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 10
Reasons Why Age Can Be An Asset
- Resources and expertise – The
“age-advantaged” worker comes with a broad, deep toolbox
full of resources assembled over a lifetime, including:
- Experience
- Skills, know-how, and expertise
- Knowledge of the business environment: markets
and market forces, customers, competitors, suppliers, challenges,
and opportunities
- Organizational intelligence
- Valuable contacts and connections
They are resourceful problem-solvers and experimental
innovators, able to draw on a lifetime of observation.
They've seen and made mistakes; they've seen best practices;
they've seen what works and what doesn't, and they've learned
from it all.
- Wisdom – With age comes the accumulation
of knowledge that leads to good judgment, common sense,
insight, and pragmatism.
- Perspective and vision – Seasoned
workers have developed a sense of history and context.
Their experience enables them to see the big picture and to
weigh relative importance and worth of things. They recognize
patterns and cycles and can see things in terms of shades
of grey. More strategic in focus, they have the ability
to recognize the end goal and the steps it takes to get there.
- Commitment and loyalty – Studies
show that workers in the 55+ age range are the most satisfied,
engaged, motivated workforce segment, and the most likely
to identify with their organizations and share its values.
They tend to focus on making a contribution and helping to achieve
the goal rather than on proving themselves and calculating the
next move up the corporate ladder.
- Stability and dependability –
Age-advantaged workers are less likely to have childcare issues
and less likely to quit. They are far more likely to show up
for work and to follow through.
- Self knowledge – With maturity
comes a strong sense of identity, self confidence, understanding
of personal values, and emotional intelligence.
- People skills – A lifetime of
interacting with people has made age-advantaged workers politically
aware. It has instilled patience and professionalism.
It has taught the older worker to understand, appreciate, and
work with different personalities, styles, and viewpoints; to
manage up and down; and to cope, collaborate, and accommodate.
- Flexibility – Having reached a
place where they no longer need to build careers, age-advantaged
workers offer flexibility in terms of schedules, hours, and
also compensation and benefits.
- Reputation and credibility – All
of these points serve as the foundation for one of the most
important assets of all: strong reputation that generates
credibility and instills confidence in a wide
variety of constituencies.
- Ability to mentor – As important
as performing, older workers add value by teaching, mentoring,
and passing on a lifetime of accumulated knowledge and practical
intelligence.
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Quotes This Month
“Experience is simply
the name we give our mistakes.”
~Oscar Wilde~
“The great thing about
getting older is you don't lose all the other ages you've been.”
~Madeleine L'Engle~
“Age is something that
doesn't matter unless you are a cheese.”
~Billie Burke~
“Wisdom doesn't
necessarily come with age. Sometimes age just shows up all by itself.”
~Tom Wilson~
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