Active Ageing Workforce In Virtual Environment - Methodology And Innovation - Esangathan White Paper

Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Env ironment Methodology and Innovation

WHITE PAPER by Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN September 2008

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

TABLE OF CONTENTS 1.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .................................................................................................................3

2.

INTRODUCTION..............................................................................................................................4

3.

MAIN ISSUES..................................................................................................................................7 ACTIVE AGEING SOCIETY .............................................................................................. 7 LOSS OF KNOWLEDGE AND KNOW-HOW ............................................................................... 9 USE OF ICT FOR A NEW PRODUCTIVE SOCIALITY ..................................................................... 12

4.

STRUCTURING DIMENSIONS .....................................................................................................14 THE SOCIOLOGICAL DIMENSION ...................................................................................... 14 4.1.1 Critical facts ...................................................................................... 15 4.1.2 Representations of seniors by the various categories of actors .......................... 16 THE ECONOMIC DIMENSION .......................................................................................... 19 THE TECHNOLOGICAL DIMENSION .................................................................................... 23 4.1.1 Introduction of Collaborative Working Environments (CWE).............................. 23 4.1.2 eSangathan findings .............................................................................. 24 THE MANAGERIAL DIMENSION........................................................................................ 25 4.1.3 Management of senior knowledge workers................................................... 25 4.1.4 Measurement ...................................................................................... 29 4.1.5 Knowledge transfer and capture............................................................... 29

5.

INDIAN INSIGHT ...........................................................................................................................30 INDIAN POPULATION PYRAMID ....................................................................................... 30 CHALLENGES ........................................................................................................ 31 PRACTICES IN INDIA ................................................................................................. 31 5.1.1 Government ....................................................................................... 31 5.1.2 Corporation........................................................................................ 32 RECOMMENDATION .................................................................................................. 32 CONCLUSION ........................................................................................................ 32

6.

INHIBITORS TO THE EMPLOYMENT OF AGED WORKERS.....................................................33 MACRO-LEVEL INHIBITORS ........................................................................................... 33 MICRO-LEVEL INHIBITORS ............................................................................................ 34 INDIVIDUAL OR PERSONAL INHIBITORS ............................................................................... 35

7.

GOOD PRACTICES, A FEW EXAMPLES ....................................................................................36 GOOD PRACTICES IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR ............................................................................ 37 7.1.1 Sweden ............................................................................................. 37 GOOD PRACTICES IN NATIONAL INSTITUTIONS AND NGOS ............................................................ 38 7.1.2 Belgium............................................................................................. 38 7.1.3 Denmark............................................................................................ 39 7.1.4 France .............................................................................................. 41 7.1.5 The Netherlands .................................................................................. 42 GOOD PRACTICES IN CORPORATIONS ................................................................................. 42 7.1.6 Corporations in France .......................................................................... 43

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN 7.1.7 Corporations in Sweden ......................................................................... 43 GOOD PRACTICES IN HUMAN RESOURCES AND PERSONNEL COMPANIES ............................................... 44 7.1.8 Senior Work (Sweden)............................................................................ 45 7.1.9 Highlighting the Public Sector.................................................................. 45 8.

RECOMMENDATIONS..................................................................................................................46 8.1 RECOMMENDATIONS TO EUROPEAN INSTITUTIONS ............................................................ 46 8.2 RECOMMENDATIONS TO NATIONAL GOVERNMENTS & INSTITUTIONAL BODIES IN CHARGE OF EMPLOYMENT..... 47 8.2.1 Recommendations to national governments ................................................. 47 8.2.2 Recommendations to institutional bodies in charge of employment .................... 47 8.3 RECOMMENDATIONS TO CORPORATIONS ...................................................................... 47 8.4 RECOMMENDATIONS TO THE WORKERS ....................................................................... 48

9.

CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................49

10. BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................................................................................................50 DOCUMENTS ......................................................................................................... 50 WEB REFERENCES.................................................................................................... 51 APPENDICES .......................................................................................................................................50 APPENDIX APPENDIX APPENDIX APPENDIX APPENDIX APPENDIX

1 2 3 4 5 6

– List of Figures – List of Tables – Indian Demography – EU use of internet – Öresund Pilot - Indian Pilot

53 54 60 62 63 69

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY During two years the eSangathan consortium has concentrated its work on a very specific segment of the population; the active ageing workers. Further, eSangathan made the “a priori” assumption that ICT, and more particularly collaborative working environments and Web 2.0 tools could be mastered by this segment of population and contribute to the employability of the aged workers. Due to the profile of the pilot members chosen by eSangathan, it is more particularly the knowledge workers who have been considered. The choice of having two completely different profiles for the pilots has enabled the eSangathan team to better understand the issues to overcome in both situations: • An homogeneous group in a corporation • An heterogeneous group of unemployed and aged workers willing to reposition themselves onto the labour market Two appendixes of this White paper describe the work done with the pilots and the results. Key findings can be summarised in few words: • Aged workers who are willing to learn new ICT tools and develop new usages are able to do so. A few did reject upfront and took for granted that this evolution is not for them; not worth the effort • No specific ICT equipment is necessary for aged workers. The existing systems and software interfaces are sufficient to enable the customisation of a workstation. At least if the developments are done with the respect of the international development norms. • ICT is a natural intergenerational integrator. Indeed, when several generations are members of a team and do use the same working tools and environment; they develop a common language and usages. Age doesn’t count anymore; only skills The White paper also includes a set of recommendations at different levels: • European institutions • National governments and institutional bodies in charge of employment • Corporations • Workers One more generic finding during this two-year work is that too many people speak, work and care about ageing in a wrong way. They consider the same way people from 55 to 70 as the people over 70. The new duration of life expectancy and the relatively good health situation of the European citizens should lead our economists, sociologists, researchers, statisticians and certainly our politicians to put new glasses on and consider seriously the opportunity raised by the potential of their major asset : the knowledge of aged workers. Intellectual capital is a major asset, and a great part of it is still hidden in the heads, habits and behaviours of aged knowledge workers. Europe and the national governments have to organise a proper way not to lose this asset and making sure new generations can benefit from it. The eSangathan team believes that ICT and more specifically collaborative working environments as well as more recent tools like managing social networking (as an example) can easily become intergenerational enablers if an appropriate organisational management is implemented.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

2. INTRODUCTION The combined reality of the population growth decline in Europe and the ageing of the workforce turn the issue of the "active ageing workforce" (AAW) into one of the major topics politicians have to face for the competitiveness of their countries in the European landscape right now. The way Europe envisages to remain an actor playing a major role in the global marketplace is to be defined taking the demographical situation into perspective. Of course, the situation varies from one country to another in the EU-27; nevertheless the global situation is worrying. In the 2006 communication on The Demographic future of Europe - from challenge to opportunity, the Commission of the European Communities highlighted the issue and made the decision to produce every two years a European Demography Report. The first Demography Report has been adopted in May 2007. The forecast calculated by OECD shows that the Age Dependency Ratio will jump from 23 in 2000 to 51 in 2050. This is the ratio of population aged 65 and over as a percentage of population aged 20-64. If we look at the extremes amongst the European members of OECD, it varies from 27 to 73 for a country like Spain while the ratio is much more stable for a country like Sweden where it varies from 30 to 43. It definitely shows how important it is to anticipate such well known situations at government level. Of course, this also relates to the decline of the fertility rate which moved from 1,86 to 1,62 between 1990 and 2004 according to OECD figures. Only few countries have raised their fertility rate such as France, Finland, Denmark or Belgium. The highest rate of decline is in most of the Eastern European states. Such figures have an immediate effect on the workforce and the available talents which are the drivers of the economic development. This particular situation will be analysed in the section on active ageing society. At this stage, a simple graph will perfectly illustrate the general trend: Figure 1 - 1995-2030 EU-workers population trend

Source: European Commission

The graph shows us that one of the core topics of the eSangathan project, which is the employment of the ageing workforce, is a crucial issue which still requires political and social decisions in order to maintain, if not enhance, Europe's competitiveness. This raises the urgent need to improve the employability of older workers and to prepare the labour market for ageing. It clearly shows that the productivity will increasingly rely on a more important portion of aged workers if no other solutions are adopted.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN It also shows the inescapable way that the working life will be longer; some countries, like Germany, have already taken strong measures in order to face the situation. It also explains the reason why it is important to reach the objectives of the i2010 and Lisbon strategy to have 50% of the 55+ included into the labour market. The latest available figures from Eurostat show that we still have a long way to go. Indeed, the figures from 2007 tell us that Europe has reached the level of 43,7%. Unfortunately, the differences between the countries are really important, ranging from 29,7 Poland to 69,6% in Sweden. This is also to compare with a 66,1% in Japan and 61,8% in the USA. Here we have a first signal given by Sweden. Political anticipation has resulted in a balanced correlation between the Age Dependency ratio and the active aged workers ratio. Assumption made by eSangathan The eSangathan team made the "a priori" assumption that ICT could leverage employment opportunities for aged workers who are not necessarily media savvy. The reasons why a number of aged workers are not enough ICT-literate is mainly due to the fact that unfortunately training opportunities are still very rare for 45+ workers and that not all the jobs have required training them. If there is no professional opportunity to be trained, it fully depends on the personal motivation of the worker to become ICT-literate. It is not obvious if there is no specific professional or personal reason to do the effort. In addition, too many large corporations have developed the very bad habit of continuous pre-retirement plans since the early 90, which has killed the opportunity for many workers to develop their skills. To the contrary, those companies have encouraged a large number of workers to consider that there was no room for them anymore in the labour market and unfortunately a number of people have considered that there was no more professional future. Of course, you always have the one who has a personal project and a strong personal motivation and becomes an entrepreneur. But, let's be realistic; it is not a majority of the cases. Now, the reality lies into the fact that more and more people question themselves about "what to do" because of economic necessity to remain active. The economy is not flourishing in Europe and the welfare systems raise crucial issues for the future of the retirements in many countries. Add to this longevity factor. Indeed, the life expectancy in the EU-25 for 2050 is 81,8 compared to 75,6 in 2004 for men and 86,9 versus 81,8 for women. So, the number of 80+ in the EU-25 is projected to grow 58% between 2005 and 2050. The reason of the ICT-based "a priori" assumption of the eSangathan team is twofold: •

•

There is no evidence that an aged person should not be able to acquire new usages based on ICT. We have demonstrated it during the project and are sharing the findings in this paper. There is formal evidence that a country who invests in ICT (infrastructures and usages development) gets a return measured in productivity and GDP.

ICT skills in Europe In June 2006, the European Commission (DG Entreprise and Industry) has established the ICT Task Force, set up to recommend policy actions that seek to improve the ICT sector’s competitiveness and remove obstacles to greater ICT uptake. The ICT sector itself represents 6% of the workforce and makes about 8% of EU GDP. The first key suggestions and observation of the Task Force is that Europe needs urgently to increase the employability skills for millions of low-skilled people. All the sectors have to invest in ICT in order to remain competitive and ICT-skills are becoming a basic requirement to access an increasing number of jobs. Viviane

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Reding, commissioner for DG Information Society and Media stated in March 2007 that ICT drives 50% of EU growth. This is the result of the annual i2010 benckmarking report. "The growth is mainly induced by companies finally jumping on the "broadband train" and adopting more sophisticated IT solutions for their business processes in significant numbers". Such a statement means implicitly that the required skills are evolving and that aged workers need to revisit their skills if they want to remain part of the labour force. This explains the rationale behind the eSangathan project and the three pillars of the project: 1. Active ageing knowledge workers Two pilots of aged workers (55+) have been implemented. One in the Öresund region; a heterogeneous team composed of unemployed or persons willing to reposition themselves in the labour market. The second pilot is a corporate one in Mahindra & Mahindra (India). Why in India? Because the idea of the project was born in India, observing how aged skilled workers, active in the structured economy, were respected and represented high value for their corporations, even after having retired. Further, according to a study by Citigroup, rapidly growing sectors in India such as engineering services, retail, civil aviation, telecom services and infrastructures are facing moderate to severe talent shortages. There is a need to retain older workforce as consultants or mentor to meet talent gap in the labour market. 2. Employment by social innovation The roadmap consisting of methods and tools that was chosen to use in the pilots is based on innovative social approaches to help emerge projects in a team and further structure them with the hope to generate self-employment. This was particularly used in the Öresund pilot due to the heterogeneity of the team. The practice of such methods and tools helped the pilot members to shift mindset from hierarchical thinking th heterarchical thinking. 3. ICT We chose specifically the collaborative working environments (CWE) because CWE is an advanced ICT usage. It familiarizes the users with the Web 2.0 approach and it offers potentially a better work/life balance for the employee. The project took also advantage of new tools coming up such as blogs and wiki. eSangathan What does it mean? The term Sangathan is a Sanskrit word which refers to a group of people. eSangathan was coined to use as the name for a group of people participating on electronic form in the format of a collaborative platform.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

3. MAIN ISSUES

ACTIVE AGEING SOCIETY Europe is not only an ageing society; it is becoming an active ageing society. At least, it will have to, for economic and competitiveness reasons. Of course we knew since years it would come and, of course, governments could have anticipated the effect of this reality on the workforce. Some did, like Sweden, and they are far better prepared than many other EUcountries to include aged workers (69,6% compared to the average EU-rate of 43,5%) into the labour force. Some others thought they could wait because the "boomer" effect would be softer due to a good fertility rate resulting from a different policy, such as France. The country just did reach a rate of 2 compared to the lowest fertility rates in Europe which are around 1,2 or 1,3 in countries such as Poland or Lithuania. To ensure replacement of the previous generation and therefore population stability, a rate of 2,1 is required. Those parameters can never be looked at with a short term vision. As an example, in the case of France, the point is that the curves do not match at the right time and that some industries will be facing critical skills issues in the coming years. This can easily be understood by anyone in the twinkling of an eye when looking at the OECD figures for Europe. The same pyramid and figures are available at country level. Figure 2 - 2000 and 2050 EU-25 age pyramid

The most astonishing figure is the “old age dependency ratio” (65+ in % of 20-64) which is jumping from 26 to 56 between 2000 and 2050.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN In 2005, around 17% of the population in the European Union is aged 65 and over. Of these, 59% are women. The proportion of women increases with age. According to the latest estimates (2005), at age of 65, women in the EU can expect to live, on average, another 20 years and men around 17 years (see Table-2 in Appendix). More important, is the disability-free life expectancy of women and men at age 65 (see Table-3 in Appendix). The most recent figures (2003) tell us that women at 65 are estimated to be able to live, on average in the EU, another 10,5 years free of disability, while for men the figure is around eight months less. Again, there are, of course, significant differences between the countries. Keeping this table in mind and looking at the self-perceived health status of women and men aged 65-74 (see Table-4 in Appendix) enables one to imagine the proportion of population that could potentially work longer. Globally it shows already a few fundamental factors to be considered from a policy point of view: • • •

the pace of ageing will accelerate more people live longer and healthier women will occupy a very significant part of the aged population

A natural consequence of living longer and healthier is that some people will want to stay economically active for various reasons. This will most probably be combined with the fact that retirement age will be put back a few years due to welfare balance constraints. Such adjustments will result in the increase of aged workers and particularly of aged knowledge workers for whom "retirement" doesn't at all have the same meaning as for people in jobs with harness. There is one more factor that will influence this evolution in the number of knowledge workers in the coming years; it is the education level of the workers which has been going up for the last 20 years in addition to the development of eSkills. Those factors combined with the cost of labour, which resulted in massive outsourcing of jobs with low added value during the same period, generates automatically a growing number of knowledge workers in Europe. Knowledge workers As we do concentrate on knowledge workers, let us have a closer look at them. First of all, it is important to define who eSangathan does consider a knowledge worker. Indeed, since P. Drucker coined the term in 1959, a number of definitions have been flourishing because of the evolution from the industrial to the information society. As the definition of the knowledge worker is not yet a universally accepted one, eSangathan considers that the knowledge worker is a professional who works and applies his/her intellectual capacities to create, process, distribute and connect information, ideas and expertise. Statistically, it is not easy to identify or isolate the knowledge workers. At this stage, we will consider a rough figure which is the one given by Eurostat for the employment in knowledgeintensive service sectors (see Table 5 in Appendix). The percentage of employment ranges in 2006 from 14,59% in Romania to 47,67% in Sweden with an average employment rate of 32,78% in the EU-27 countries. Gender issue We do not want to enter the gender issue because it is not our main topic. Nevertheless one must keep in mind that women: •

live longer

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN • • • •

retire earlier are still less educated have poorer eSkills than men work in less knowledge-intensive sectors than men

To conclude this section one should remember a few new parameters of the society: • • •

People live longer and healthier An increasing number of people might become willing to work longer and there are much more women than men. Unfortunately for the economy, 45+ women are less educated, have poor eSkills and few of them work in the knowledge-intensive service sector.

