It’s important that we embrace the issue of being able to afford the expense of living as people are living longer, says Mona Mourshed, founding global CEO, Generation, whose organizational vision is “a meaningful career and sustained well-being for every person, anywhere in the world.”
Mourshed joined WorkingNation’s editor-in-chief Ramona Schindelheim for an interview for WorkingNation Overheard at JFF Horizons in Washington, D.C.
“Midcareer and older workers get very scant attention, and that is true across the world,” she says. “When you look at the long-term, unemployed in the U.S. 40% are age 50-plus. And that’s been true for the last 10 years.”
Mourshed points out, “When we ask employers of midcareer and older worker how they performing on the job, 85%-plus are performing as well, if not better than, their younger peers. This is just an example of the continued mismatch between perception and reality.”
When asked how to address the disconnect about the perception and the reality around the older worker, Mourshed says, “On some level it’s very similar to the journey that we’ve been on with gender and how do we increase representation of women in the workforce.”
She offers up four steps toward that goal. “One is be aware of the facts of how midcareer and older workers are performing in the particular environment. Two is by having panels of interviewers of mixed ages to be able to have different perspectives.
Three is have demonstration-based interviews so that people can show you their skill as opposed to a perception of what they have or don’t have.
“Four is make sure that when there are new technologies in the workplace, such as AI, that people are actually being trained in how to use them,” suggests Mourshed, who sits on the WorkingNation Advisory Board.
Learn more about Generation.
WorkingNation Overheard at JFF Horizons 2024 was made possible through funding from EnGen.
