Page 48 - increasing-the-value-of-age-guidance-in-employers-age-management-strategies

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

age management practices and higher organisation of human resources
procedures, in the former case. Family-owned culture, allied to the difficulty of
replacing experienced staff in very small units, likely applies in the latter case.
Regional differences are sometimes reported. A study in Italy indicates that
most companies that employ active age management policies are located in the
north of Italy, while the rest were located in the central area, and none from the
south.

3.4. Conclusions

This chapter assessed different European sources on the employment situation
and lifelong learning activities of older workers and enterprise policies on
education and training.
Assessing the progress made on EU employment targets for older workers
suggests that:
(a) countries are increasingly employing older workers in 2000-10;
(b) countries differ strongly in their employment of people aged 55 to 65;
(c) differences occur in the number (and percentage) of older employees in the
different economic sectors within the EU;
(d) gender differences occur, with female older workers having lower
participation rates, with the exception of Estonia, Latvia, Finland and
Sweden;
(e) most countries are raising or have raised the statutory pension age, or are
planning to do so.
The following can be concluded on training of older workers:
(a) participation in adult learning generally decreases with age and drops most
between the two oldest age cohorts analysed (45-54 and 55-64).

Research on company activities for older workers shows that:
(a) active age management policies are still not fully embedded in organisation
human resources policies, although positive examples are manifold;
(b) age is an important factor in describing working conditions, with significant
differences emerging between younger and older workers for most job
characteristics;
(c) fewer companies are systematically checking the need for further training of
older workers compared to permanent employees in skilled or high- skilled
positions;
(d) CVET is less practised in SMEs compared to larger companies, while older
workers are overrepresented in SMEs. SMEs also offer limited training

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