LOSS OF KNOWLEDGE AND KNOW-HOW Since the early 90's the world is undergoing a profound transformation. The information revolution which is less than 20 years old has generated the Information Society which is replacing the Industrial Society in the most advanced economies. It is the first time in history that a change inducing such deep and radical new usages was introduced at such a rapid pace. It changes our way of working and living. The new tools themselves are a major change factor: computers, networks, broadband connections and internet. This report is not intended to go back over the recent economic and societal history; but, as usual, a few figures are very meaningful to illustrate the background which is needed to understand our concern about the knowledge workers in an ageing society. First of all, we should remember that the personal computer (PC) was officially launched in 1981 and became more largely available in retail networks around 1984. A "strongly" configured PC of that time had a hard disk of 64K and a 5,25" floppy disk reader. No question of internet. In 2002, more than 500 million PCs were in use: 75% were professional or work related. As of June 2008, the number of PCs in use worldwide hit one billion, while another billion is expected to be reached by 2014 (source: Wikipedia). Nowadays, computers are commonplace in companies; which does not mean that employees have developed sophisticated usages. Also, more and more European households are equipped. By the way, we reach a point where many people even say that they have a better equipment at home than in the office. Nevertheless, again the situation in Europe varies significantly from one country to another; from 83% household equipment rate in The Netherlands to 20% in Bulgaria.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Figure 4 - Households computer equipment in 2006

Source: E-Communications Household Survey

One more very interesting information is the proportion of households with at least one computer depending on the number of members in a family as well as the level of urbanisation where the family lives. Figure 5 - Proportion of households with at least one computer

Source: E-Communications Household Survey

Unfortunately, the survey also tells us that in 60+ single households the penetration is only 15% on average in the EU-27 countries. Having a computer equipment is one thing; but nowadays, the most important is to be able to communicate and having access to one's data from any location. At least, for the knowledge workers, it is a key requirement to perform one's job. Of course, if the knowledge worker is in a traditional workplace setting, it is less relevant because all the tools will be available in the employer's premises. But, more and more knowledge workers have adopted more flexible work patterns and are highly dependent on the quality of the connection. So, let us now have a closer look at the European picture. Again, we have to remember that the opening of the network that we all know under the name of "internet", to commercial interest occurred only in 1988. It took about 10 years before it became really used by citizens and that governments woke up and realised the radical change it would introduce in the society as a whole. The European Commission has played a major "push" role (and continues) to implement the Information Society with the vision that the

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN future of the European economic development, innovation and competitiveness would rely more and more on intangible goods. It is one of the key fundamentals of the Lisbon Strategy for Growth and Jobs. So, at the end of 2006, 79% of the Dutch households were connected compared to respectively 12% and 11% of the Romanian and Bulgarian ones. Here is the picture of the European situation: Figure 6 – Proportion of households with broadband internet access

Source: E-Communications Household Survey

More important for the eSangathan issue, the 60+ single households are really the ones who suffer from the digital divide. In the EU-27, only 10% were connected at the end of 2006 (4% in narrowband and 6% in broadband) compared to 40% for the -29 years old population. Of course, this is not of full signification for the knowledge workers who do not necessarily pretence to single households. But, it is a signal one should take into consideration. We also know that knowledge transfer can be organised in a number of different ways and using a variety of methods. However, the professions which are nowadays mainly based on the processing of data will definitely use one or another digital device for knowledge capture and transfer. This means that companies and governments should make sure that today's 45+ population has an adequate eSkills level. We enter an era where writing is digital, voice storage is digital and movements are digitally video-recorded. The world of 3D is also becoming part of the knowledge capture sphere! This statement is not futuristic; it is already part of the daily working environment of the knowledge worker. So, in few years time the Information Society and the Knowledge society are shaping new behaviours, requiring new skills and developing a new living and working environment for a permanently growing part of the population. According to a definition given on the EU-Knowledge Society portal, the knowledge society "stresses the fact that the most valuable asset is investment in intangible, human and social capital and that the key factors are knowledge and creativity" which differs from the information society "in which low-cost information and ICT are in general use". Since the early 90's thousands of European jobs have been destroyed without realising that by pushing older workers out of the companies, the knowledge was also stepping the door. In fact, most of those companies had simply not made any inventory of the knowledge which was making the value of the company. Knowledge is an intangible asset; but it is part of a very tangible good: the WORKER and more specifically the KNOWLEDGE WORKER. In the industrial fields where know-how and knowledge is directly linked to physical execution, it is easy to locate quickly the knowledge gaps. It is much more difficult when it comes to knowledge as such. In the knowledge economy, the fields of occupation are becoming much more virtual and tacit knowledge is playing an increasing role in the execution of the processes or in the rise of new processes resulting from creativity and innovation. This is why it is becoming so important that an organisation (a company, an administration, a NGO, a team, etc.) develops a new culture of knowledge sharing and transfer, with the respect of the existing expertise, in order to develop further knowledge in a virtuous circle. It also means that the organisation itself should become

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN an enabler for knowledge development having understood that knowledge creation is a process in itself requiring certain conditions. It is not necessarily compatible with the very short term view and attitude which are prevalent in numerous organisations. One has to agree that the speed at which changes may need to be implemented require some agility; but this is not to confuse with waste of knowledge by despising aged experienced workers. The time is over where newly created gurus, experts and IT-specialist simply mixed up knowledge management (KM) and data base management. For years an incredible number of useless huge data bases have been created in the name of KM. Most probably nobody is even able to use those. We have entered a new era where the ICT tools themselves, such as collaborative working environments and some other Web 2.0 tools capture automatically the knowledge underpinning the processes. Then, it is by organising intergenerational teams with common tools that the know-how itself will be tacitly transferred...just ‘by doing’ together. A well thought out combination of organisation, social behaviour and ICT-tools commonly used by all can definitely lead to the ‘learning organisation’, the concept introduced by Peter SENGE with ‘The 5th Discipline’ in 1990.

To conclude this section, one can recommend to any organisation to: • • •

carefully watch and manage its age pyramid identify the knowledge keepers manage the transfer in well balanced multigenerational teams.

USE OF ICT FOR A NEW PRODUCTIVE SOCIALITY Nowadays, ICT is everywhere and in almost everything! at least more or less and at an incredible increasing pace. The phenomenon is a new reality all over the globe. Of course, this is also noticeable in the working life where the most advanced corporations have already introduced ICT tools enabling a bottom-up and networked communication. Social networks have always existed. They have structured the society and some communities and networks were and are very strong. In the corporate world, they were also existing, but in a more formal way and not open or visibly structured. Now, they flourish and some corporations are stimulating their existence breaking down the rigid hierarchy. Cisco illustrates perfectly this new management style. It is a profound shift and probably the first and most visible result of the Web 2.0 organisational revolution which turned the web into a universal, omnipresent participative and collaborative tool. Aged workers are not necessarily comfortable with those new approaches. They mean for them a fundamental change compared to the traditional, structured and hierarchical organisations they have known in their professional environments. Some were unhappy in such environments, but they knew they had to cope with the system; those ones will probably consider the upcoming working environments as an opportunity and be pro-active in mastering the ICT tools. A greater number were comfortable with a very structured system and may feel lost in the new working conditions where autonomy becomes a highly appreciated factor. This situation will not reverse, to the contrary. It definitely means that a large number of aged workers will have to adapt their skills, develop a voluntary and pro-active attitude towards lifelong learning and become familiar with new ICT tools if they wish to be further included

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN into the labour market. This also means that the national institutions in charge of helping and accompanying unemployed aged workers in their way back to employment will have to evolve themselves by understanding in concrete what is happening in the labour market and the skills that are required. Looking at the figure showing individuals using the internet from any location by age group, one realises that the 55-64 age group is lagging far behind. A serious effort is necessary in order to improve the employability of that age group. Of course, knowledge workers are those who might have benefitted from training; but Europe still needs to invest to improve the eSkills level of its aged population. The table in Figure 7 comparing OECD countries is selfexplanatory. Figure-7 - Individuals using the internet from any location, by age group in 2007

Why do we relate this to sociality? If one looks at the way A. Fiske from UCLA defines the way social interactions are organised, four major models do emerge: • • • •

Communal sharing (CS) Authority ranking (AR) Equality matching (EM) Market pricing (MP)

All of those exist at one moment or another in the collaboration relationship in a team and within an organisation. The more the organisation is ready to embrace CWEs and Web 2.0 tools, the larger the role will be for CS and EM in a balanced MP relationship. At the end, this is a different way to express one of the findings of the eSangathan project which is the correlation between informational evolution and social evolution in an organisation moving from hierarchy to heterarchy. If Europe wants the aged knowledge workers to be part of this new sociality, an urgent effort and investment is necessary to improve the eSkills of this age group of population.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

4. STRUCTURING DIMENSIONS To grasp a clear understanding of the issues related to the inclusion of aged knowledge workers in the labour market, it is necessary to consider four structuring dimensions: • • • •

The sociological dimension to clarify who is considered a “senior” in our society The economic dimension due to the demographic situation The technological dimension to position the issues related to ICT and ageing in the labour market The managerial dimension to introduce the micro-level concerns of the active ageing workers

THE SOCIOLOGICAL DIMENSION The word "senior" is extremely used since a few years in political, social and commercial contexts as well as in research. However, as it frequently happens when it comes to societal issues, it is the marketing vocabulary which takes over. In this case, it comes from an ageing centred categorisation launched by Dr. Yankelovitch in U.S.A. in the 70'. This social scientist and consultant ran a big survey to find out the needs of the female population at the request of a company willing to stimulate their sales of underwear items. The usual rules of marketingmix were of no help. The scientist and his team evidenced the existence of a "climbing" generation with really different expectations from the previous one. A more anthropological approach led them to define a biological, psychological and social age. This led more recently to under-segment even more the generational cohorts. This way they launched the generational marketing. The word "senior" that corresponds to one entry of the eSangathan issue allow us to easily identify a segment of population initially represented by the "babyboomers" 1 . Although, in practice, the representations attached to this word refer sometimes to younger people (like “decruiting” the 45+). When it comes to labour statistics it generally relates to the 55-64 segment of population. Regarding health issues it goes up to 75 and in pathological terms, it climbs to 85+. In other terms, we notice that the categorisation of seniors is tightly correlated to the ageing process. Nevertheless, as far as employment is concerned, the perception of age can as well be the objective result of the working environment (job hardness, early start of professional life, etc.) as well as a social elaborated one that questions both the individual and his/her environment. Progresses in the fields of health, legislation, global improvement of the living conditions in Western countries, ICT development as well as the raise of the educational level have also changed the picture, particularly in the 80'. Practically, the word "senior" that represents a market opportunity has progressively become a positive reference. A senior has become a kind of "ex-young" who is dynamic, in good health, in the heart of positive relationships, of a medium education level and in constant evolution. Nevertheless, the situation is definitely uneasy for a large number of 50+ on the labour market in more than half of the EU-countries.

1

The baby-boomers are those persons born between 1946 and 1964

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN 4.1.1

CRITICAL FACTS

In the field of labour, empirical observation reaches similar results as the research that has been conducted in Western countries and in Europe. Contrarily to what may induce the “jingles” of a marketing that seems inoffensive and reassuring, seniors clearly suffer of discrimination at work. Of course, the situation has improved since the time where labour was essentially physical. It was then easy to dismiss somebody as soon as he/she showed some weakness. Regarding knowledge workers, laying-off an employee is far more difficult to justify. However surveys reveal objective discriminatory practices, particularly in two fields: recruitment and access to training. 4.1.1.1 Recruitment Figures regarding the employment rate of aged workers have already been cited in the introduction. So, let us focus more on the situation of highly educated and skilled people who are the knowledge workers. In relationship with the population in general, they are not the most disadvantaged. First of all, we notice that highly educated people are the ones who stay the longest in the jobs as shown on figure 10 in the economic dimension of the document. In the EU-25 countries, only 30,8 % of 55-64 with a low education level are in job compared with 61,8 % of those with a high level of education. « In general, highly qualified aged workers stay longer in the labour market than their less qualified homologues. This result can be partially explained by the fact that the less educated ones may have entered the labour market younger than those with a higher education level, which could be the reason why they retire earlier ». This analysis is confirmed by figures referring to the proportion of non-manual highly qualified jobs among male population at work which is higher in the 55-64 group than in the 30-49 one (30,1 % and 24,3 %). The explanatory factor is probably because of the acquired experience during the professional career. However, supplementary discrimination, we notice that with women results differ: the proportion of non-manual highly qualified jobs is the same for both 55-64 and 30-49 groups. Taking into consideration the demand for skilled workers, this fact is rather alarming for the European economy. Even if, objectively, the employed knowledge worker cannot complain so much as his “generational cohort fellows”, he/she suffers discrimination as soon as he/she is unemployed or looks for a new job. According to a survey ran in France by ADIA (an important European interim group), a 50+ knowledge worker has 7 times less chance to be interviewed than an “average reference” candidate (28-30 years old, white and European by his name and photo). If he/she is a « basic » employee, this candidate has 4,5 times less chance. The reason may be the fear of the recruiter for a possible future mental decline in the case of a job with high responsibilities. According to ILO, ‘curiously this belief is particularly common in countries where wage systems and benefits are strongly linked to age and length of service (Austria, Belgium, France, Japan and the United States).’ So, unfortunately, when it comes to a new recruitment for an aged knowledge worker, the high level of education is not anymore necessarily a valuable asset.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN 4.1.1.2 Access to training As far as facilities for training are concerned, the situation is often clear. Among the European countries that are little aware of the matter, France is a pertinent example. According to a very detailed national survey, from the age of 45, the access to training diminishes in every socio-professional categories with a clear drop after 55. Knowledge workers do not escape this phenomenon: in the private sector, the access to training reaches 63,5% for the 30-34, compared to 50,2% for the 50-54 and 34,3% for the 55-59. Clearly, the return on investment becomes very questionable to many employers. On another side, the more an employee is getting older in France the less he/she can expect pay rise. So, there is no particular incentive to update his/her competences or acquire new skills. But, one should not consider this reality in some countries as a fatality. There are “best in class” in Europe like Denmark, and even more Sweden. According to a study, they are the best in delivering non-age discriminated training to aged workers and they also consider as very important block-release training. For those two countries it is a characteristic that greatly explains the highest 50+ employment rate. The Netherlands have chosen a different path to reduce the training access disparity: they have introduced a fiscal reduction system for the companies that train their 40+. 4.1.2

