contact theProfessional Association of Innkeepers International for some on the ground information.  Try out innkeeping for a season or a year.  Or check out house sitting via THE CARETAKER GAZETTE, (715-426-5500) published by Gary and Thea Dunn.

Owning/Operating A Family Business

If you do go into business for yourself, chances are you’ll find yourself (at least in early stages) working with your spouse or another family member.  A caveat: these partnerships are easier to get into than to get out of, so make sure you know how to end gracefully (and save the relationship itself).

The Center for Family Business has courses and more information on this topic.  203-932-7421.  Another resource: The Family Firm Institute, Inc.

And, don’t overlook your local Chamber of Commerce.  Knowing who’s who in business in your community can be a great way to test the waters.

Books/Magazines

There are literally hundreds of books on becoming a successful entrepreneur.  One of our favorites remains Paul Hawken’s Growing a Business (Fireside, 1998).  The co-founder of Smith and Hawken, he now leads The Natural Step, an organization committed to sustainable business practices.

Inc. Magazine remains a reliable source of information for the entrepreneur, whether you are just starting out or growing your business. We loved the recent coverage on balancing business with life featuring Pete and Laura Wakeman of Great Harvest Bakery. Search the Inc. site for this.

Also useful is Entrepreneur magazine, which also features a wealth of small business how to’s.

Jeff Berner’s The Joy of Working From Home: Making a Life While Making a Living (Berrett- Koehler Publishers, Inc. 1994) is a classic of its kind, packed with great ideas for you entrepreneurs and independent contractors.

No One Will Hire Me …

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(…I’m too old.)  Of all the self-defeating statements we hear from people 60 and older who are in need of a job, this has to be the most common and saddest.  No doubt, this belief is based on personal experience with ageism, losing out to a younger competitor, for example.  Or simply finding that the strategies that worked before — a dynamite resume, power networking  — aren’t producing the desired result, especially in the current economic climate.   Ageism isn’t going to disappear, and we might do well to take the advice of employment counselors, weary of the complaint: “Get over it!”

Here, according to a new study from MetLife Mature Market Institute are seven common mistakes older job seekers must correct if they are to be successful in finding work.

• “I’ll just do what I was doing before.”
• “My experience speaks for itself.”
• “I don’t have time for this touchy-feely stuff about what work means to me.”
• “I know! I’ll become a consultant!”
• “Of course I’m good with computers.”
• “I’ll just use a recruiter for some career coaching.”
• “I’ve always been successful, so why should things be different now?”

If you are looking for work and any of these misconceptions ring a bell with you, take the time to download and read Buddy, Can You Spare a Job?  The MetLife Study of the New Realities of the Job Market for Aging Baby Boomers (October ’09).  It just might turn your head around.  As the study says, “Wishful thinking is not a job search method.”  Resilience, a willingness to relocate, and the motivation to learn new skills are absolute musts if you are seeking a job at 60 or older.  Or at any age, for that matter.

50+? The Peace Corps Wants You

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“Do people tell you you`re over the hill? … What if you were?  Over the hill, over a stream and over an ocean.  To another continent.  Thousands of miles from your own. Where elders are looked to as leaders …”

If you’re over 50 and have ever been attracted to becoming a Peace Corps volunteer, this advertising message should alert you to the fact that the Peace Corps is recruiting older adults, for their maturity, life and business experience, and transferable skills.  Of the approximately 7,800 volunteers around the world, people 50 and older make up 5%, or fewer than 400.  Host nations are asking for volunteers who can offer real-world experience in technical fields, business development, agribusiness or teaching, rather than young adults right out of college, says Rosie Mauk, the Peace Corps’ associate director of volunteer recruitment and selection.  Applications among older Americans, many of whom have lost jobs in last year’s economic downturn, are on the rise.

2young2retire facilitator and Peace Corps volunteer, Patrice Koerper, who recently returned from an assignment in Macedonia, describes it as the “most amazing, rewarding adventure of my life,”  and the Peace Corps itself as the best organization she has ever been associated with.  A seasoned public relations professional with a “great job,” Patrice was looking for a change of direction.  She had three personal goals for her next endeavor:  first, she wanted “to see the faces of the people I was helping”; second, she wanted to get to know more people; and third, she wanted to live in Eastern Europe from where her family immigrated generations ago.  Service with the Peace Corps in Macedonia met all three.

