The real problems with this intention to work in retirement are two-fold. First, it means that in combination with not having saved enough, our fellow workers aren’t mentally prepared to cut back on their current lifestyle when they retire. The only solution for them is to keep earning a paycheck.

That brings us to the second – and more severe – problem: Intention – meet reality. This is from the survey commentary:

The Retirement Confidence Survey has consistently found that workers are far more likely to expect to work for pay in retirement than retirees are to have actually worked.  Only 23 percent of retirees report they worked for pay in retirement. So intentions may be one thing and reality another.

Compare those numbers: 74% of workers today “intend” to work in retirement, to compensate for their failure to save enough. However, only 23% of retirees actually do work.

Something has to give, don’t you agree? I think it will be the “working” part. So you had better put a Retirement Plan B in place, such as more saving and less spending.

Here is a link to a Forbes article about the Retirement Confidence Survey: Trouble on the High Seas of Retirement?

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First, jobs for older workers are increasingly harder to keep and find. There are plenty of ways to work around laws prohibiting age discrimination. Second, many people work in jobs that are physically demanding. They just wear out and are unable to do these jobs well into their 60′s. Even factory workers can break down from the demands of the job. Eyesight goes, joints wear out, stamina declines, etc. You know what I’m talking about.

The strongest evidence of both of these problems comes from the Social Security Administration itself:

• In 2009, 72 percent of men who filed for Social Security benefits filed before their full retirement age.  This is an increase from 58 percent who filed early in 2008.
• In 2009, 75 percent of women filed early compared with 64 percent in 2008.

These statistics strongly suggest that jobs for older workers are just not there. Where will these jobs come from if folks have to work until age 70? Do they expect older Americans to change careers and start working at fast food counters?

Any politician who advocates for an increase in the retirement age needs to address the “where will the jobs come from” problem as well.

You can read more about the issue here.

What do you think about this plan for saving Social Security?

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Dr. Boyd’s presentation is available on the AARP event site. Here are some key points for your consideration.

You need to discover (1) Why you want to make a career change and (2) why you haven’t already made a change.

The analysis of change begins with a life hierarchy:

• Purpose
• Goals
• Strategies
• Tactics
• Behaviors

Your job occupies a lower level on this life hierarchy.  This is an important concept so that your job and career do not determine your life purpose and goals. That is the tail wagging the dog.

A second framework for career change analysis is the “Means-End Chain.” This involves appreciating the relationships among activity attributes, consequences (functional and psycho-social) and values (self).

Career change is a form of personal reinvention. We must understand the level of reinvention (purpose, goals, etc.) before jumping off the career-change cliff. Be sure your desire for change is not rooted in some other personal need.

“Dabbling” in different career-related activities as a career-change precursor makes a lot of sense if done with purpose.

The big three reasons why we don’t make career changes:

1. Inertia
2. Necessity trumping your life purpose
3. Fear of change

Finally, you must develop a personal career change strategy, while being certain that your strategy does not dictate your purpose. Begin your strategy with a serious self-examination of your life purpose and goals.

After the session, I asked Dr. Boyd about this pop psychology assertion: “Pursue your passion and the money will follow.” He responded that this has some but not much merit. The problem, he said, is that too many folks jump from passion to change, without preparation in-between. Can you say failed restaurants?

Lots to think about for baby boomer career-changers. I say go for it.

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First, the hard facts, for which Mr. Rasmussen was an excellent resource:

• 41% of the workforce is 55+, the largest percentage since 1962.
• 53% of workers over 45 work for a younger boss.
• There are now 5 unemployed workers for every available job. Ouch.
• The average job posted on CareerBuilder.com receives 50 applications. Double ouch.

Two fastest growing sectors for 50+ employment: health care and education

The industry expects there to be 3.2 million new healthcare jobs by 2018. A huge component of that growth will be home caregivers. Unfortunately, I am concerned that a lot of boomers will be receiving, not giving, that care.

Another trend that is important to our age group is the tremendous growth in temporary and part-time employment. There are two reasons for this. First, older workers are interested in part-time work. Second, employers appreciate workers for whom they don’t have to provide benefits.