REPRESENTATIONS OF SENIORS BY THE VARIOUS CATEGORIES OF ACTORS

Representations as such are not necessarily a barrier to the correct perception we have from others. However, when « a priori » representations take place, adopted by the majority against a category of persons, we enter the field of stereotypes. It corresponds to conceptions and opinions towards behaviours, appearance, qualities and defaults considered as « typical » from one group of persons. So, let us have a look at how “seniors” are perceived by the main actors. 4.1.2.1 U.E. citizens A Eurobarometer survey allows drawing a picture of the way European seniors are perceived as a whole. Regarding 50+ at work discriminations, it indicates that 46% of Europeans (UE 25) estimate that they are quite current. At country level, we note that this opinion is very strong in Hungaria (66%) and Tchequia (63%) and less, for example, in The Netherlands (37%), Denmark (35%), Ireland (30%) or Luxembourg (31%). The asked question referred explicitly to the possibility for seniors to go on working efficiently. The survey did not segment according to the educational/training level. Globally the image is not flattering. 4.1.2.2 Governments and supranational level At this level, many countries are late, except the Scandinavian ones and Great Britain that have developed, since about ten years yet, a coherent system of legislative measures to encourage keeping seniors at work. However, to legislate is not enough. Thus, Canas points out that in 2007, after one year the legislation on ageing at work had been promulgated in Great-Britain, a few SMEs were applying it. He estimates than only about 17% of employers had modified their management habits in recruiting. It is clear that, for most of the U.E. countries, main impulsions come from the European institutional level.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN The Mature@eu report recollects the main measures adopted by U.E which contain articles about discrimination against seniors as far as employment is concerned. It counts 8 of them, that each European country has to transfer to their own national legislative corpus in due time. Transposition in national legal systems is often done, under constraint at the latest, due to the internal political reasons. 4.1.2.3 Employers Identification of the main representations on knowledge seniors at work among the employers has never been the main topic of most of the research and surveys. However, we assume that surveys trying to find out more particularly about knowledge workers or employees in the field of Information Systems and technology could give some indications. So, according to the Mature@eu report, we may think that if seniors as a whole are suspected to see their productivity irremediably go down, their physiological capabilities decline and their tendency to psycho rigidity increase, their mental or intellectual competences are far less subject to caution. One also “records that while there may be a diminution in the speed of information processing….this effect is minimal until well after the normal retirement age ». We may then suppose at first sight that, at employers’ level, senior knowledge workers are not really, as such, the object of negative representations. However, in the I.T field, the capacity to actualise new computer procedures or to use new functionalities (wiki, CWE, blog, etc) seems to be strongly doubted – that is what the Mature@eu report qualifies as « strange perversion ». More generally there are friction points; they are rather organisational at work (requests for more flexibility in working time for example. Much more, everybody agrees to find normal that, regarding the Top jobs, seniors are better: in 2006, a U.S. study with 400 employers noted significantly positive attitudes towards white-collar seniors. According to the given answers, those are more productive (56%) than blue-collars (41%). On another hand, in Austria in 2007, out of 700 interviewed employers, 61% said they prefer seniors for management jobs; what we may qualify as globally positive. But, all the knowledge workers are not managers. The early retirement age is also an indicator to examine. The example of France shows that early activity way out does not concern all seniors; more specifically it concerns the less trained ones and those who, in the sectors that suffer deep technological or organisational changes, have been judged the less able to adapt to these evolutions. Further, as Huyez-Levrat report explains, seniors are generally an adjustment factor when the labour market is tight. Indeed, since the 19th century, “many evolutions have influenced the elaboration of a compromise between workers representatives and employers one to use age in managing professional careers… The effect of this mechanism is that during underemployment periods, the oldest ones are ‘naturally’ designated as over-numerous population to prior take out the labour market, eventually with their agreement as we may see in the recent story of pre-retirements.” The problem comes from the attachment of some companies and even workers themselves to use the criterion of age to organise their professional careers while age is denunciated as an illegitimate criterion, even discriminatory for the actions led towards the objectives of prolonging careers. Saying it another way, ‘a new consensus must be built on the way to replace age in the professional careers’.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN 4.1.2.4 Seniors They are subject to representations of themselves and their work. Results of research show that knowledge workers do not differentiate from other professional categories. 4.1.2.4.1 Stress sensitivity An survey led with 11.000 employees in France indicates that white-collars are over 50% to declare they work under pressure – which is far much more than in other professional levels. Employees are « only » 30% to declare so. By comparison, seniors as a whole claim by 66% a stressing situation at work. About half white-collars estimate they are able to control their stress. Most authors underline how much a more or less decisional latitude given to a professional to organise his/her work and to let him/her some space to reach his objectives is essential in preventing stress. For seniors, this latitude is a precious resource to « develop their strategies based on their experience » 4.1.2.4.2

Feeling of a capacity to stay in one’s job

There is relatively little research existing on this particular issue, but the point is coherent with the necessary analytical competence one expects from a knowledge worker. According to A. Molinié, it is a pragmatic notion, a judgement that yields the relation to work. There are of course subjective aspects (family, health, expectations and so on…) but we have the hypothesis that they are potentially balanced by the sense of responsibility that autonomy at work gives. The VISAT survey, done in France, on which the author bases herself, has interviewed among others 461 employees aged 52, out of which18% knowledge workers. They declared over 85% they feel able to keep their job at least until retirement. As a dynamic self projection it is an important element to take into account. Another significant result of the same study is that, when the job allows learning, the probability of feeling able to stay in one’s job is over double for 52 years old. Knowledge workers are among the privileged that may hope for a progression of their knowledge and, thanks to that, foresee staying in their jobs.

From a sociological point of view one should remember the following: • • • • • • •

The statistical meaning of a senior in the labour market is a 55-64 person When unemployed, the highly educated senior is more discriminated From the age of 45, the access to training diminishes in every socio-professional categories with a clear drop after 55 To legislate to encourage recruiting seniors or keeping them in the workplace is not enough; managerial behaviour has to change Some countries like USA and Austria prefer aged workers for management jobs Those who do not adapt to organisational and technological change are excluded Senior knowledge workers in job still may expect progress in their career and increasing their knowledge

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN THE ECONOMIC DIMENSION Increasing the rate of employment of aged workers is a key component for the future of the European economic growth and competitiveness. It is, in the view of the eSangathan consortium, even more important for the knowledge workers who do possess the most valuable good of the emerging new economy: knowledge. All the indicators which evaluate how healthy the economy is and build forecasts and perspectives are still based on the old, traditional indicators. They do not yet include standards on the measurement of intangible assets which are becoming the core value of the information and knowledge society. Of course, intangible assets such as trademarks, customer lists, documentation, etc. are quite easy to identify and evaluate. It is more difficult to evaluate, when it comes the skills, creativity, etc. of the staff. The knowledge worker is the one who can produce and deliver this new category of asset. Even if corporations do not yet value intangibles in their annual reports, those assets based on knowledge are becoming more and more important in an economy which is not anymore based on "strong arms"; but on "agile brains". The fact that the human resources department in a large number of corporations have not managed their personnel age pyramid and anticipated the massive retirements of the boomer generation creates some surprises. A very good example is given with the situation at RWE Power, the power generation and mining division of the German utility of more than 70.000 employees. A quick look at the graphical representation of the current workforce and the workforce in ten years time doesn't need any explanation. It is not an isolated case and in some other large European industrial companies, and in public services the situation is even worse. This is showing us that even if we live in a very short-term thinking society, the corporate strategy needs to anticipate for many years in advance which skills are key for development, innovation and growth. In the case of RWE, the analysis of retirement trends and future labour demand over time horizons of 5, 10 and 15 years revealed that today's workforce surplus would in several years turn into a shortfall in many parts of the business. Without this exercise, one can guess that early retirements would have been proposed to the surplus workforce; just as it has been happening for years in many countries. Again, it is a graphical representation that shows the results of the short term social policies with governmental blessing when it comes to retirement age. Figure 8 – Official and effective age of retirement of men, 2005

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Inevitably, such a situation creates skills gaps which might be critical for the national economy. It enhances a new and crucial role for the public and corporate HR-departments who have to plan and anticipate the situation in order to localise the existing critical skills; build attractive plans to retain them for longer years if necessary and empower them for knowledge sharing and capitalisation. Why not invent knowledge leaders? As shown in the case of RWE, such actions need to be taken now in the organisations where the age pyramid is shifting "to the right". According to the latest populations projections reported by Eurostat, in 2025, there will be much the same number of women and men of working age (but older), but together they will account for a smaller proportion of population in the EU - for around 63% of the total against 67% in 2005. At the same time, the share of those under 15 will have fallen to 14,4% while the share of the 65+ will have risen to 22,5%. Keeping also in mind women will be 29% more than men in the latter age group. From an economic perspective this is giving four strong signals to develop the number of knowledge workers in Europe: • • • •

Investing in training now for the range 35-54 in order to maintain and develop high skills Integrating more the women into the labour market and investing in their skills development Ensuring high education level of the younger generations Adapting permanently the eSkills to remain competitive in the information and knowledge economy.

How does today’s situation relate to those issues? In 2006, it is still a small portion of the population aged 15-64 which is highly skilled. Obviously, there are again huge differences depending on the countries; but the overall EUpicture shows that in order to fuel the market with skilled knowledge workers, training should continuously benefit the 35+ population: Figure 9 - Skills structure of the population aged 15-64 in the EU 27 by age group, 2006

One can see in the following charts (women and men) that the high level skilled population is better integrated in the workforce; especially when ageing. Here we have two more signals: •

the level of skills has a direct effect on the employment rate

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN •

skilled women should be encouraged to work longer and medium skilled women should be given the opportunity to become high skilled during their professional life Figure 10 – Activity Rate by five year Age Groups

The situation about young people is twofold: •

•

A significant number of young women and men still leave the education system with only basic schooling between 18 and 24. Many of those, moreover, do not receive any further education or training once they enter the labour market. This is still the case for more than 30% of men in Spain, Italy, Portugal and Hungary (Eurostat). The number of tertiary students is globally increasing at a slow pace with more women then men in undergraduate programmes across Europe and then more men than women continue on to do postgraduate studies. Apart from the fact that differences remain between the fields of education, more women should be stimulated to continue longer studies with the perspective of becoming knowledge workers. Women are still under represented in science and maths and over represented in teaching.

The issue of eSkills will be detailed in the technological dimension of the document. The reason why it is mentioned here is a "reminder". eSkills have become part of basic and elementary education and the generations that were not born with the internet or other fancy digital devices have to be educated and trained to be able to continuously adapt themselves to the permanently changing organisational environments which are more and more digitalised.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN The level of attainment is not sufficient in Europe and a massive effort has to be undertaken towards all the 35 and onwards population who is not spontaneously media-savvy.

From an economic point of view one should remember the following: • • • • • • • •

Organisations need to manage the age pyramid of their personnel Organisations need to anticipate which skills will be necessary in the coming years Knowledge leaders should be created in organisations Training and development of eSkills of the 35-54 age segment is key Enhancing the number of highly educated youngsters is the future of competitiveness The level of skills has a direct effect on the employment rate Skilled women should be encouraged to work longer ICT-literacy and an up-to-date level of eSkills is necessary for knowledge workers

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

THE TECHNOLOGICAL DIMENSION The sociological and economic structural dimensions have definitely an impact on the employment of aged knowledge workers in the knowledge society. Examining them has highlighted the place and the perception of the seniors in our European society as well as the urgent need for more than half of the EU-countries to consider, or reconsider, drastically their position towards a segment of population which represents a high potential for the near future of their growth, competitiveness and socio-economic development stability. So, now, we will look at the third structuring dimension that we definitely consider as fundamental for the employment of aged knowledge workers: the technological one. eSangathan has a foothold in ICT. More specifically in CWE 2 , and is a newcomer in the Web 2.0 world. The team chose this turning point not because it is absolutely new; but because it is starting to be part of the IT strategy of major companies who have finally understood the benefits it could bring to the corporations and their personnel. Indeed, the beauty of this technological evolution is that when it is well introduced in an organisation, with the respect of the pace of evolution of human interactions and learning curve of new usages, it is beneficial to both parties: the employer and the employee. They both benefit from the result of from better working conditions enabling a higher quality of work/life balance which raises the productivity level. 4.1.1

INTRODUCTION OF COLLABORATIVE WORKING ENVIRONMENTS (CWE)

From an economic, productivity and efficiency point of view, research starts showing that collaboration is a key driver of business performance around the world. In 2006, Frost & Sullivan created a collaboration index based on two main factors: • •

An organisation’s orientation and infrastructure to collaborate, including collaborative technologies such as audio conferencing, web-conferencing and instant messaging The nature and extend of collaboration that allows people to work together as well as an organisation's culture and processes to encourage teamwork

As part of the findings of this survey and research, it appears that in general a positive attitude about collaboration exists, along with specific preferences and regional differences. So, it is more and more considered that CWE and more Web 2.0 tools will be part of the daily working environment of more and more knowledge workers as they are tailored to share exchange and capitalise knowledge. Sharing knowledge is not a natural tendency for most human beings of the older generations. Introducing CWE in an organisation to aged knowledge workers means a dual shift: a behavioural one and a technological one. Two major conditions are required to be successful, in addition of mastering the chosen tools. 4.1.1.1 Time is necessary This is a constant finding; once more confirmed by the eSangathan pilots. One could think that due to the fact that more and more people are getting familiar with ICT and internet usages, this would change. it is not the case. The time to start climbing the learning curve is generally 2

CWE : Collaborative Working Environments

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN underestimated as well as the fact that the introduction of a CWE in an organisation or in a team need a dual approach: a global one for the training and a much more individual one, close to the coaching format, to make sure that each individual keeps a pace in the learning curve that doesn't create the risk to exclude him or her. Indeed, the learning happens in stages which differ from one individual to another. In addition, there is a difference between understanding the concepts, the logic and the way the features do operate and concretely using and producing collectively. This is the point where a close management is necessary during the first few months in order to build a coherent work pattern. The duration will depend on many factors such as the ICT-literacy starting point, the motivation which might be related to the project itself, the context, the colleagues and the communication as well as the management itself. This will be further illustrated by concrete cases of the eSangathan pilots in the final version of the document. 4.1.1.2 Trust is mandatory Interestingly enough, trust which is a major topic in psychology is entering the organisational sciences since the early 2000. One can assume this related closely to the fact that ICT-based working patterns are developing quite fast since a few years and that "distance" has been entering as a very important factor in the management systems. In a shortcut, managing at a distance without trust is "mission impossible". Now, how to build trust and how to measure the level of trust in an organisation is not the core topic of this White Paper. 4.1.2

ESANGATHAN FINDINGS

The first thing that eSangathan has noticed is that every interviewed person was open for more suggestions about new tools satisfying potential needs. Needs that the pilot members detected by themselves, or that we discovered during the interviews. We know, for example, that after all, the pilot members of the Öresund pilot got frustrated by the limited functions of Basecamp which did not allow the use of multi-chat correctly, or to collaborate really on a document due to the limited write board. Of course, Skype and any wiki is able to solve such needs, and this is probably what they expected from the managers of the project: proposing them tools answering exactly their needs when they became conscious of their needs. Now, the statistics tell us that about one third of the group really used BaseCamp and integrated it while the others never used it so much. The reasons that can have originated this attitude might be because some people have not by themselves the curiosity to learn tools for their own purpose, and also because in the European pilot, the social innovation tools were introduced as a priority, and maybe CWE came in second time. This demonstrates again how difficult it is to convince and convert people to these new usages. On the Indian side, the SharePoint platform has been used, mainly for file sharing and document publishing. It really answered a need. One of the teams solved its problem of transferring a huge amount of data by using the shared server. They also used blogs and forum discussions. Now they plan to set up a supplier library to consolidate information about them, where suppliers will also be able to participate. This will avoid people to have to collect the information again each time they need it. They expect a real improvement of their productivity by doing this. The Mahindra & Mahindra Group is really on the way to what is called “the extended company”. They will surely be able to improve the quality of life and the work/life balance of their retiree experts as soon as the new usages will be better mastered and the tools totally integrated. They plan to deploy instant messaging as a next step with

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN external collaborators; this is not a simple thing to achieve in such a large corporation with a strict security policy! One common feedback shows that the interviewed participants felt generally more productive. We say "generally", because actually the situation was quite varying from people who understood the interest of the tools and their potential, but didn't have time to fully integrate it, to people who clearly integrated it (like the Indian team cited previously) and already saw the benefit of it! The eSangathan team saw that the new tools were better accepted when they are very simple (seems obvious) and involve participation more than collaboration. The learning curve is then quite fast. During the last months of the project period such tools were adopted by the users. More complicated tools like wiki that needs real collaboration have a longer learning curve, more than one year to accept the change of paradigm which is really difficult for regular users. One should keep this in mind. But they can be integrated and have great results, like it happens into the consortium team who benefited from more time to adopt it. During the few last months of the project we introduced much more tools such as RSS feeds, customizable homepage, social bookmarking, social networks, etc. Time was short for it; but viral communication is working. At this stage, the eSangathan team hopes to have stimulated curiosity so much that all the involved members of the team and the pilots will continue. Already, during the project they all discovered that ICT and particularly CWE and all new web 2.0 environments require permanent learning…. And they all agreed it was great to have such an opportunity! From a technological point of view one should remember the following: • • • • •

CWE favours work/life balance and increases productivity When introducing new technological tools, time is needed and trust is mandatory ICT tools need to satisfy a need An adequate choice of ICT-tools should anticipate the organisational needs More sophisticated tools like wiki which requires real collaboration have a longer learning curve

THE MANAGERIAL DIMENSION The managerial structuring dimension is a fundamental one at micro-level. It is the one that will make the difference between processes that are well or badly implemented: if it works or not; if it is accepted, neglected or even rejected: if it turns to be profitable or not for both the organisation and the knowledge worker. Indeed the combination of maintaining or integrating aged knowledge workers and making use of collaborative working environments and probably some additional Web 2.0 tools is a real organisational challenge. We wrote that one of the key findings of eSangathan is that TIME and TRUST are major factors to be taken into consideration as already mentioned in the technological dimension. 4.1.3

MANAGEMENT OF SENIOR KNOWLEDGE WORKERS

Some people may think that managing knowledge workers is an easy task compared to some other management duties. The arguments brought forward by those people are that knowledge

