How Boomerang Workers can add value to your teams

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In Shifting Demographics
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How to hire quicker (and save money too)
Due to the pace of technological advances, the IT industry is faced with a widening skills shortage. As a result, the race to acquire and retain the right talent and skills has never been so intense.

‘Boomerang Workers’ are one talent pool that is often underutilised, although more businesses are changing their attitudes towards the older workforce. These are retirees who later return to the workplace – whether motivated by financial needs, a desire to be intellectually stimulated or other reasons.

Today more retirees are returning to work than ever before and they play a major role in supporting organisations, helping the younger generation in their careers as well as closing the skills gap. Here are some ways you and your teams can benefit from working with a Boomerang worker.

Transferring knowledge to the younger generation – Valuable knowledge that often gets lost as the older generation retires can be retained by taking the time to transfer it to the younger generation. For organisations to remain successful, they will need a mix of both old and new skills that can be continuously developed to keep pace with today’s changing skills landscape.

A more diverse and balanced workforce – Diversity of all types is important in the workplace and many organisations today are starting to embrace generational diversity as part of it. Each person and generation brings different values to the organisation. Recruiting boomerang workers can not only help create a healthy mix of people of all ages at work, but also bring fresh knowledge, perspectives and ideas that can benefit the wider organisation.

Offering life and professional skills – No amount of training can make up for the decades of wisdom and experience older workers have acquired. Over the years they’ve most likely worked in various roles, locations, as well as with people who work in different ways. As a well-seasoned professional they’ve gained a sound understanding of business politics as well as qualities like resilience that will be of great value to organisations and their colleagues. They can provide the best of both worlds by providing knowledge from real world and professional experiences.

Learning and mentoring opportunities – The younger workforce tends to gravitate towards more experienced people for advice when they are starting out in their careers. There’s plenty they can learn from older workers, not just in terms of general knowledge and particular skills at work but also in terms of getting inspiration, learning about leadership, decision-making and implementing new ideas.

These are just a few of the many reasons why Boomerang Workers are avaluable source for today’s talents and organisations. The most successful companies have realised this and are developing ways to cultivate this large and highly skilled talent pool.

As always, balance is key, and a healthy mix of people of all ages and experiences is key to ensure they can learn from one another to avoid falling behind. Boomerang Workers can learn just as much from the younger generation to also develop new skills when returning to the world of work.