For workers of all ages, work satisfies a range of needs, including financial security, a sense of accomplishment, recognition for superior performance, skill development, and social status. However, both youths (aged 16 to 24 years old) and older workers (aged 55 years or older) often find themselves at a disadvantage in the job market. These two…

Purpose: This study aims to empirically validate an innovative work behaviour-enhancing model of employability in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and to examine possible moderating effects of age. Design/methodology/approach: Data have been collected from 487 pairs of employees and their immediate supervisors who worked in 151 SMEs.…

Having enjoyed teaching during my active career, I continued to teach summer school following retirement. Self-observed sensory and cognitive impairments, although not mentioned by students in their evaluations, induced me to consider the pros and cons of continuing to teach. My hope is that this list of benefits and problems will be of assistance…

This paper presents the findings of a research project on older workers transitioning into work as vocational educators through online undergraduate university study. The study involved interpretive phenomenological analysis of the experiences of 10 older learners. Their experience of online learning was found to be shaped by diverse influences…

Objective: To discover senior and retired exemplary rehabilitation educators' defining career moments and to provide doctoral students and early career rehabilitation educators with insights from widely recognized and successful rehabilitation educators in the field. Method: Twenty-seven exemplary rehabilitation educators answered qualitative…

The institutionalised categorisation of adults who are over 55 years of age, unemployed and low-skilled as "older" and "disadvantaged" may adversely affect their employment prospects and their self-esteem. This paper reports on the findings of a study that explored the experiences of a small group of such adults; in particular,…

As increasing numbers of older adults stay in the workforce or engage in encore careers, they are subjected to diverse issues and challenges. The new dynamics of the workplace in a global market exert pressure on older workers and employers alike in which training and development has a potentially significant function for achieving greater…

Bobby Curran grew up in a working-class neighborhood in Baltimore, finished high school, and followed his grandfather's steel-toed bootprints straight to Sparrows Point, a 3,000-acre sprawl of industry on the Chesapeake Bay. College was not part of the plan. A gritty but well-paying job at the RG Steel plant was Mr. Curran's ticket to a secure…

A growing body of research and policy focused on "older workers" is attempting to address perceived concerns that older workers' skills are declining, along with their participation in employment and in employment-related learning opportunities. The discussion here seeks to contribute to this research. Its focus is the learning of older…

Today's society, shaped by demographic changes and a global economy, has created different employment trends and work lives that result in adults' engaging in postretirement second careers. This phenomenon is a common occurrence in rapidly aging societies like Korea. This qualitative study examined the postretirement career transition process of…

Purpose: This article aims to review the changing demographics of employment and it proceeds to critically examine the existing literature on later-career workers' experiences of training and development. Population ageing in developed economies has significant implications for workplace learning, given suggestions that most occupational learning…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the concept of intergenerational learning as a way for organizations to deal with an ageing worker population in a positive and constructive way. Design/methodology/approach: The paper employs a thematic synthesis of qualitative literature and considers all types of sources including quantitative…

This paper investigates whether on-the-job training has an effect on the employability of workers. Using data from the Netherlands we disentangle the true effect of training incidence from the spurious one determined by unobserved individual heterogeneity. We also take into account that there might be feedback from shocks in the employment status…

This study examines the construct of subjective life expectancy (SLE), or the estimation of one's probable age of death. Drawing on the tenets of socioemotional selectivity theory (Carstensen, Isaacowitz, & Charles, 1999), we propose that SLE provides individuals with their own unique mental model of remaining time that is likely to affect their…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to draw attention to older workers (OWs)' subjective engagement in working and learning in the manufacturing industry. Workplace learning (WPL) literature rarely considers the subjective side of learning from a cultural historical activity theory (CHAT) account. Design/methodology/approach: The paper adopts a…