Workshop 4 (half day)
Are We Ready? Strategic Human Resource Management and the Maturing Workforce
Presenters: Jerry W. Hedge, Organizational Solutions Group
Janet Barnes-Farrell, University of Connecticut
Walter C. Borman, Personnel Decisions Research
Institutes & University of South Florida
Coordinator: Sara P. Weiner, IBM
The baby boom generation has started turning 60; with 78 million members, this represents the largest cohort to ever approach retirement. Because it is far larger than any generation before or since, its impact on the workplace over the next several decades will be dramatic. For example, when baby boomers reach retirement age, the departure of many highly-skilled veteran employees could result in a huge loss of institutional knowledge. Many organizations will also find themselves with far fewer employees in the succession pipeline equipped to assume leadership roles, and too few experienced mentors to help these emerging leaders succeed. Worldwide, the workforce is aging, and this requires that we give more attention to both the problems and potential of older workers. As organizations grapple with this aging workforce, a strategic human resource management challenge will be to offer new and attractive opportunities that enhance the likelihood that older workers will continue to contribute to organizational life in significant ways.
This workshop should appeal to a diverse audience. HR practitioners will gain practical insight on the latest thinking about how to best recruit, retain, utilize, and motivate older workers. Academic and business professionals will be provided with literature-based findings about performance and motivation differences between “younger” and “older” workers. Researchers will be presented with practical issues and unanswered questions to be explored across a wide variety of age-related content areas.
This workshop is designed to help participants:
• Summarize research on how cognitive and noncognitive capabilities change with age
• Examine factors that influence retirement decisions
• Compare aging worker best practices of various employers with those of their own organizations
• Identify work–life issues and strategies of particular value to mature workers
• Apply organizational policies and actions that promote continued investment in older employees
• Design workforce development strategies to minimize loss of organizational knowledge
Jerry W. Hedge is an independent consultant who has been involved in personnel research for more than 25 years. He has worked with both public- and private-sector clients designing, implementing, and evaluating human resource management systems and tools. His expertise includes job analysis and competency modeling; performance measurement; selection system development and validation; and issues associated with aging workers. Of particular relevance to the current workshop, he coauthored The Aging Workforce: Realities, Myths, and Implications for Organization. He received his PhD in I-O psychology from Old Dominion University.
Janet Barnes-Farrell is an associate professor of psychology at the University of Connecticut. Her research and teaching interests center on work and aging, work–life issues, and performance measurement. Pertinent to this workshop, she coedited a special issue of Experimental Aging Research devoted to work and aging, and has contributed to several recent edited books concerned with our aging workforce, including Retirement: Reasons, Processes, and Results, and the forthcoming Aging and Work in the 21st Century. She received her PhD in I-O psychology from the Pennsylvania State University.
Walter C. Borman is CEO of Personnel Decisions Research Institutes, Inc., and professor of I-O psychology at the University of South Florida. He has conducted personnel research studies in the public- and private- sector for more than 30 years. Borman’s expertise is in the areas of performance appraisal and measurement, job analysis, personnel selection, and personality assessment. He and his PDRI colleagues were recipients of the Myers Award for Applied Psychology in the Workplace in 2000, 2002, and 2004. Recently, he coauthored (with Hedge and Lammlein) an APA book on the aging workforce. He received his PhD in I-O psychology from the University of California (Berkeley).
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