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN workers are autonomous; they are experts in their fields; they are fully responsible and understand perfectly the processes and the organisation, etc. It might be the case for some of them, but it is not always the case. It is even becoming less and less the reality in a globalised world where few people still work alone using only their own knowledge. The race for competition has induced new working environments, methods and management systems. Collaboration and participation are becoming a "must" in most of the organisations and the real difficulty consists in including the aged knowledge workers in this new organisational movement. Of course, you always have a few forerunners; but it is not the majority. Even within the knowledge workers. Just because their fields of expertise was not necessarily requiring eSkills where now it becomes part of the daily working environment. It simply means that managers should be aware of the value of the knowledge workers who are part of their organisation and make sure they benefit the necessary support to remain at the top of their recognised skills and knowledge. 4.1.3.1 eSkills The number of occupations where a knowledge worker can avoid being ICT-literate is shrinking every day. It becomes a dual responsibility from the employer and the knowledge worker him/herself to update his/her skills and adapt to the changing technological and economic environment. And both aspects: economy and technology interact on each other in the global world. Here comes the question: how much are the aged workers ICT-literate? How do they use the continuously evolving ICT tools? Figures from Eurostat are globally available for the segment of 55-64; but here again it is very difficult to find data specifically for knowledge workers. A quick look at the following figure is already an indicator of the problems that the aged active population might encounter: Figure 11 - Women and men aged 55-74 assessed to have high computer skills in 2006

When it comes to internet usage without entering into the specific competences on particular products and tools; the situation is not really better and it looks narrowly correlated to the computer skills and the broadband access; which makes sense. Two figures in Appendix are appealing because they show evidence of the divide being created between generations at the

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN same time that most of the economists and politicians do predict that we will have to work longer. To work longer, one must have the skills which are required by the market demand. 4.1.3.2 Training Most of the 55-64 knowledge workers are highly educated people. Nevertheless they belong to a generation where it was less common than today to reach university and do long studies. Some did acquaint their knowledge by practice combined with vocational training or even getting a master degree or even a PhD while working. One can see from the following Figure that the proportion of 50-54 who beneficiated from high education do not represent a majority and again the differences between the EU-27 countries are quite impressive, ranging from less than 10% in Portugal and Romania to about 35% in the Netherlands. The interest of these figures is that they compare the education attainment level for two age groups; the 30-34 and the 50-54. Unfortunately one can see from this figure that in some countries like Germany, the number of highly educated people is decreasing. This questions how the knowledge society can be embraced in such conditions. Anyway, the EU-27 level of highly educated people is still quite low and should be increased to reach the goals set by the Lisbon strategy. Figure 12 - Division of men ages 30-34 and 50-54 by educational attainment level in 2005

The situation for 50-54 women is worse; but the trend for the 30-34 generation is showing an enormous progress in most of the countries. It even outreaches the men achievements in countries such as Denmark, Lithuania, Spain or Finland. It doesn't necessarily mean that those women will have access positions corresponding to their level of education; but anyway it shows a progress. One should also say that a large number of highly educated women do embrace education-related professions. Vocational training is a major tool and opportunity for aged knowledge workers; unfortunately the older you get, the less chance you have to benefit from training opportunities paid by the employer as shown in figure hereunder. One must have some courage to train him/herself if there is no incentive from the employer. This courage is not a given to everybody and it can explain partly why it is so difficult for a number of people to stay in job or to maintain themselves in the labour market if they lose their job for one or another reason. Let us not forget that since 15 years the first segment of population to be pushed out of the organisations were the aged workers; knowledge worker or not !

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Figure 13 - Number of employees who participated in continuing vocational training in the EU-27 by age in 2005

So, the key message here can be taken word by word from the EU-Commission publication "Employment in Europe 2007": "If workers are to remain and progress in work they need to update skills regularly, as skills and competences determine not only the extent to which those entering or returning to the labour market can take up the jobs on offer, but more crucially, the extent to which those already in work can keep their jobs in a changing technological and economic environment. Skills are, indeed, a key dimension of employability, but evidence suggests that older workers in particular face a lack op opportunities to update their skills." This topic of getting trained is to important for the future of the EU-knowledge society that we want to introduce one more figure which illustrates how few countries have understood the role of education and training to extend the working life. And we all know that due to demographical reasons, we will have to extend our working life. Figure 14 - Employment rates for the age group 55-64 and their participation in education or training across EU Member States

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN 4.1.4

MEASUREMENT

Measurement is always necessary in a management system. Now, it is important to know what to measure for what purpose. This is really an important and useful question to raise upfront as in today’s technology-based systems more or less everything can be measured. Of course, measurement should not be confused with tracking which is restricted by law. Examples of what can be measured by a CWE are highlighted in the eSangathan report CWE Usage Analysis and Best Practices by Pilots. Knowledge transfer and capture

4.1.5

This is probably the primary reason why many organisations have already implemented or are thinking of implementing CWEs. Strangely enough it is quite recently that major corporations understood that their Information System could leverage the capture and the transfer of a critical corporate asset: knowledge. CWEs are particularly useful to do so because the capture is implicit due to the fact that it is the main working tool itself. It is not an additional effort. It is while adopting new working patterns and tools that intergenerational teams start sharing and learning from each other. Exactly what is necessary in a market where the demographics are an issue and where lack of critical skills might raise problems. 4.1.5.1 Work/Life balance A major collateral benefit to such organisational choices is the improvement of the work/life balance for the aged knowledge workers. Such an organisation implies the possibility of location and time flexibility. The work is process and results driven. The purpose of this White Paper is not to advocate all the advantages of flexible work organisation such as telework. The advantages for the organisation, the employer, the employee and the society are well known.

From a managerial point of view one should remember the following: • • • • • • •

In some European countries the number of highly educated people is decreasing The level of highly educated people is not yet the one expected by the Lisbon strategy; the situation of aged active women is worse than that of men Few aged workers have access to vocational training Skills are a key dimension to employability Statistics show a positive correlation between education/training and employment Measurement system should be set according to legal rules Implementing new working patterns such as CWE facilitate knowledge capture and generate better work/life balance

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

5. INDIAN INSIGHT India has got larger workforce participation from the younger generation, but there is a question mark on their talent. According to a study by Citigroup rapidly growing sectors in India such as engineering services, retail, civil aviation, telecom services and infrastructure are facing moderate to severe talent shortages. There is a huge demand for engineers from every industry in India, the shortage of talent is pronounced. INDIAN POPULATION PYRAMID Figure 15 - Population Indicators for India: 1990 to 2020

Male (figures in ‘000s) Age

1995

1997

2000

2020

0 to 14

171,370

173,421

175,443

178,643

15 to 49

246,921

258,173

274,907

368,964

50 to 64

43,406

45,876

50,182

87,895

65+

21,500

22,536

24,103

45,613

Female (figures in ‘000s) 0 to 14

160,657

163,434

165,764

170,595

15 to 49

229,472

239,917

256,331

345,034

50 to 64

39,352

41,708

45,969

90,228

65+

20,573

21,719

23,419

47,942

Total Population (figures in ‘000s) Age

1995

1997

2000

2020

0 to 14

332,027

336,855

341,207

349,238

15 to 49

476,393

498,090

531,238

713,998

50 to 64

82,758

87,584

96,151

178,123

65+

42,073

44,255

47,522

93,555

Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census, International Programs Center, International Data Base

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Figure 16 -

Population in different age groups and their proportions to total population Age

2001

0 – 24

553590834

25 – 44

284008819

45 – 64

139166661

65 – 79

41066824

80+

8038718 Source: C2 and C14 Table, India, Census of India 2001.

The gender position of the elderly reveals that the life expectancy of women is expected to remain higher. For the period 2006-2010 the life expectancy of female is 68.1 against 65.8 of males which will rise to 72.3 for female against 69.02 for males during the period 2011-2016. CHALLENGES According to Asim Handa, director in India of FutureStep, a division of executive search firm Korn/Ferry “just about a fifth of the engineers graduating each year, about 80,000 are really employable, and that they get absorbed quickly”. Project managers are in very short supply, “Project managers have the tri-facets - business skills, client-facing skills and management skills, India have a shortage of managers who combine those three skill sets" asserts Ravi Aron, a senior fellow at Wharton's Mack Center for Technological Innovation. According to study conducted by CII – RocSearch, key challenges for human capital management are manpower sourcing, training and retention. There is an acute paucity of manpower at middle level management and about 82 percent of respondents participated in the survey, have felt that there is a shortfall of trainers and physical infrastructure for training. The report also proposed leadership development for middle management, knowledge management to mitigate impact on attrition, cross functional growth opportunities and sponsorship of higher education are the significant strategies to retain employees. “In the absence of vocational training and lack of exposure to the requirements of the industry, availability of skilled workforce and managerial pool has become daunting despite a growing unemployment rate," said N Srinivasan, advisor to CII President. PRACTICES IN INDIA 5.1.1

GOVERNMENT

“Educated, skilled, healthy empowered people are an asset and challenge before us is to ensure every citizen is an asset” exclaimed Shri Arjun Singh, Human Resource Development Minister. With such an understanding Government of India has increased the retirement age for employees of public sector units, Teachers, Doctors, Scientists and Judges, following are the instances: • •

Public Sector - The retirement age limit of employees of profit making Central Public Sector Undertakings (CPSUs) has been raised from 58 to 60 years. Teachers – Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry has proposed an increase in the retirement age of teachers in Central-aided universities from 62 to 65 to address

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN shortage of qualified hands, on the similar lines retirement age has been increased to Doctors serving as professors and aiding patients in premier institutes like AIIMS • Scientists – Key scientists of DRDO engaged in strategic projects has service age limit of select DRDO scientists to 65 years • Judges - Proposal to increase the retirement age of the Judges of the Supreme Court E Sreedharan, though retired, the Government needed his services and he was appointed the CMD of Konkan Railway, first major project in India to be undertaken on a BOT (Build-OperateTransfer) basis and later on he was made the managing director of Delhi Metro and by mid2005, all the scheduled sections were completed by their target date or before and within their respective budgets. Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, Govt. of India has constituted 'National Council for Older Persons' in May 1999 to stipulates that State Government will take affirmative action to provide facilities, concessions and relief to senior citizens for improving their quality of life and to ensure that the existing public services are user friendly and sensitive to older persons. 5.1.2

CORPORATION • • •

60,000 armed forces personnel retire every year, corporate giants such as OP Jindal, Hinduja group and Reliance Retail has offered employment to take entire people in a Seminar on Defense Industry Partnership in Human Resource Management. Citigroup outlines that the infrastructure bottlenecks and talent crunch poses longterm hurdles to India's economic growth in its 2008 Asian Economic Outlook Top Indian IT and biotechnology companies are tapping the foreign talent to address this dearth of local talent.

RECOMMENDATION • • • •

There is a need to retain older workforce from public and private enterprises this would also help in meeting the talent gap in the labor market Human Resources proactively adopt flexible working culture with visiting office not mandatory for performing business duties Human Resources (HR) to identify people on the verge of retirement and implement mandatory policies for the employees for CWE training session and monitor the progress As consultants older workforce can help in honing the skills of larger pool of human resources apart from readily employable resources

CONCLUSION According to a survey of 4,742 employers spread across all major sectors conducted by Manpower India, recruitment major found that a majority of the respondents did not have any strategy in place to retain or use 'older workforce' — employees aged 50 years or above. Experienced, well-trained manpower is simply walking out of the office door, never to return. The survey shows that only 14 percent of the respondents are having a strategy for recruiting older workers and 16 percent of employers having retention strategy for older people.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

6. INHIBITORS TO THE EMPLOYMENT OF AGED WORKERS The way the list of inhibitors to the employment of aged workers has been established is the result of a process implemented in the SIG-France. It has been a collective work of all the members of the special interest group, with several iterations until all the members agreed on the categories of inhibitors and the list of inhibitors themselves in each category. Then the list was made available to the consortium members who had the opportunity to challenge it. The interest of having done the initial work in France is that the rate of employed aged workers is low (38,3%) and that the market is still discriminating them. Since a few months the situation is evolving thanks to the introduction of a governmental action and new legal measures. This will be looked at in the "good practices" section of the document. The inhibitors have been organised in three categories: • • •

macro-level inhibitors micro-level inhibitors personal inhibitors

The two last should be overcome. To overcome the subjective inhibitors, awareness campaigns can be useful as well as regulatory or legal measures if well explained and justified to the market. Social bargaining is also a useful method to change the image of the aged worker in the societal mindset. The personal inhibitors might partially disappear if the subjective inhibitors do weaken. For the rest, they require a personal work of the individual him/herself. The case is different for the objective inhibitors which do correspond to a reality. Positive factors to overcome those ones include the permanent development and update of skills, ICT literacy and flexibility towards working patterns.

MACRO-LEVEL INHIBITORS The macro-level inhibitors to the employment of aged knowledge workers (and to most of the aged workers) are inhibitors which could be considered as a reality based on written testimonials, expert views, research findings and even statistical studies. They reflect corporate behaviours and only few EU-countries do escape to this phenomenon. The macro-level inhibitors identified by the SIG-France and the eSangathan team are: •

• •

The level of pay: wages reached thanks to experience during a long number of years are often considered by employers as an excuse for not hiring an aged knowledge worker. Some knowledge workers do accept lower wages to get the job; others just do not want or cannot. Indeed, many 50+ knowledge workers who have entered the labour market later than blue collars may still have financial constraints and do not want to change lifestyle. Cumulated experience over the years is not sufficiently valued; especially the transverse competences and the cross-disciplinary knowledge. A too long experience in the same job might be considered by some potential employers as counterproductive.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN • •

• • • • • • •

• •

In many EU-countries the potential for employment is globally low even if skill shortages exist. This economic inhibitor might become more visible if Europe has to face a recession period. The economic situation and requirements are fast moving; time pressure is high and the rhythm of work is accelerating. Those factors require a permanent adaptation capacity from the workers with frequent questioning. Not all the aged workers are in this process. Aged knowledge workers may have a level of demand which is not understood by the employer or justified from his/her point of view. Behaviour and negative representation of aged workers by companies, institutions and government. A French Observatory for Discriminations and ADIA interim company made a survey in 2006 which gives evidence of the 50+ discrimination. Company culture stressing "youthfulness". Misapprehension and insufficient training by companies to face the senior's issue. Contradictory political decisions depending on the "political wind that blows". As an example, this has been the case in France since 1981. aged workers are often considered as having a mediocre sense of social relationship Tasks hardness. This is not only for blue collars. Knowledge workers can also suffer from hardness due to physical deterioration (eyes, rheum in the hands, etc.). The Mahindra & Mahindra Group pilot has demonstrated that is was absolutely necessary to customise the workstation according to each particular individual in order to get the best results. It can be little tuning or adjustment like the size or the colour of fonts, etc. Bad mastering of foreign languages in a great number of countries. The Oresund pilot has shown that even when people speak both languages (in this case Danish and Swedish); communication can be hindered by linguistic issues. Companies are still "decruiting" (laying off) in a large number of countries and the 50+ are still the first ones to be asked to quit. One positive counter example (not in EU) seems to exist in Norway.

MICRO-LEVEL INHIBITORS The micro-level inhibitors are much more complicated to fight against because they are the result of a perceived image and not from real facts; difficult to argue and difficult to change the population's mindset towards an image. Those inhibitors play a very negative role and make the life of an unemployed knowledge worker more complicated when looking for a job. This also means that before new and innovative working patterns can be envisaged for the aged knowledge worker with a potential employer; this subjective barrier needs to be overcome. The SIG-France and the eSangathan consortium have identified such micro-level inhibitors as a result of market observation, practical experience of some members of the team, desk search and research results. Here are the identified micro-level inhibitors: •

Reluctance to geographic mobility. By the way, this is not specific of aged knowledge workers; one comes across this argument with any generation. It is related to the person herself and not to the age. On the other hand, many tasks to be performed by a knowledge worker can now be executed anywhere thanks to technological progress and the CWE environments experienced in the eSangathan project are a clear and positive answer to this issue. One should also keep in mind that in some cases it is simply due to family reasons that an aged worker cannot be mobile (because of husband/wife, old parents, etc.).

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN •

• •

•

• • • • • •

The negative image of the aged worker expressed in terms of lack of motivation, lack of dynamism, lack of flexibility and adaptability and low level of eSkills or ICTliteracy. According to Juhani Ilmarinen it would much more relate to work-setting (content, culture, environment) which is not accurate for the aged workforce. Physical ageing: depending on the person it might be backaches, senses alteration, tiredness, less vivacity, etc. It might also relate to the hardness of a previous job. Absenteeism. This point is absolutely controversial and globally research shows different point of views on this issue such as less short time absence and more long term absence unless flexible work patterns are introduced. By the way, it becomes globally admitted to recommend new working patterns enabling a better work-life balance. This is absolutely possible thanks to new ICT solutions as demonstrated in eSangathan. Seniors are supposedly "has been" persons. Many people mix-up physical ageing and mental ageing. So, they think that the aged knowledge worker requires more time to apprehend, understand, assimilate and retain. According to a survey made in March 2008 in France by Manpower, Ipsos and Les Echos, this negative image is on its way to be changed and seniors are looked at much more positively. Frequent difficulties with ICT and psychological freeze. This argument can be realistically tempered by the progression of internet use by this segment of population. Supposed "bad spirit" towards young people who want to "take your seat". Actually, the middle-age employees are the ones who criticise the most. Frequent psycho-rigidity of seniors and a tendency to think they know everything and that they "are not the be had". Behaviour modelled by the phenomenon of the "self-prophesy": senior end up looking like one project on them. Lack of intellectual curiosity (or lack of motivation because of the lack of professional future). Fear of stress which is completely contradicted by recent research led by the University of Michigan.

