Thought for the day: we must both respect and ignore age at work

I just turned 55 yesterday. I completely get that people can argue whether that is or isn’t old, but just for the purpose of this article, let’s pretend it is. How should we think about age at work, and how should others think about older colleagues? Here are a few perspectives. I hope you find at least a couple interesting. They are largely intended to be (my) observations rather than judgements.

Many older people have less certainty. In the lifetime of those of us over, say, 40, in many countries, the way older people are viewed and treated has changed radically. When I was younger, older people were much more consistently treated as respected elders of the tribe, often had money saved, a job for life, a couple of generations of family around them, and had a level of authority. Quite a Confucian vibe. This isn’t always true today. It seems more like older people just have to roll up their sleeves and wrestle with others in the quest for money, security, respect and happiness. A humorous example: A few years ago I was sitting on the sofa with my cousin’s teenage children. One of them turned to me and said “Hey Dave, let’s go into town and get f***ed up”. Now he probably wasn’t serious, and I didn’t accept his kind offer, but I very much enjoyed the sentiment, and reflected on the fact that I couldn’t even have contemplated speaking like that to one of my uncles when I was that age. Although many things are better for many of us in society, arguably many older people have less certainty.

Older people can both accept and fight ageing. In the wonderful text “Desiderata”, Max Ehrmann wrote the line: “Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.” In other words – act your age. On the other hand, in his poem “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night”, the rather naughty Welsh poet Dylan Thomas wrote “Rage, rage against the dying of the light”. These two sound opposite, but I think it may be possible to do both. As we get older, we can try to retain a sense of fun and play, humility, the Buddhist notion of “Beginner’s Mind”, curiosity, passion, innovation, but at the same time, choose to play some of the roles associated with an elder (calmness, mentoring etc.)

We can think of our life as having three themes. A wonderful Japanese colleague Konishi-san shared some Japanese wisdom with me. It can be helpful to think of your life in three phases. Let’s call them absorbing, producing, and giving back. Whether or not you are working, studying or doing anything else, this viewpoint suggests that in the first third of your life your dominant theme is learning and absorbing. The second third of your life is about being a workhorse, part of the engine of society, getting things done. And the third third is accepting one’s role as an ‘elder of the tribe’, mentoring, sharing, giving back. There are lots of exceptions to this: some can’t ever work, we all do a bit of all three all the time, they overlap, and it certainly doesn’t have to be exact thirds. But nevertheless it is a perspective worth playing with.

Work is not just work. When you are getting older, and considering choices like retiring, downshifting etc., it is super important to be clear about work means as a part of your identity. Some people imagine they would love to blow off work as soon as they can afford to. Some are right. Some end up feeling a bit lost and aimless. I know that work is a very important part of my identity, and although I may change the nature of it a bit, I hope never to lose passion or ambition. I remember reading about a terminally ill British ex-military man and business executive who missed work terribly, and set up a service for the terminally ill to find appropriate work. More humorously, when I lived in Japan, I heard a couple of cruel nicknames that wives purportedly used to refer to their retired husbands who were hanging around the house: Nureochiba (濡れ落ち葉) – literally meaning wet fallen leaf, referring to retired husbands who get stuck underfoot at home, and Sodaigomi (粗大ごみ) – meaning big rubbish (like broken washing machines) that you have to get someone to take away. [Excuse me for the sexist roles – that was just how it was when I was in Japan.]

We mustn’t treat every older person the same. Just like every person of a specific gender, or ethnicity, we should not assume every older person has the same hopes, fears, skills, plans. And specifically, we shouldn’t stereotype based on outside appearance. I have met many older people who look tired and ready for a nap, but when you get to know them, they are curious, playful, openminded and ready to experiment. And I have met many younger, more dynamic people who are the opposite. As Forrest Gump might say, older people are like a box of chocolates. Or as Bob Dylan says in the song “My Back Pages”, “I was so much older then. I’m younger than that now.” I certainly feel like I am.

I think the bottom line here is that older people, their colleagues and companies looking for staff should all “check themselves before they wreck themselves”, as Ali G might say, with regards to judging older people, and matching them to work. A simple, stereotypically approach might just not work.