Page 113 - increasing-the-value-of-age-guidance-in-employers-age-management-strategies

Increasing the value of age: guidance in employers’ age management strategies

motivated several of the company’s senior employees to stay in their jobs longer.
This trend is seen in several cases.
When the guidance focuses strongly on the individual, effects can also be
seen in the self-confidence of an older employee. With the right guidance
activities, employees validate their own knowledge and skills and, at the same
time, learn something new. In the case of a mentoring programme, younger
colleagues gain more experience and can see their confidence increasing as well
as their motivation to perform better as they learn from their more experienced
colleagues.
Mentoring activities also help younger workers in setting their career paths
and potential further education processes. By learning new skills and by sharing
the experience of their older colleagues, they can reflect on what they would like
to do in the future or what they do best. This shows the relevance of the creation
of a lifespan approach, with a holistic understanding of the individual which
stimulates contact and cooperation between generations.

7.2.1.2. Organisation level
At this level, there is an important link between the goals behind approaches
used and the activities developed. Organisations are generally focused on
targets, using guidance activities for a specific reason, and working toward
reaching underlying goals. When looking at the cases, companies seem to be
reaching their goals (see Chapter 3):
(a) productivity is increasing/not lost;
(b) the culture is changing;
(c) knowledge is transferred within the organisations.

A strategic approach to these subjects, through an age management
strategy, helps create a stable process of change; it might even speed up the
process. One Wicke’s employee commented: ‘Although I have already been with
the company for 15 years, I learned a lot of details that proved very useful later
on. By just taking over the job without an assessment, getting acquainted with my
new tasks would have been much harder and certainly taken longer than half a
year.”
However, it is not always possible to make a direct link between the age
management strategy, guidance activities, and the results. More variables than
just the strategy itself affect the results, for instance other developments within
the organisation or country. Nevertheless, age management does contribute to
the realisation of the goals.
Age management strategies result in a higher level of social capital. Social
capital is seen as the (economic/productive) benefits that relate to the (social)

100