INDIVIDUAL OR PERSONAL INHIBITORS Those are the inhibitors directly related to the person as such. Only a few have been identified:

• • • •

Easiness and fluency in English which limits job opportunities Psychological difficulties due to job loss: self-devaluation, articulation of professional and personal life, a feeling of failure, anxiety to face the labour market and the future Difficulty to define a professional project and to master the recruitment process Insufficient capacity to sell oneself

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

7. GOOD PRACTICES, A FEW EXAMPLES The eSangathan team has agreed on the following definition of a good practice and tried to identify a few existing ones to illustrate what can be done in order to improve the situation of the aged workers in the labour market. Definition of a good practice: "a good practice is an action that has produced outstanding results in a comparable situation and that could be adapted for our situation. Such an action is a collection of specific methods and tools with a possible multiplying effect that have proved to be successful and sustainable". We have also defined criterions to identify a good practice in the specific field of the eSangathan project: • •

• • • • •

Number of 50+ hired Number of companies created by 50+. The company should exist for at least 2 years. We are perfectly aware that a number of 50+ may create a company to be selfemployed because he/she can't get a job. But, in some cases their might be facilitating measures implement by a government, a region, etc. to stimulate such an action Age management policy concerning eInclusion of the aged workforce Legal or justice decision in favour of the 50+ employment or age discrimination Increase of the rate of employed 50+ Company agreements in favour of ageing workforce Any other initiatives/experiments organised or facilitated by governments, social partners, regions, etc.

The purpose here is not to give an exhaustive list of good practices; but only a few examples. This White Paper will be available in the format of a wiki after the project ends. More good practices will be added on the wiki over time when they are collected. Over the time, we will also concentrate on cases about knowledge workers where ICT is playing a major role in the good practice. Nowadays, it is quite difficult to find for two major reasons: • very few publications and statistics concentrate on knowledge workers • relatively few cases have used ICT as lever to innovate and develop a good practice for the employment of aged workers Now, if you combine the two as eSangathan wants to do; it is still complicated to find numerous examples. Nevertheless, one should not forget to mention the very useful work published by Eurofound in 2006 which is already of great help when one wants to introduce an aged worker's policy in an organisation. The publications are: • • •

A guide to good practice in age management Employment initiatives for an ageing workforce in the EU15 Age and employment in the new Member States

Let us now hope that the initiative of this White Paper with a special focus on knowledge workers and ICT will in the near future also become a useful reference for those organisations looking for inspiration about working conditions for one of their major intangible asset : knowledge, experience, know-how and inter-personal skills.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN GOOD PRACTICES IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR The good practices presented here can relate as well to practices developed in governmental services or administrations as in local governments or regional bodies. It focuses on practices that impact directly the professional life of civil servants and state employees. In many countries they have a special statute which differs from the private business sector and in some cases they can offer good examples. In other cases they reveal discrimination due to their statute; it can relate to the age at which they can retire, the way their pension is calculated or the rights they have once retired compared to the employees of the private sector. On the other hand, a practice that can look as being discriminating due to the history of the statute can be inspiring for generalisation across all active aged workers. A few more examples will be given in the final version of the document. 7.1.1

SWEDEN

7.1.1.1 Project Senior Competence in Stockholm, Sweden It is evident that unemployed people over 50 find it especially hard to re-enter the labour market. This is a problem that we share with many other countries in Europe. The City of Paris has initiated and is the main owner of the Eu-financed project Senior Competence. Stockholm City and Frankfurt City are project partners. The target group for the project is unemployed people with university education or relatively qualified professional background, aged 50+: •

• •

Coaching during three months, in groups and individually, on how to find employment. The method includes measures to strengthen the individuals and help them identify their own driving forces in the labour market. Participants will learn how to formulate application letters and CVs, and how to put together certificates and references. They will themselves organise visits to companies in order to meet employers and seek employment. Participants will meet a private employment agency that will inform them about the most efficient ways of seeking employment. This personal contact with the agency also provides an opportunity to find employment. Some participants will instead be offered a trainee placement with an employer, thereby gaining work experience and personal references. If a trainee placement is not possible for e.g. health reasons, an action plan will be set up with measures required for equipping the participant for the labour market.

7.1.1.2 Computer programme This includes half a day a week for 3 months, and offers practical training using Microsoft Office (Word, Excel and Power Point), Internet and how to sent CVs and applications to various job sites. 7.1.1.3 The importance of good health This cannot be sufficiently stressed when you are working. The Health programme aims to improve the health of the participants. They will receive a training pass which enables them to train as much as they want, over and above the fixed activities. Health profiles are carried out

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN at the beginning and at the end of the health programme. This enables us to measure the improvement. In addition to the above, training measures will be carried out for coaches or senior social services officers in the mobilisation method. The method is one of the tools for shortening the period of unemployment and social welfare dependency in close cooperation with the participants. 7.1.1.4 Results The project started January 1st 2007 and ends December 31 2008, therefore an overall evaluation is yet to be done. Thus, the quantitative results form group 1 is as follows: Figure 17 – Results from Group 1 of Senior Competence Project

Part of Stockholm Persons Bromma 12 Hässelby - Vällingby 6 Norrmalm 7 Kista 3 Södermalm 1 Östermalm 3 Total 32 Results Persons Percent % Work 11 34,4 Practical Training 2 6,3 Illness 9 28,1 Still un-employed 4 15,6 Other causes 6 18,8 Total 32 100 Source: Website, http://www.stockholm.se/seniorcompetence

GOOD PRACTICES IN NATIONAL INSTITUTIONS AND NGOS There are several types of institutions from which good practices originate. Of course, national employment bodies whose vocation is to facilitate the return of unemployed to the labour market are very representative of this section. But one should not forget to mention other institutions such as social partners, associations dedicated to seniors, etc. who fulfil a very important role to stimulate the employment rate of aged workers.Let us look at some examples in different European countries. 7.1.2

BELGIUM

7.1.2.1 SeniorFlex NGO & dedicated associations can be counted among good practices as well. Based on practice from the field, acknowledgeable on these topics, they are active factors of opposition to age discrimination. They inform against age discrimination cases, they recommend and publicize good practices in some enterprises, they communicate good solutions found in other countries, they lobby and propose law changes and recruitment approaches train

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN to forecast competence management in enterprises, or even how to get useful help from seniors already retired. They promote new working conditions; insist on flexibility, continuous training, individual career management, intergenerational teams, suggesting individual choices and new kinds of relations with the company, instead of meaningless general rules (tariffs and collective bargaining). They call for attention of the public opinion and the deciders, by organizing events , colloquiums, Forum and seminars, by using the media ,and the press, on the specific topic of ” the activity of seniors, a priceless resource for the economy”. They help, represent, and support seniors willing to, and not knowing how to remain active: • • •

By uniting them as a group to avoid despair, helplessness and loneliness. By helping them to recognize their competences as added values and by coaching their networking By accompanying them through their job search , keeping abreast of the new communication means being computer literates, helping them to consider new forms of activities such as independent , SME’s founder or takeover, Coach, Interim manager , part timers , Consultant, Teacher, Tutor, Trainer,….So does Seniorflex via Flexsenior to connect offers of and requests for senior’s competences.

SeniorFlex is also representing, lobbying and proposing changes by visiting Governments members, and politicians, for the cancellation of brakes, ceilings and penalties and calling for tax incentives and social rules support of flexicurity. NGO SeniorFlex, was founded in 2003 by a handful of seniors 45+, when they felt that age discrimination prevailed everywhere, in our societies, from labour market to political action, and nobody was taking care of them! To represent, defend and valorise seniors of 45 + when they want to remain active, even after retirement age, either by choice or by necessity, SENIORFLEX has organized a Colloquium in the Federal Parliament , a Petition , several pre-elections challenges, and is preparing more events, Forum and Press Conferences .They are concerned with Belgium and France, because both countries were the worse pupils of the OECD class, for managing the consequences of their aging population, but both could find -and provide - emulating comparison grounds at international level. In France, SeniorFlex participates as Founder and Member of the Board to the FIDES (Federation Interrégionale pour le Developpement de l’Emploi des Seniors) a federation of associations which analyzes , lobbies, and recommends changes, their book “the Blues des Quinquas” was distributed to all politicians. 7.1.3

DENMARK

The senior workforce in Scandinavia has a favourable position in comparison with other countries in Europe if we look at the general statistics (mentioned earlier in the White Paper). Though, if we make a comparison with the young workforce, there are similar challenges in the Nordic countries with those two target groups, which has an increasing unemployment rate (see globalis.se). Even if there are priority within the business world, and society as a whole, to safeguard knowledge, experience, and transferring that lifelong learning in some sense to other target

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN groups, there are very little support action experience to give examples on, especially when it comes to initiatives in corporation with the public sector. Within the business world there have been implemented e.g. mentor programs, and similar initiatives, and from the government there is a tax reduction for those who continue to work after their original pension age at 65. We will here give some good examples on initiative taken from the civil society that focus on the aging workforce in Denmark. 7.1.3.1 Senior PC Support Senior PC Support (read more...) is another well received initiative taken of the DaneAge Association with the purpose of helping and advising seniors who needs support and guidance using computers at home. All members can call Senior PC Support for free (only a normal phone call charge) Monday to Friday between 10 am to 15 pm, which is a across the country service, where volunteers are working at a call centre (phone line service) as Senior PC supporters. The supporters working with IT support for the members who call in, have many years of broad experience using a PC and the Internet that answers and solve the questions over the phone. DaneAge Association and Microsoft Denmark has decided to expand their cooperation on ITsupport and advice for elders by establishing Senior PC Support. They have identified that there is a need to support a massively increasing interest from seniors in the society, which both organisations want to address. The support from Microsoft consists of training (for free) of the volunteering PC supports and donation of software-systems for the effectiveness of the homepage of the DaneAge Association, where more ways of cooperation are planned for the future. Marianne Wier, director for Politics & Strategy at Microsoft Denmark, says on the background for the cooperation with DaneAge's establishment of Senior PC Support: "The growing digitalization of the society steadily calls for higher requirements that the citizens can handle IT. If the leaders do not get on the IT Wagon we risk staying with a digital divide. This risk is we very interested in avoiding, and DaneAge is an ideal and obvious partner in this. The unique in this cooperation is, that there are no Microsoft-personnel helping the elders, it is DaneAge's own volunteers that function as Senior PC supporters. This is the optimal support process." (read more...) 7.1.3.2 DaneAge DaneAge Association is a national membership organisation, which was founded in 1986, and has know approximately 525 000 members organised in 219 local chapters/committees. DaneAge is an independent NGO, where 27% of all Danes aged 50+ are members of the organisation, which is a very high rate of membership. As an organisation DaneAge has a secretariat with a staff of 100 people, and around 10 000 volunteers working in local chapters/committees with social work, carrying out local membership activities, lobbying and so on. 10 000 people working voluntary is a very positive amount of persons prioritizing the aging workforce. DaneAge is also the 1st charter member of AARP Global Network (www.aarpglobalnetwork.org), the pre-eminent international network of organisations serving the needs of the senior population in countries around the world.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN The statement and task of DaneAge is to support a person's right to create an active and meaningful life on their own terms, thus actively be able to participate in society, regardless of age. Hence to guarantee this, they undertake activities like following (gathered from aeldresagen.dk) : • •

Providing assistance, support and counceling for those who need or want it. Value-added membership benefits, in terms of special discounts on insurance products, bank services and so on." Now in August the 14th DaneAge Association established a Jobmarket for elders has had a very good reception, where many people call and want to upload their CV on the Jobmarket site. The purpose of the Jobmarket is to create contact between companies looking for employees with experience, thus also experienced elders looking for flexible working conditions. The number of interested calls and notifications, since the Jobmarket started, shows that there is a need for this kind of platform, where focus is on alternative jobs with more flexible conditions. Many of the CV's established on the Jobmarket site represent a broad spectrum of un-skilled and well-skilled men and women, where they all have a common denominator regarding working hours and working conditions. DaneAge's Chief consultant Karin Kjemtrup says that: "More and more companies can see the perspectives in getting hold of this group of people in the labour market in a situation, where it is difficult to get people for jobs. Many of the companies that DaneAge Association are in contact with are very keen on appreciating and trying to fulfil individual job wishes". In contrast to the established job portals, which generally are focusing on fulltime jobs, the DaneAge Jobmarket tries to focus on alternative ways of employment with variable time of daily work, and periods of employment. 7.1.4

FRANCE

7.1.4.1 APEC Using networks is not something new for APEC, the French agency for unemployed high qualified workers; however using the internet and more precisely the social networks is a new matter! Social networks allow enhancing professional visibility, to initiate and develop contacts and allow recruiting or being recruited. The most spread out professional network, LinkedIn and APEC announced a partnership which is already active. Develop your e-reputation! It is no longer easy to be professionally "unconnected" and not be a member of the pervasive social networks. Recruiters, head hunters are using Google to identify candidates' e-dentity and as long as they don't find anything about your expertise, you will not exist! So, get online and start creating some links or "friendship" with others on social networks, always being careful about information you give. APEC and LinkedIn have created a special environment where you can get "news about your networks" and therefore decide about appropriate actions you wouldn’t have take otherwise. Give and you will receive! Developing an efficient professional network will help you to reach the right people to get a new job or find the right information to lead you to the right people. It is not about having the biggest number of contacts but rather about helping people to reach the right person, who might be in your contacts...The rule is about helping and your turn will come both ways. If you want to know more about this new service and use it, just go to the website.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN 7.1.4.2 Agreement in the banking sector The agreement about non-discriminatory criteria such as age is now open for signature in the whole banking sector. Not only age but other criteria such as quantitative objectives of recruitments, promotions, trainings, are requested to be publicly mentioned in the Companies’ Annual Report. For companies above 300 employees, the AFB ( French Association of Banks) proposed to publish indicators on diploma recognition upon experience, access to continuous training above 50, on promotion and earning, on career and skills development as well as on second part career interviews and on skills evaluation after 45. Other companies, not in the banking sector, such as HP are taking same type of initiatives. 7.1.5

THE NETHERLANDS

7.1.5.1 SESAM Academy The SESAM Academy stands for Academy for Seniors and Society. Within it, retired managers can follow a training course and become a voluntary consultant or coach for all kind of nonprofit organisations and for a period varying from 1 to 50 days. The aim of their support is to improve the quality and effectiveness of such organisations. The way the Academy was created is a good practice in itself: Impressed by the Centre of Active Aging of the University of Maryland, Washington DC, and the Director of the Dutch organisation NPOE (the Netherlands Platform Older People and Europe) decided to import the program in the Netherlands. First, a project manager was selected, then a presentation of the differences and similarities between the US and the Dutch contexts was organised, at the end an Advisory and a Steering Committee were created. The launching event allowed gaining more visibility and interest which led the Academy to eventually become an independent organisation (a Foundation) to better manage its growth. In 2008, over 600 organisations have received support from 75 senior SESAM voluntary consultants and still counting! GOOD PRACTICES IN CORPORATIONS We will find two sorts of initiatives in the good practices observed in corporations; the ones resulting from a corporate strategic decision that will impact only the corporation itself and those from a particular type of companies whose business is dedicated to human resources and personnel services. Of course, those practices cannot be simply compared due to the major difference in core business of each category of companies. The practices can also not be compared between large companies operating at international level and SMEs. One has also to keep in mind that a large corporation implemented in several geographies or countries can develop good practices in one country and not at all in other ones. It might be related to the local legal and social system, to the level of unionisation in a particular country and of course to the local age pyramid.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN This introductory comment to the good practices observed in the corporate world tells us that each case is unique and that it needs to be contextualised to be understood before one can learn from for an application in a different environment. It is the basic rule of benchmarking: analyse and compare identical processes and learn from the differences to become better. More examples will be given in the final version of the document. 7.1.6

CORPORATIONS IN FRANCE

7.1.6.1 Bateg (Vinci group) Mr L. Celerier, Bateg HR Director has announced key points in his statement about a specific approach for active ageing workforce at the Deauville conference, in June 2007. Five years ago, 3 fundamental events happened in terms of HR management: The massive retirement of the after war baby-boom generation, the Fillon laws which concern the increase of the retirement cotisation quarters to be entitled to receive a full retirement rate and the relative good health of the building sector which has lead us to heavily recruit while there is a lack of well trained workers. As we have to work longer, a new general HR policy( and not only a senior policy) has to be implemented for the immediate needs and for the coming years. Bateg has commited itself into 3 strategic directions: • Keep the know-how, the senior expertise and manage the know-how transmission • Rethink the HR process management and motivate seniors • Improve the work conditions and flexibility As a conclusion, Mr Celerier confirmed that legal tools are not an issue and involved all the concerned decision makers to step ahead. 7.1.7

CORPORATIONS IN SWEDEN

7.1.7.1 About Vattenfall Vattenfall´s core business is to produce and provide electricity and heat to customers throughout Europe. The corporation generates, distributes and sells electricity and heat, both to private households and industrial customers. Vattenfall AB is the parent company of the Vattenfall Group. With its registered office in Stockholm, it is a Swedish public limited liability company. Vatttenfall´s corporate governance is based on the campany´s Articles of Association, the Swedish Companies Act and other Swedish and international laws and regulations. Where applicable, Vattenfall also complies with the rules and regulations governing companies listed on the Stockholm Stock Exchange. 7.1.7.1.1 Ageing Workforce Management in Vattenfall AB Sweden The ageing of the population and workforce is an emerging issue by all the industrialised western countries. This issue will not only have a heavy impact on industrial productivity, social insurance and retirement programs but also affect immigration, culture, tradition and values. At the company level, the current population trend means that in the coming decade the proportion of the workforce aged 55 and over will increase dramatically and with it will come new management challenges.