In 2006, while exploring new possibilities for work and life, she took the training to become a certified 2young2retire facilitator.  She also found herself drawn to the Peace Corps and decided to apply.  After a six-month application process which she found both “laborious and scary,” she felt the Peace Corps knew more about her than anyone.  If you’re an older volunteer, you should expect that because there is so much more to know.

Based on an assessment of your skills and experience, the Peace Corps decides what kind of work you will take on.   Once you have accepted an assignment – you are offered up to three locations – you receive language and other training to prepare you for life in your host country.  The mission of the Peace Corps is captured in these three goals:

  1. Helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.
  2. Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.
  3. Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.

The Three Goals, plus the commitment to a 27-month duration of service, tend to screen out all but the most serious applicants.  Peace Corps volunteer are supplied with a round trip ticket, housing allowance and a stipend to cover food, transportation and incidentals.  For Patrice this came to $220 a month, or roughly equivalent to 250 Euros, an average salary in Macedonia.  The point is, volunteers must live like the locals.  She received full medical coverage during her service and affordable health insurance for up to 18 months following service.   Older volunteers who draw Social Security and/or other pension benefits, may accumulate significant savings while they are away from home.  All returning Peace Corps volunteers are awarded just over $6,000 toward a smooth transition to life back home, and Patrice notes, they are eligible for Response Corps, short-term, high-impact assignments that typically range from three months to a year, at the request of a country.

Eager to begin her new assignment, Patrice arrived in Macedonia and spent the first six months “doing nothing.  Patience is the Number One way to survive,” she notes.  Macedonia, which became independent from Yugoslavia in 1991, is in the process of reinventing itself and its economy.  She was assigned to work with a government agency and eventually found herself doing workshops on change.  At first, people tended to view volunteers with suspicion, perhaps because there has been no formal tradition of volunteering.  She grew comfortable with the experience of “living minute to minute.” The last seven months of her service in Macedonia proved to be the most fruitful and rewarding.   “I realized I was in the business of building hope and trust,” Patrice says.  She kept the motto of Macedonian native, Mother Theresa, in mind: “Do small things with great love.”

Here are links about the Peace Corps, including recent budgetary debate and how to go about applying:

Recruiting the 50+
Budget Debates, Future Prospects
From Job Loss to Peace Corps
About Peace Corps
Forum for Volunteers
How to Apply


One Thing Leads to Another

I was walking with my friend and yoga student, Mary, up from the beach after finishing a class and she said she had been thinking more about how one thing leads to another, and whether that might be a good topic for the Small Group Ministry at the Unitarian congregation we both belong to.

We agreed that it was. It was also too intriguing a statement not to pursue, so I asked her to describe what she meant. And she told me, in brief, how she found her life-long passion because when she graduated from college, she went out knocking on doors looking for a job and found herself at the Library of Congress where they were looking for someone to work with the blind. All she wanted was a job, and it turned out to be a job that led to other jobs, in Beirut where she later lived, and then in Geneva, one thing leading to another, and in the process she found the work she was meant to do.

Why does this resonate with me? 2young2retire, the mom-and-pop I founded with my husband, Howard, ten years ago, helps people at midlife and beyond transition from work they did for a living, to work they do for love (and sometimes for money). Our book (Too Young to Retire: 101 Ways to Start the Rest of Your Life) and course on which it is based, use provocative questions to get at what really matters to people, where they feel they could make a contribution — a different motivation from making the mortgage payment — and then how to proceed to find that next work. This work, usually found in one’s late 50’s or 60, has been called a Next Chapter, a Second Act, an Encore career, but what characterizes this new work is that it feels like a calling, something you simply cannot resist doing.

Transition is never easy because we tend to be creatures of habit. And it’s good to have a plan, a goal, a sense of direction. But perhaps we’ve not given enough weight to the value of just getting started, taking that first step, as Mary did long ago, and then simply letting one thing lead to another. Because it most certainly will.