Lemonade from lemons
There was a very intriguing article in Investor’s Business Daily on Wednesday, December 13. It was an interview with Shirley Ann Jackson, President of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, With Boomers Retiring, U.S. Tech Industry Faces ‘Quiet Crisis’; http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?rtsec=17&artnum=1&issue=20061213&rss=1
The jest of the article was that the retirement of boomers from the sciences and engineering talent pool was going to limit the U. S. economy’s technological advancement over time. Ms. Jackson makes an interesting point. He point shows a need. Her point offers an opportunity.There is a great deal of high value talent about to come onto the market. Some of the retiring engineers and scientists will use retirement as an opportunity to pursue new passions, but there is another view. These boomers have had long careers in technology because they have a deep and abiding passion for their field of expertise.Here are some important points to keep in mind about this particular type of boomers.
- They are life long learners. Nothing interests them more than something new.
- They are healthy and likely to live a long time.
- They know what it is to live lives of passion.
- They have financial flexibility.
- They are sophisticated and experienced.
Women and men who have lived a passion are not the kind to spend the next 30 to 40 years playing shuffleboard or reading on the front porch. I would bet that after a year or two of traveling or writing they will want to pursue their old passions again.
Some of these boomer scientists and engineers will teach. Others will want to do research or product development as they did before retirement. If business is smart, and sometimes they are, they will harness this talent pool for themselves.
Here is the opportunity. If the boomers are smart they will form their own consortiums; think tanks, consultant practices, to deal with business. Why outsource to India when you can outsource to a company of retirees in the US. There are a dozen ways to do this. An obvious one that comes to mind is an affiliation with a university.
Take it further. Artists, trades people, hobbyists can band together to sell their goods and services. Think of the guilds of the middle ages.
The act of pulling something like this together takes work. Who will do the work? Retired boomers? What’s required? Planning, talking, networking. The Internet and the virtual workplace make this all easily possible. Who set’s it up? Who will sell the goods and services? Who manages the operation? Boomers and others.
There is work out. You just have to be willing to do it.
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POSTED IN: Mindset, Networking, New Ideas
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