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“The biggest hypocrisy on the Swedish labour market is the view regarding older workers. In the rhetoric, those who have just turned 60 are encouraged to work longer, but in practice something else happens. Employers hand out gold watches for long and faithful service while at the same time personnel departments prepare early retirement offers”, Wolodarski states. In the political debate, referring to the baby boom generation (those born in the 1940´s) by the term “köttberg” (literally means meat mountain) has awakened both attention and anger. Behind the above statements lie the big changes in the age pyramid, which more and more will affect the Swedish labour market in the future. As a result of the fast increase in the proportion of older workers in the workforce, society and increasingly more employers are beginning to worry about the prospect of so many going into retirement well before the regular retirement age. Therefore Vattenfall AB first focused on competence exchange. In that field we started up a program, called “Competence Transfer Mentoring” to train older workers in techniques and methods for transferring personal knowledge and know-how within the organisation. The program recognises the central role that the older worker can play in facilitating the transfer of vital knowledge throughout the workplace. In cooperation with the Swedish Royal Institute of Technology Vattenfall are developing “Dialogue Seminars”. The seminars are designed to make visible, process and utilize tacit knowledge and know how. For example, this knowledge includes experience of special operations, how to work in multi-cultural projects, how to find and use data on lessons learned from earlier projects, and general wisdom acquired through the years. The corporation has also worked with the internal and external labour market. With support of the internal labour market with the programme “Senior Resource Pool” to promote the use of special competence possessed by the pool members all of whom are in the age bracket 55-65 years old. Additionally, the organisation cooperates with the external organisation “The Working square” in order to make possible for elderly experienced people to come to Vattenfall for project work. All the members of the age bracket 57-65 years of age have been invited to take part in a range of “+57-seminars” on different locations in Sweden. The age bracket counts about one thousand employees. The goal is to motivate, inspire and make possible for an active working life until the ordinary retirement age at 65 or 67. In this programme the “80-90-100-tool is presented. It stands for 80 % of working time, 90 % paid and 100 % retirement paid. Source: Website, www.vattenfall.se, Nils Friberg, Senior Advisor Vattenfall AB Nordic.

GOOD PRACTICES IN HUMAN RESOURCES AND PERSONNEL COMPANIES ADECCO (Switzerland and other countries where ADECCO is implemented) Since 1999, Adecco has been a leading company on non discrimination and promotion of diversity, including ageing workforce issues: awareness raising at clients, training of employees, communication on the workplace and on websites are part of this commitment. A national agreement against discrimination, including age, was signed with the 5 major trade unions in 2007. Testing on age are spread throughout the Group's branches since 20008. Dedicated training on intergenerational management is experienced at some clients to facilitate day-to-day management for supervisors. Effects are positive with experienced workers discovering industries and job positions they did not think of. Employment is a key issue at Adecco and we believe innovative solutions for competencies at work are necessary to develop the skills of tomorrow. eLearning trainings on age management are currently being developed for our 3 main stakeholders: employees, candidates and clients. Bruce ROCH - Manager of Innovation & Diversities Department - Adecco France Group

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN 7.1.8

SENIOR WORK (SWEDEN)

Senior Work was founded in 2007 and has Sweden’s most comprehensive bank of available senior experience and know–how. The corporation has created a link between the best individuals within the Swedish business community and the best senior individuals, the very same talent that built our global presence the last decades. This includes managers at the very top level of all business disciplines such as; manufacturing, sales, marketing, law, finance, export, HR and general management. These are individuals who most often have left their operational role, but who still have their own strong driving forces and ambitions to contribute to more and better commercial successes in both the private and public sector. Senior Work matches these individuals against specific and well defined needs and lets the companies rent them and only pay for the hours they actually work. From an employer’s perspective totally free of recruitment costs, raining costs, pension costs, bonus salaries, overhead costs and other responsibilities associated with being an employer. All members Senior Work’s competence bank, have passed the company’s internal screening process with evaluates both the formal and personal profile. Senior Work’s bank of experience and know–how is open for managers and specialists with at least twenty–five years of operational experience. Senior Work offers senior competence for corporations, the public sector, portfolio corporations and family and owner lead business. The services are Senior managers and leaders, Senior Business advisors and Senior board embers. 7.1.9

HIGHLIGHTING THE PUBLIC SECTOR

Here is the point of view of Senior Work management team about the situation in the public sector : “Will 40% of your organizations management know–how retire within the next five years? Have you lost the next generation of leaders when you moved to another town due to a policy decision? Is the turnover among your younger managers to high? Have you difficulties in taking advantage of the management potential among well educated staff with an ethnic background? Has your organization a past experience from solving this kind of problems? If not, do you know where and whom to turn to? Where will you find the mentors? How do you plan to replace the specialists who are just about to retire or persuade him/her to postpone their retirement for another 36 months? With the current pace of change in today’s business life, no corporation can staff itself for all the future demands and situations it will face. The only thing you can be sure of is that having the right critical and strategic business know–how, will give your company a competitive edge. The trick is to have access to it at the very moment you need it or as we say on demand." Source: Website, www.seniorwork.se and Sven-Erik Hattenhauer, Area Manager Skåne in Sweden.

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8. RECOMMENDATIONS A set of European organisations have shown their concern about the demographic issue and its immediate effect on the workforce for the coming years. Many papers have been written and a few conferences organised. The results do not reach the level of expectations and the objectives of the i2010 and Lisbon strategy, reinforced by the Stockholm European Council and the Riga declaration, will not be reached. It was agreed to set an EU target for increasing the average EU employment rate among older women and men (55-64) to 50% by 2010. The rate is 43,5% for the EU-27 in 2007 with differences ranging from 69,6% in Sweden to 28,1% in Poland. It is already agreed that the objective will not be reached! The eSangathan team has learned about this active ageing workforce issue during the last two years and is making a few strong recommendations to the major actors playing a determinant role: • • • •

The European institutions The national governments and institutional bodies in charge of employment The corporations The workers

8.1 RECOMMENDATIONS TO EUROPEAN INSTITUTIONS The major finding at this level is that the topic of “active ageing workforce” is not a European strategic topic. The political and social messages are scattered and lack consistency. eSangathan recommends that: •

• • • • • • •

One DG in the European Commission becomes the leader of the topic instead of having it dispersed in four different DGs. A consistent aggregation of the work is necessary to be useful for the market. The time of working in “silos” is over and transversal management is necessary on topics with such a high societal and economic impact Coordination with specific European institutions like Eurofound in Dublin and OSHA in Bilbao becomes more visible Common work with the social partners at European level should be produced A strong signal is sent to the EU-national governments to implement a special effort to upgrade the ICT skills of the aged (knowledge) workers A European programme obliges governments and companies to raise the eSkills level of the citizens and the employees Knowledge workers should become an identified statistical segment Statistical segmentation consists of smaller segments for the aged workforce in order to be more meaningful (5-years segments instead of 10-years segments) Recent and consistent figures are available making comparisons and projections possible

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN 8.2 RECOMMENDATIONS TO NATIONAL GOVERNMENTS & INSTITUTIONAL BODIES IN CHARGE OF EMPLOYMENT At national level, eSangathan wants to distinguish the governmental action itself from the actions recommended to institutional bodies like social partners unions or specialised employment agencies, etc. 8.2.1

RECOMMENDATIONS TO NATIONAL GOVERNMENTS

It appears that in many countries it would be beneficial for the unemployed aged workers to revisit the role of national employment bodies and the skills of the agencies personnel. They have the responsibility to help the unemployed, recommend orientations or make decisions on vocational training in order to improve their employability; in many cases they don’t know themselves the role and importance of eSkills. So, eSangathan recommends that: • •

• • 8.2.2

Governments ensures a higher level of quality of the personnel in charge of unemployment of aged workers Governments launch and implement an ICT eSkills programme for the 45-64. Why this segment and not the traditional 55-64? In order to prevent a low level of employability for this earlier generation which is not as ICT-enabled as the new comers and my suffer in a few years from now from skills discrimination We have to remember that 50 is the most discriminating age on the labour market (if not 45). Social partners bargain ICT eSkills programme for the 50+ to be implemented with a measurement system eSkills assessment centers are implemented

RECOMMENDATIONS TO INSTITUTIONAL BODIES IN CHARGE OF EMPLOYMENT • • • • • •

Employment bodies have the right skills and regularly train their personnel Agents should work (mandatory)at least one month a year in a company or in a public organisation Measure the result of the trainings in terms of return to the labour market Update at least once a year the training offers Establish the list of the ICT eSkills training centres Publicise the critical skills required by the labour market

8.3 RECOMMENDATIONS TO CORPORATIONS Here are a few recommendations to corporate management. eSangathan recommends to corporations to: • • •

• •

Develop a ICT users leadership programme for 50+ Implement, advertise and include in the personal objectives an ICT eSkills programme for the 50+ Invest in 45+ women. Women have a longer life expectation and for various reasons may need to work longer. The 50-64 generation is not enough skilled and sometimes women come back to the labour market after 45 having lost their initial skills or not being recognised anymore as a potential in who a company should invest. Introduce age pyramid and the age management as part of the annual results Organise job rotations to keep the knowledge workers intellectually fit and adaptable to changes

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN •

Assess the skills of the 40+ and train them

8.4 RECOMMENDATIONS TO THE WORKERS The most important recommendation to the individuals is to make sure that their skills are continuously updated. As well their professional skills for which they are valued as their ICTskills. We recommend to them a regular eSkills assessment which enables one to position him/herself. We want to stress the situation of the women in society. Aged women workers are less skilled and more disadvantaged in the labour market. They need to do a particular effort and need institutional and corporate support to get there. We want also to recommend to aged workers to make sure they get familiar in a way or another with ICT and have home equipment. Statistics tell us that only 15% of the 60+ single household have equipment. Workers at 40 to 45 should make sure they benefit from a skill assessment in their company and continue to benefit from vocational training.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

9. CONCLUSION As you can notice, we mention « conclusion » (singular form) because the only very important point the team wanted to demonstrate is that active ageing workforce and ICT are not contradictory. eSangathan has demonstrated it. In other reports it has been explained how to do it and the eSangathan team is convinced that aged workers can remain active and included into the labour market thanks to ICT. No further conclusion is needed; just embrace ICT; agree it is part of your working life and enjoy the intergenerational relationship opportunity it provides to you.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

10. BIBLIOGRAPHY The bibliography consists of documents and web references (websites and blogs). The topics of this White Paper are in direct relation with very fast moving facts and figures which justifies to also use more volatile data available on the web until the formal statistical systems provide evidence for those trends. The documents will appear with their publication details and with an hyperlink when they are available on the web. The web references will appear with the name of the website or the blog. DOCUMENTS • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Changing social patterns of relations to work, Sprew project D3, P.Vandramin FTU editor, 2008 Ageing and Employment, Final report, Warwick Institute for Employment Research, Munich, 2006 The demographic future of Europe - from challenge to opportunity, Commission communication COM(2006) 571 final, 2006 Europe's demographic future: fact and figures, Commission staff working document SEC(2007) 638, 2007 Society at a glance: selection of OECD social indicators - how does your country compare?, OECD, 2007 i2010 - Annual Information Society Report 2007, Commission of the European Communities, 2008 The Future of Knowledge - Increasing Prosperity through Value Networks, Allee V., Butterworh Heinemann, 2003 Internet usage in 2007-Households and Individuals, Smihily M., Eurostat, 2007 The Future of the Internet Economy-A Statistical Profile, OECD, 2008 Senior human ressources in science and technology, Meri T., Eurostat, 2008 Baromètre des discriminations, Adia, 2006 OECD Famaily Database, OECD, 2007 OECD population pyramids in 2000 and 2050, OECD Landmarks of Tomorrow: A Report on the New "Post-Modern" World by Drucker P.F., Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1959 The life of women and men in Europe, Eurostat, 2008 Employment in Europe 2007, European Commission, 2007 Managing Demographic Risk by Strack R., Baier J. and Fahlander A., Harvard Business Review, February 2008 The transition of women and men from work to retirement by Romans F., Eurostat, 2007 Gestion des âges et politiques de l'emploi: Rapport annuel 2004, IGAS, 2004 Equality at Work: Tackling the Challenges, ILO, 2007 L'emploi des seniors en Europe du Nord, DARES N° 10.3, 2003 Augmenter le taux d'emploi des seniors: les enseignements des expériences étrangères, Conseil d'orientation des retraites, 2007 E-Communications Household Survey, European Commission, 2007 The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization by Senge P., 1990 Traité de psychologie du travail et des organisations in Le travail à distance by Kouloumdjian M.F., Dunod, 2006 Economic Fundamentals fo the Knowledge Society by David P.A. and Foray D in Special Issue of The International Social Science Journal, N° 171, 2002 Discrimination in the European Union, European Commission, 2007

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN • • • • • • • • • • • •

Recruitment policies and practices in the context of demographic change by Healy M. and Schwarz-Woelzl M., Mature@EU project, 2007 European Equal Treatment Directive, Directive 2000/78/EC, European Commission, 2000 Accord sur la non discrimination par l'âge et l'emploi des seniors dans la banque, 2008 A guide to good practice in age management by Naegele G. and Walker A., Eurofound, 2006 Employment initiatives for an ageing workforce in the EU15 by Taylor, P., Eurofound, 2006 Age and employment in the new Member States by Mandl, I., Dorr, A. and Oberholzner, T., Eurofound, 2006 Place et sens du travail en Europe : une singularité française by Davoine L. and Meda D., Centre d'Etudes de l'Emploi, 2008 Towards a longer woklife ! Ageing and the quality of worklife in the European Union by Ilmarinen J., FIOH, 2007 Les seniors et le monde du travail, a survey by Manpower Institute, IPSOS, LCI and Les Echos, March 2008 La perception mutuelle des générations, La Lettre Emerit N°53, 2008 Building the Web 2.0 Enterprise, McKinsey Quarterly survey on Web 2.0, July 2008 Meetings Around the World: the impact of collaboration on business performance by Frost & Sullivan, 2006

WEB REFERENCES • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

European Commission - Research - RTD info Eurostat : Employment rate of older workers by gender ICT for Competitiveness and Innovation - European Commission Viviane Reding, Commissioner for DG Information Society and Media Verna Allee Associates i2010, a European Information Society for growth and employment Riga Ministerial declaration, June 11, 2006 Factors influencing sickness absence in Denmark Flexible working environment can reduce absenteeism Older workers stress less Stockholm European Council, 23-24 March, 2001 Lisbon European Council, 23-24 March, 2000 Growth and Jobs, European Commission OSHA or European Agency for Safety and Health at Work Eurofound or European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions CIA : The world fact Book European Health Expectancy Monitoring Unit Ageing Workforce News Observatoire des discriminations Wikipedia ACAS : Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service Human sociality

