As I sat down to dinner tonight, I picked up the business section of this morning’s Seattle PI (yes, it’s true, I never read the paper in the morning) and read an article from the AP called “Retirement Detour.”
Not surprisingly, more retirees are wanting to go back to work. And it’s not necessarily about wanting something to do, it’s about paying the bills and putting food on the table. AARP reported more than double the number of people attended its annual job fair than last year.
Not to be alarmist, but now as retirees, we are competing for jobs with people half our age also looking for jobs because they’ve been laid off from their jobs recently. One woman talks about feeling that even though she may have better skills than her younger counterparts applying for the same job, the 20 or 30-something doing the interviewing will most often hire the younger person.
That is certainly true in some cases. However, finding a job is still about keeping up-to-date with skills and with the marketplace. For instance, there’s a wide spread belief that people in their 50’s and older don’t have good computer skills. Being a 55 year old geek myself and knowing plenty of other 50 and 60-something geeks, I know that to be flat out untrue.
After all, it was our generation that really got on board with this stuff. Bill Gates is my age and so is Steve Jobs. So, that’s one of those old myths that may die hard. Something the 30 and 40 somethings may want to consider is how will they be perceived in 10 or 15 years? Not such a long time, after all.
Having said all that, keeping up with the skills needed in the workplace is important and it’s true that many of us, young and old, don’t have the required computer skills needed for many positions, such as how to create Excel spreadsheets or format a document in Word. Or worse yet, how to save and organize files, manage email and even something as basic as to know how to log on and off a computer.
Happily, most of us probably know how to post our resumes online. If you don’t, it’s time to learn unless you want to bag groceries at the local Safeway. Speaking of posting our resumes online, the article provides a pretty extensive list of online job sites for retirees and older job seekers.
Sites included are RetirementJobs.com, RetireeWorkforce.com, RetiredBrains.com, Retirement-Jobs-Online.com, and agingworkforcenews. That’s just the first 5 in a list of 15. To read the article and see the rest of this list of resources, see Retirement Detour by Dave Carpenter.
Even though I have a job (and what some would consider a very good job) I have dusted off and re-written my resume because I am looking for a new challenge in a new environment. Contrary to the perception that older workers don’t like to go to trainings, I just want to ask, who have they been talking to? It’s sure not my experience.
I’d love to hear yours.