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APPENDICES

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

Appendix 1 – List of Figures Figure 1 - 1995-2030 EU-workers population trend ........................................................................ 4 Figure 2 - 2000 and 2050 EU-25 age pyramid ............................................................................... 7 Figure 4 - Households computer equipment in 2006......................................................................10 Figure 5 - Proportion of households with at least one computer .......................................................10 Figure 6 – Proportion of households with broadband internet access .................................................11 Figure-7 - Individuals using the internet from any location, by age group in 2007 ..................................13 Figure 8 – Official and effective age of retirement of men, 2005 ......................................................19 Figure 9 - Skills structure of the population aged 15-64 in the EU 27 by age group, 2006 .........................20 Figure 10 – Activity Rate by five year Age Groups ........................................................................21 Figure 11 - Women and men aged 55-74 assessed to have high computer skills in 2006 ...........................26 Figure 12 - Division of men ages 30-34 and 50-54 by educational attainment level in 2005 .......................27 Figure 13 - Number of employees continuing vocational training in the EU-27 by age in 2005 ...................28 Figure 14 - Employment rates for the age group 55-64 in education or training across EU Member States .....28 Figure 15 - Population Indicators for India: 1990 to 2020 ...............................................................30 Figure 16 - Population in different age groups and their proportions to total population .........................31 Figure 17 – Results from Group 1 of Senior Competence Project.......................................................38 Figure 18 - Indian population in 2000 .......................................................................................60 Figure 19 - Indian population projection in 2025 .........................................................................60 Figure 20 - Indian population projection in 2050 .........................................................................61 Figure 21 - Women and men aged 55-74 having used the internet in 2006 ..........................................62 Figure 22 - Women and men aged 16-24 having used internet in 2006................................................62 Figure 23 – Integrated roadmaps.............................................................................................66

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

Appendix 2 – List of Tables Table-1: Total employment rate of older workers (55-64) between 1997 and 2007 (females & males) .........55 Table-2: Difference in life expectancy of women and men at age 65, 1990 and 2005 .............................56 Table-3: Disability-free life expectancy of women and men at age 65 in 2003......................................57 Table-4: Self-perceived health status of women and men aged 65-74 in 2004 ......................................58 Table-5: Employment in knowledge-intensive service sectors (1995-2006) ..........................................59

A few useful tables are included in the document to ease the reading. As some readers may be interested in more detailed figures they are part of this appendix and are attached hereunder.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Table-1: Total employment rate of older workers (55-64) between 1997 and 2007 (females & males) 1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

EU (27 : 36.2 36.2 36.5 36.9 37.7 38.5 40.0 countries) EU (25 : 35.7 35.8 36.2 36.6 37.5 38.7 40.3 countries) EU (15 36.3 36.4 36.6 37.1 37.8 38.8 40.2 41.7 countries) European Union 36.3 36.4 36.6 37.1 37.8 38.8 40.2 41.7 Euro area 33.1 33.2 33.3 33.7 34.2 35.2 36.5 37.9 Euro area (15 33.4 33.5 33.5 33.8 34.4 35.1 36.4 37.8 countries) Euro area (13 33.4 33.4 33.5 33.8 34.3 35.1 36.4 37.8 countries) Euro area (12 33.4 33.5 33.5 33.9 34.4 35.2 36.5 37.9 countries) Belgium 21.9 22.1 22.9 24.6 26.3 25.1 26.6 28.1 Bulgaria : : : : 20.8 24.0 27.0 30.0 Czech Republic : : 37.1 37.5 36.3 37.1 40.8 42.3 Denmark 49.1 51.7 52.0 54.5 55.7 58.0 57.9 60.2 Germany 37.9 38.1 37.7 37.8 37.6 37.9 38.9 39.9 Estonia : : 50.2 47.5 46.3 48.5 51.6 52.3 Ireland 39.7 40.4 41.7 43.7 45.3 46.8 48.0 49.0 Greece 41.2 41.0 39.0 39.3 39.0 38.2 39.2 41.3 Spain 33.2 34.1 35.1 35.0 37.0 39.2 39.6 40.7 France 29.4 29.0 28.3 28.8 29.9 31.9 34.7 37.0 Italy 28.6 27.9 27.7 27.6 27.7 28.0 28.9 30.3 Cyprus : : : : 49.4 49.1 49.4 50.4 Latvia : : 36.3 36.6 36.0 36.9 41.7 44.1 Lithuania : : 39.5 40.9 40.4 38.9 41.6 44.7 Luxembourg 22.9 23.9 25.1 26.4 26.7 25.6 28.1 30.3 Hungary 17.7 17.7 17.3 19.4 22.2 23.5 25.6 28.9 Malta : : : : 28.5 29.4 30.1 32.5 Netherlands 30.5 32.0 33.9 36.4 38.2 39.6 42.3 44.3 Austria 29.1 28.3 28.4 29.7 28.8 28.9 29.1 30.3 Poland : 33.9 32.1 31.9 28.4 27.4 26.1 26.9 Portugal 47.3 48.5 49.6 (b) 50.1 50.7 50.2 51.4 51.6 Romania : 52.1 51.5 49.6 49.5 48.2 37.3 (b) 38.1 Slovenia 19.1 21.8 23.9 22.0 22.7 25.5 24.5 23.5 Slovakia : : 22.8 22.3 21.3 22.4 22.8 24.6 Finland 35.4 35.6 36.2 39.0 41.6 45.7 47.8 49.6 Sweden 63.4 62.6 63.0 63.9 64.9 66.7 68.0 68.6 United Kingdom 47.7 48.3 49.0 49.6 50.7 (b) 52.2 53.4 55.4 Croatia : : : : : : 24.8 28.4 Macedonia : : : : : : : : Turkey : : : : 36.3 (i) 35.8 (i) 35.7 (i) 33.5 (i) Iceland : : : : : : : 83.0 Norway : : : : 65.2 65.9 66.2 66.9 Switzerland 62.4 (i) 63.8 (i) 64.5 (i) 64.7 (i) 63.3 (i) 67.1 (i) 64.6 (i) 65.8 (i) United States 55.9 57.1 57.7 57.7 57.7 58.5 59.4 59.8 Japan 63.6 64.2 63.7 63.4 62.7 62.0 61.6 62.1 (:) Not available - b) Break in series - i) See explanatory text - p) Provisional value

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2005

2006

2007

40.7

42.4

43.5

41.0

42.6

43.7

42.5

44.2

45.3

42.5 38.7 38.6

42.6 40.6 40.5

43.7 41.8 41.8

38.6

40.5

41.8

38.7

40.6

41.8

30.0 32.5 42.7 60.3 41.8 52.4 49.5 39.4 41.3 37.6 30.5 (b) 49.9 47.9 47.1 30.4 31.1 31.5 45.2 28.8 (b) 26.2 50.3 36.9 29.0 26.8 50.9 69.1 56.2 30.1 : 33.2 (i) 81.8 65.8 65.2 (i) 59.9 63.0

31.8 34.7 44.5 59.5 45.4 (b) 56.1 51.6 41.6 43.1 (b) 38.7 31.4 50.6 49.5 49.2 31.7 33.0 30.8 46.1 31.8 27.2 50.5 39.4 30.7 30.3 52.7 69.4 (b) 56.9 32.6 : 31.0 (i) 84.3 65.5 65.1 (i) 60.8 63.8

32.0 39.6 45.2 60.7 48.4 58.5 53.1 42.3 44.1 38.1 32.5 53.6 53.3 49.6 33.2 33.6 30.0 47.7 35.5 28.1 50.1 41.7 32.6 33.1 54.5 69.6 57.4 34.3 : 30.1 84.3 67.4 65.7 (i) 61.7 64.7

Source Eurostat

Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

Table-2: Difference in life expectancy of women and men at age 65, 1990 and 2005

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Table-3: Disability-free life expectancy of women and men at age 65 in 2003

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Table-4: Self-perceived health status of women and men aged 65-74 in 2004

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Table-5: Employment in knowledge-intensive service sectors (1995-2006) 1995 1996 EU (27 countries) : Belgium 32.87 Bulgaria : Czech Republic : Denmark 38.96 Germany 26.89 Estonia : Ireland 29.27 Greece 20.15 Spain 22.18 France 33.48 Italy 24.16 Cyprus : Latvia : Lithuania : Luxembourg 30.54 Hungary : Malta : Netherlands 36.65 Austria 25.63 Poland : Portugal 21.80 Romania : Slovenia : Slovakia : Finland 37.27 Sweden 44.22 United Kingdom 36.78 Croatia : Turkey : Iceland 38.17 Norway 40.74 Switzerland : (:) Not available - b) Break in series

1997 : 34.60 : : 40.12 27.91 : 30.15 20.51 23.59 33.55 24.71 : : : 33.44 25.27 : 36.39 26.53 : 22.01 : 20.83 : 37.44 44.19 37.25 : : 38.40 40.63 34.08

1998 : 34.93 : 22.83 40.85 28.56 27.53 29.38 20.81 23.93 33.92 25.57 : : : 34.31 25.37 : 36.93 27.55 : 21.97 11.94 20.25 : 37.37 44.12 37.86 : : 37.91 40.45 35.52

1999 : 35.90 : 22.56 40.63 29.23 28.05 30.42 21.51 23.91 34.29 25.72 : 22.67 23.77 35.33 25.83 : 38.00 28.02 : 18.31 11.70 21.38 22.99 38.30 43.89 38.44 : : 37.52 40.97 35.25

2000 : 35.96 : 22.78 41.56 29.92 28.63 31.28 21.79 24.07 34.73 26.21 24.52 24.21 24.59 37.91 25.49 : 39.07 27.98 : 19.57 11.44 23.18 24.18 37.41 45.38 39.46 : : 38.87 42.28 36.08

2001 30.34 37.00 21.18 24.03 42.13 30.37 26.88 31.76 21.76 24.55 34.69 26.68 25.53 24.76 26.19 35.50 26.50 29.72 39.21 28.17 : 19.37 11.12 22.80 24.48 37.91 45.71 39.81 : : 39.26 42.26 36.22

2002 30.89 37.80 23.12 24.11 42.72 31.02 28.03 31.98 22.48 24.80 35.04 26.95 26.49 24.76 26.90 35.79 26.31 27.83 39.96 29.28 : 19.66 11.30 23.14 25.33 39.14 46.14 40.54 : : 40.92 43.61 39.03

2003 31.42 37.77 22.21 23.82 43.99 31.80 30.86 33.46 22.75 25.32 35.53 27.47 26.27 24.83 24.74 38.07 26.46 28.50 38.77 30.06 : 19.80 13.09 22.95 24.01 39.23 47.05 40.92 21.69 : 41.93 44.27 38.42

2004 31.98 39.02 22.13 24.42 43.20 33.00 31.61 33.44 23.08 25.44 36.00 27.45 27.03 23.97 24.16 38.67 27.95 28.80 42.43 30.17 : 20.31 13.02 24.28 24.14 39.72 47.23 41.10 20.81 : 43.02 44.55 40.35

Source Eurostat

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2005 32.18 38.60 22.23 24.52 42.32 33.36 27.49 33.49 24.90 26.07 36.16 30.25 26.34 24.60 24.96 39.03 28.47 29.08 42.16 31.30 24.32 22.46 14.07 24.27 25.05 40.34 46.95 42.11 21.11 : 42.84 45.60 40.96

2006 32.36 38.38 22.02 24.98 42.83 33.55 28.96 34.02 24.54 26.98 36.72 29.83 26.96 25.81 25.54 41.96 28.27 30.40 41.91 30.98 24.23 23.08 13.72 25.04 25.59 40.53 47.79 42.39 20.94 : 43.13 45.67 41.21

Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

Appendix 3 – Indian Demography As stated in the socio-technological dimension, India is starting to feel the lack of skills to fulfil the internal market demand and needs to envisage a more sustained effort to keep the workforce longer in the labour market and especially the knowledge workers. It will not be a cultural revolution; but the volume of the number of retirees that stay active will have to increase in the coming years. By the way, the age pyramid projections made by the U.S. Census Bureau show that there should be potentially enough aged population to compensate the lack of skills of the younger generations. But, one has to be cautious because those statistics do not reflect the segments of skills. So, more work needs to be done on this aspect and reliable figures are definitely not easy to find. Figure 18 - Indian population in 2000

Figure 19 - Indian population projection in 2025

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Figure 20 - Indian population projection in 2050

One easily sees with those 3 pictures the evolution of the number of aged persons and the start of shrinking of the new generations. One major signal is the importance of education for the new generations and the need of a countrywide strategic view on the kind and level of skills that will be needed to serve the domestic market.

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Appendix 4 – EU Use of Internet

To understand the technological and generational divide, one only needs to have a look at the two figures hereunder. They demonstrate that if aged workers are not stimulated to do an effort and climb the learning curve, they might encounter employability problems in the next coming years. In addition, the divide will also be behavioural because the new generations which are "digital natives" will simple behave, work and communicate differently. This might directly affect project teams and teamwork. Figure 21 - Women and men aged 55-74 having used the internet on average once a day or almost every day in the last three months in 2006

Figure 22 - Women and men aged 16-24 having used internet on average once a day or almost every day in the last three months in 2006

We were not able to find any specific figures on knowledge workers in a professional environment. But, those figures give a general panorama of the situation in Europe!

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

Appendix 5 – Öresund Pilot by Martina Sophia BACH The following appendix aims to give the reader a clear and crisp picture of how CWE has been working for the ageing workforce in the European Pilot, aiming from hierarchical structural thinking towards self-organizing complex heterarchical thinking when working with themes of importance. The aim for a hierarchical structural thinking and action is closely related to the participative dimension in the development of Web 2.0 trends on the Internet and suggests that collaborative and participative tools are in fact changing and improving the way people organize themselves virtually and how this can contribute in sharing and creating knowledge. THE EUROPEAN PILOT IN ÖRESUND Folkuniversitetet in Sweden has been responsible for the work with the European Pilot and the premises in Landskrona was used in order to carry out physical meetings, and also support with computers and internet access for the pilot members who was in need for this. Folkuniversitetet is an adult educational association that offers a wide range of adult education all over Sweden. It is an association of five foundations: the extra-mural departments attached to the Universities of Stockholm, Uppsala, Göteborg, Lund and Umeå. The close connections to the universities allow the organisation to provide, through lectures, study circles and seminars, information about the latest developments in research. Folkuniversitetet also engage academic staff in offering university-level courses in a wide range of subjects and is independent of all political, religious and trade union interests. European Pilot was in an early stage of the project progress re-named Öresund Pilot Group. This because all consortium members during the project management board kick-off meeting found the target group Swedes and Danes in the region Öresund more interesting to study since this region statues interesting examples from a European Union perspective. The objectives for the Öresund Pilot were to establish the pilot, create an effective pilot identity and communication mechanisms inside and outside the pilot, use and refine roadmaps, train pilot members in professional ICT working environment and measure the results of the pilot. During the first six months of eSangathan, project management put emphasis on learning the consortium’s CWE MayeticVillage and the synchronous tool Skype in order to get a clear view and hands-on practice on how CWE can be deployed. This was done in parallel with formulating the prerequisites for joining the pilot and recruiting aged knowledge workers from both Sweden and Denmark. The prerequisites for joining: • • • • • • •

45+ Swedish or Danish citizen Basic English language skills Basic computer- and Internet skills Open minded to non-traditional and self-organizing heterarchical methods for social innovation Motivation for learning and use of CWE Motivation for sharing knowledge and experience with others

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN •

Willingness to return or stay longer on the labour market

RECRUITING METHODS Initially, Folkuniversitetet started dealing with the internal networks in the organization, with focus on people working in the south of Sweden – Skane. This took place right after kick-off meeting in Copenhagen, October 2006 through e-mailing, FU Intranet, FU website and ordinary phone calls to people who might be interested in joining the group. As project manager for the Öresund Pilot Group and responsible for the pilot, Martina S Bach recruited some participants from her own business network. In early January, press releases to local papers were published and this gave the recruiting process a real boost which also gave the majority of pilot members. Since the European Pilot became an Öresund Pilot on an early stage of the project, the recruiting process became a joint venture between Folkuniversitetet in Sweden and Copenhagen Business School (CBS) in Denmark. Leif Bloch Rasmussen from CBS recruited aged workers from his own business network and also discovered the organization “Seniors without Boarders” (SUG) in Denmark, which gave additional people to the list of presumptive participants. In the end of the recruiting process, Folkuniversitetet held a presentation on “Arbetstorget” in Lund – a labour market project supported by EU, with Folkuniversitetet in Lund as project responsible. This presentation resulted in several requests to join the pilot. It should be noted that it is was not possible to have people assigned to the pilot through local employment agencies, as this would require a full time educational plan for each participant. In Sweden and Denmark, unemployed aged workers are placed in different labour market programs and only through mandatory participation they get financial compensation from the unemployment benefit fund. This means that unemployed aged workers prioritise those programs before participation in a project like eSangathan since we do not pay for participation. In the end of March 2007 we had around 35 presumptive pilot members with various background and age. Thus, one must keep in mind that all our pilot members joined on a voluntary basis and represented a well distributed mix of retired, un-employed, employed and self-employed aged workers and it also turned out to be a rather high-educated group with former teachers, engineers, PhD’s. MBA’s etc. 70% of these where between 55+ and 65+ and represented a very active group of people with interest and commitments in many different areas, such as NGO work etc. In mid June we had a final list of participants representing 22 of the above presumptive. Already in May, questionnaires where distributed among pilot members in order to map different skills. The matrix for evaluation criteria of ICT skills Hard skills/competences (OECD & Euro stat) and the matrix for evaluation criteria of ICT skills Soft skills/Cross curriculum Competencies (CCC) were applied. After collection and analysis of these questionnaires, we could in general state that most of them where fairly high-rated when it came to hard skills. Concerning Internet skills the pilot members seemed to master basic use of Internet fairly well. Summing up soft skills competencies in this group, participants have in general good selfesteem. The group seems to be good at acquiring information using ICT but have harder times in evaluating, handling and integrating information using ICT.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN FALL-OUTS During the first couple of months (March-April) we had a turbulent time in the project. It was rather difficult to know who was in and who was out, due to several reasons. Around 60% of the group was still working - employed or self-employed. This limited us in finding suitable dates and time where as many as possible could join the meetings. Furthermore, as people joined this project on a totally voluntary basis without any economical compensation, we had to be flexible in many ways. Yet, it was crucial that all members attended the meeting, because without the face-to-face dialogue with project managers, it would be very hard to learn and understand the methods applied in this project. Especially, Team Syntegrity sessions presuppose that all members actively and democratically take part of formulation of themes, themes auction etc. In all, eighteen people left the project within the first couple of months. Some because they got job along the way and wanted to focus on this instead of the project. Others said that they found the integrated roadmap and tools far too abstract to cope with. We also lost people who had great ambitions with this venture in the beginning, but after a while realized that active participation was a prerequisite for membership. An experience gained in this process was that highly motivated people stay put and develops greater interest in CWE and social innovation while others not so motivated tend to fall out quite fast. This can be called logical reduction and could be considered as a healthy output for an experimental project like this. The integrated roadmap requires inquiring thinking and spontaneous curiosity in order to cope with wicked problems and complexity. Thus, this can be viewed as a result in itself. Yet in a recruiting process like this it is difficult to separate honestly motivated people from others without seeing them in action, showing up for meetings, taking part of dialogues etc. THE INTEGRATED ROADMAP The kick-off meeting was held in the end of March 2007 by presenting the eSangathan project and the tools for navigating the integrated roadmap. The tools applied in the Öresund Pilot: Communication: Narratives - telling ones story Socratic Dialogue - philosophical practice through the search for a common statement Collaboration: Team Syntegrity – self-organizing and democratical tool for indentifying themes of importance/topics Social innovation: Social Learning Curve – knowledge scanning and identification of where the knowledge gaps can be found in a specific topic

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Business Modelling: A variety of Business Plans (we did not commit to reach the level of writing business plan, yet if pilot members were very ambitious and fast in their way of elaborating on the topics, this should be an option to them). The integrated roadmap: Figure 23 – Integrated roadmaps

Parallel with this we introduced the CWE Basecamp – a fairly simple virtual collaboration platform, and this was done by displaying training videos from Basecamp website. In each physical meeting, which where held approximately once a month, we had a session devoted for questions around the use of the CWE. FROM A HETEROGENEOUS TEAM TOWARDS A HOMOGENEOUS ONE Already from the starting point, we realized the importance of putting much effort in the creation of a group identity for this pilot. Therefore, we put emphasis on social aspects through narrative practice and Socratic Dialogue. The initial Team Syntegrity-sessions aiming at identifying 12 themes of importance (the topics that pilot members should elaborate on in CWE), also had social aspects involved since the tools is fairly much about arguing for the issues that are important to oneself. Evidently, self-organization demands a high rate of human communication and interaction.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN It should also be mentioned that practically all themes of importance identified through Team Syntegrity was about sustainable development – such as sustainable energy, ecological and collective resources, ages across boarders, social economics and social co-operation etc. In fact, CWE was also mentioned as a tool for reaching sustainable development. BARRIERS TO GET OVER Starting out with such a heterogeneous and mixed group, we quite soon depicted several barriers to overcome in order to create a strong group identity that stood united in tackling their jointly defined themes of importance. •

•

•

Language difficulties – even if people in general understand the language on the other side of the Öresund (the water between Denmark and Sweden in the Öresund Region) fairly well in daily small-talk, it is different when you present abstract and complex tools. Difference in motivation – after a couple of months in the pilot we recognised that the motivation for some participants truly elaborate on the themes of importance was not generally high. Some pilot members seemed to attend the meeting more out of curiosity than of really wanting to collaborate and make a difference. Social differences – here we depicted different aspects of relational, cultural and emotional distances, which we was not surprised by since we recruited with the aim on heterogeneity in order to secure different perspectives on the themes of importance.

Yet, smaller groups were formed after a couple of physical meetings and people who enjoyed each other’s company also focused on themes of importance where these people could be found. Originally, we planned only a few face-to-face meetings in order to introduce and train pilot members in tools like Team Syntegrity, Socratic Dialogue, Narratives, Social Learning Curve and CWE. Although, we discovered quite soon that this was not enough additional meeting were held, both from initiatives from project management and pilot members. This was problematical from the point of view that some pilot members had difficulties in being away from work/family/NGO-work during day-time. And since more than 30% of the pilot group where represented by aged workers from Denmark, we could not locate this after-work time. We had to consider travel time from Denmark to Sweden since most of the meetings were located at Folkuniversitetet premises in Landskrona, Sweden. THE SUPPORTING ROLE OF CWE The CWE, in our case Basecamp should play the role of supporting collaboration on themes of importance among pilot members. The main idea was that tools for communication, collaboration and social innovation should be taught face-to-face and then carried out through Basecamp on a virtual basis. Project Management only used Basecamp for communication with the Öresund Pilot Group and had so done exclusively since the beginning of May 2007. This worked out good since pilot members often asked follow-up questions on the CWE rather than using project management email or cell phone. During the summer months June and July, two Basecamp workshop sessions were held at Folkuniversitetet in Landskrona in order to give pilot members an opportunity to exclusively elaborate and try-out the CWE without any disturbances from trying to grasp tools from the

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN integrated roadmap. Only a few showed up to the first workshop, yet the second one attracted the majority of the pilot group. The learning curve for pilot members on CWE was around six months. So was the learning curve for project management who also didn’t know of CWE before the start of eSangathan. This limitation on CWE-skills from the management side played a certain role and will be further elaborate on under key findings. Pilot members expressed their curiosity on learning CWE, but they felt as if there never was enough time to sit in front of the computer fully testing it out since they also were eager on understanding the methodology for social innovation. Although, some of them where very active, really trying to get feedback and action in between physical meetings. User statistics shows that interaction on Basecamp was mostly about posting messages and commenting on existing messages from project management or other pilot members. And it was quite clear that virtual activity always increased after face-to-face meetings in the pilot. KEY FINDINGS IN THE PILOT •

•

• •

•

•

You need strong CWE-leadership in order to be able to support the learning and adaption process among pilot members and this means that management also need excellent skills in CWE and understanding of differences that come to attentions when working on a virtual basis (social, lingual, cultural, emotional, technical etc.) A more intensive kick-off/introduction of all tools including CWE is necessary and you should include a workshop in CWE during this introduction so that participants can get a hands-on feeling and understanding of the virtual tools already from the start. Using tools for social innovation combined with CWE one can move a group from hierarchical power-based discussions towards inquiring dialogue as the integrated roadmap suggests. We can undoubtedly see a mind-shifting from hierarchical structural thinking to selforganizing complex heterarchical thinking when applying these tools from an inquiring system perspective. Nevertheless, you need to take into account time and patience – paradigm shifts are not made on a short term basis. You need clear cut goals and expectations in order to succeed with CWE implementation. The Öresund Pilot worked with a lot of different tools and sometimes pilot members were confused on whether to spend time on learning tools for communication, collaboration and social innovation or CWE activities. Yet, without understanding the tools for social innovation, actions on CWE would have been most unlikely. It is extremely important to communicate the methodology in a consistent way. There are two options – either you create a common vocabulary for all tools or you put emphasis on the differences in perspectives of each tool. Our recommendation would be the latter one since you then don’t risk losing the complexity of each tool. In the last case there is a need for border crossing objects that make one pause, think and change perspective. Even in CWE, a totally new vocabulary unfolds for aged workers. This language is not self-evident, nor is terms like themes of importance, ‘prejects’ or common statements.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

Appendix 6 – Indian Pilot by Consortium Members from Mahindra&Mahindra and TechMahindra The following chapter brings out the experiences on the adoption of CWE by ageing workforce in corporate environment in Indian context. The M&M Pilot The eSangathan project started on October 1, 2006. On 1st April 2007, a pilot implementation of a collaborative working environment for ageing workforce started in India at Mahindra & Mahindra Group, one of the top 10 industrial houses in India. The main objective of the project is to see how innovative approaches based on use of ICT (Information and Communication Technology) and more specifically CWE (Collaborative Working Environments) can generate new ideas, models and work environments for e-Inclusion of Ageing Workforce. Tech Mahindra, a leading provider of IT solutions and Services Company, has created Web 2.0 collaborative portal with technical support for the pilot members. The collaborative solution is hosted and managed by Mahindra & Mahindra Corporation, helping the retiree experts and serving people 3 to perform regular business activities and contributing knowledge to the organization. The criterion used for selection of retiree experts was • • • • •

Location of work, age of retiree, Number of family members, Past grade at work place, Type of work (process / design / solution / consultancy oriented) and Computer proficiency

The M&M pilot comprised of 10 retiree experts with more than 100 serving people spanning in different sectors including automotive sector, Information Technology Sector, Systech Sector and specialty Business Sector. 80% of them are engineers, 90% of them have served as head of their departments, 80% of the retiree experts are between 59-65 years old, youngest member is 59 and oldest member is 70 years old. After the establishment of M&M pilot Indian team established a test for retiree experts to evaluate their Hard and Soft skills. The data has been gathered by taking notes, filling-up questionnaire and in some cases by audio recordings on tape. On the basis of collected data EU Skill Matrix was created based on hard skills 4 and soft skills 5 of retiree experts. CWE Implementation Mahindra & Mahindra had Microsoft SharePoint 2003 for Knowledge management initiative, even before eSangathan. Knowledge Management initiative was in process of migrating to 3

Serving People - employees who are working with the organization under retiree experts Matrix for evaluation Criterion of ICT Skill’s Hard Skills/competences (OECD & Eurostat) e-Europe, ICT Skills Monitoring Group, Synthesis Report, 2002 http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/22/18/37620123.pdf 5 National Council for Competence Report 1999 and CCP/DeSeCo – Sweden & Denmark 4

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. This has become a natural choice for Mahindra Pilot of eSangathan project, to have the same infrastructure along with Microsoft Office Communication Server for instant messaging. Further on, Netcipia Place has been added for collaborating with seniors from Öresund Pilot. The Mahindra Pilot is spread across various sectors of M&M group and composed of ten retiree experts. The total strength of the pilot is more than one hundred (100) members, inclusive of serving members, retiree experts. The retiree experts were interviewed with basic questionnaire usability engineering to understand the retiree both personal and professional qualities, Hard and Soft Skills - Technology exposure questions in order to measure Soft and Hard Skills of Individuals. Based on the profiling and business needs, the CWE has been customized to retiree expert’s expectations, along with Web 2.0 features on M&M portal, instant messaging and offline access integrated with Mahindra Connect - a Knowledge Management initiative. Subsequently, the end users - both retiree experts and serving members were trained on CWE platform. The training course classified into Basic, Medium and Advanced levels depending upon the availability and performed hands-on exercises / business scenarios along with serving members. Indian Pilot of eSangathan comprises of 10 communities, where the usage statistics such as number of users, requests, total number of users, referrers, destination pages, search queries and search results was provided by the Microsoft Share Point. The statistics were gathered on monthly basis for different CWE tools at various levels. The support team of the eSangathan Mahindra pilot has been solving issues in relation to the usage of the CWE feature, data migration needs to CWE, access issues such as provision of access to new members, restricted access, new sub community sites, coordinating with fellow members for sharing of knowledge and establish links to retiree experts of different group of companies and pilot members. The Mahindra Pilot conducted the survey of satisfaction to find out the usages, in terms of frequency and duration of usage of the collaborative workplace, time (of the day) of the usage, Usage of synchronous collaboration features and Usage of asynchronous collaboration features. The feedback of pilot members was collected using a questionnaire related to personal information, professional situation, computer skills, frequency of use of CWE environment, suggestions for improvements in CWE etc. Mahindra Pilot conducted Team Syntegrity session aimed to integrate set of people who seek to compress their divided views into a united message and provoke discussions with arguments and counter-arguments between participants, who have come up with fifty Statements of Importance - SIs. Key Findings Observations •

Secured collaborative working environment that is accessible on intranet and internet have enabled people to overcome the initial apprehensions of sharing information. Designing CWE with an integrated Knowledge management strategy has helped in reaching the mass. CWE features must be implemented at steady pace from basic features to advance features and encouraging members to learn by doing. Positioning of CWE within organizational information hierarchy at various levels like “Inter-department, Intra-department, Companies, Sectors and Group” levels. Enhance the technology in terms of integrating email and file upload System in CWE, enablement of CWE on mobile and integration of CWE with existing M&M Management information system (MIS).

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN • •

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Make Human Resource policy more flexible which can suits the retired employees. CWE tool must be implemented for capturing and sharing of knowledge & experience of seniors. CWE improved the productivity of users with help of project plan tool to track business activities and tasks assigned to individuals and helped the retirees to enhance the communications skills with the help of corporate Blogs, Discussions and Wikis. Usage of Wikis for collection of Technical data: Pilot members co-authored wikis to publish technical information and articles of general and team specific nature. Variations due to retiree expert wanted to spend all the time with family and choose to discontinue their services with the M&M, some have assumed change of responsibility in M&M during pilot period and Some of the pilot members have centralized team, they preferred for physical meeting as they work on same building, and their frequent inspection centric travel could not allow them to participate in eSangathan.

Conclusions •

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Both Qualitative and Quantitative measures shows that “business benefits” is the ultimate motivator of adoption of CWE. The pilot members have adopted to share documents, drawing across the team at multiple locations. Thus avoiding the inability to email system send files more than 10 MB size. Flexibility in Customization of CWE environment as per Retiree Experts requirements are important for implementation success The multiple features provided in a portal could be confusing for at least some users. Therefore, a limited number of features having focus on specific user requirements would be more helpful. Handholding during the initial phase is very important. Participation of members from Senior Management in CWE “Sharing information of common interest areas and helping others”, “Custom Training” and extendibility of platform securely beyond office premises such as Customer, supplier or Home premises, and exposure, usage, experience of ICT/CWE are the best way to enhance Hard & Soft skills

Key Recommendations • •

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Experience & Knowledge management are important for an Organization. Systems needs to be designed with a lot of care taking into account what, how much, who, how it is shared. This will deliver efficiencies and lead to large productivity gains. Enablement of CWE to accessing anywhere has immense benefit for a retiree expert, for example, hassle free CWE access from home, office, customer and supplier premises along with access on mobile. The solution need to be designed to enable tasks that are most appropriate in a remote working environment. Enhancing Capabilities of Retired Persons via adequate and custom training is an important enabler. Also, organization should have defined processes for acquiring post-retirement skills. Integrate business critical systems with CWE that can provoke discussions and knowledge sharing. Piece meal approach in introducing CWE features at multiple stages based on the skill set of pilot members. Constant review of CWE usage and identify training needs on the frequency utilization of CWE feature and publish CWE reports to encourage usage among pilot members. HRD to encourage Retiree Experts

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN • • • •

to enhance their Hard and Soft skills for post retirement work & social life to introduce policy on flexible working environments and to allow participation of RE in social, personal and professional activities Training Department to evolve Adequate Training processes to monitor and develop Hard and Soft Skills of employees and Retirees consistently Organize quarterly physical meetings of people for more effective that emails/phone calls or CWE. Senior Management mandate important for CWE adoption, having seniors as role models helps to take enhance the skills of pilot members and capture knowledge more effectively. Dissemination via “Word of Mouth” most effective form of Communication and Motivation is most important factor for a Retiree expert to explore and learn CWE

eSangathan Mahindra Pilot encourages Indian Corporations to implement CWE platform for Retiree Experts for benefit of corporations and for Retiree Experts themselves.

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Active Ageing Workforce in Virtual Environment - Methodology and Innovation WHITE PAPER – September 2008 By Nicole TURBÉ-SUETENS and Marie-France KOULOUMDJIAN

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