The problem is that until we are Medicare-eligible, and unless and until healthcare reform makes affordable healthcare available to us, we need those benefits.

This is what Mr. Rasmussen recommended for the 50+ job-seeker:

1. Network and self-promote. Personal referrals are far more important and successful in securing jobs, compared to the other primary resources: online job sites like Careerbuilder.com, and online job boards.

2. Use social networking sites. Facebook and Linked-In were mentioned specifically. I am skeptical about Facebook. Has anyone ever done anything on Facebook except share photos, express their narcissism, and waste time?

3. Update skills. Education was emphasized. No surprise here, as Kaplan University sponsored the presentation.

Rasmussen mentioned a few resources that may be worth checking out:

American Staffing Association site

PrimeCB.com, a site specifically for the 50+ job-seeker.

Finally, Careerbuilder is introducing a new feature on its site that will provide anonymous feedback to an applicant as to how he/she matches up with the other applicants for the same position. That may help you understand why you might not have been contacted after applying.

Here is my bottom line: I am so grateful to have a job and I have great empathy for my contemporaries who do not. Here’s hoping that healthcare reform will make it easier for those who want and need to work at least part-time.

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The site is YourEncore which describes itself as follows:

YourEncore is an innovation services provider that recruits and manages a network of recently retired and/or highly experienced scientific and engineering professionals. The skills and expertise of these veteran Experts are matched with the project needs of our clients with the goal of accelerating innovation.

Although the focus of this retiree job and project portal is technology, consider this clarification:

YourEncore seeks to enroll in our proprietary network scientists, engineers, product developers, market research specialists, quality control experts, medical professionals and business development managers.

So the qualifications and backgrounds that are needed go beyond pure technology.

The advantages of participating in the YourEncore job network include both intellectual stimulation and … compensation!

To join, you must create a profile which includes a detailed resume and references. In other words, they don’t accept just anyone and experience is a must. That is good because experience is what baby boomers and retirees usually have plenty of and is what can distinguish us from younger job seekers.

Finally, one of the biggest advantages of placing yourself into the YourEncore network is that your marketing costs are nil. The network does it for you.

For more information, visit the YourEncore site. At the very least, you can sign up for their newsletter and get some resume writing tips.

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A pair of researchers at Northeastern University have recently published a report “After the Recovery: Help Needed.” According to their analysis of data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and Census Bureau,  7 million new jobs will be added to the social sector between now and 2018. More significant, they believe that 5.9 million of these new jobs will be well suited for older workers, like us.

Here is the list of the predicted fastest growing  job categories for older workers.

Note that a lot of these jobs are in a social sector where “giving back” is part of the job description. These are the kinds of second career or transition jobs that many baby boomers seem interested in.

On a related topic, U.S. News and World Report recently published list of ten places that have favorable conditions for starting a second career in retirement:

• Ames, Iowa
• Harrisonburg, Va.
• Lincoln, Neb.
• Lubbock, Texas
• Madison, Wis.
• Manhattan, Kan.
• Oklahoma City, Okla.
• Richland, Wash.
• Rochester, Minn.
• State College, Pa.

I don’t have much commentary on this list except to note that it is heavy on college towns, which makes sense for pursuing many second careers. Universities generally have excellent reputations for supporting older workers. State capitals (e.g, Lincoln, Nebraska and Madison, Wisconsin) offer state jobs which include many in the social sector.

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If you are a baby boomer preparing yourself for a possible second career, it helps to know where the best job opportunities are. I came across a list of job categories with data highly relevant to this issue. It was compiled from information published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The list identified those jobs that had these characteristics: (1) projections for high future growth rates; and (2) a relatively high percentage of age 55+ workers already in those fields.

The jobs that I have selected from the list had those characteristics plus manageable barriers to entry. For example, I did not select “veterinarian” from the BLS list because no one at our age is going to attend veterinary school to engage in a transition career!

Here are three of my selections for potential career transition jobs for baby boomers:

1.  Personal and Home Health Aide. The projected ten year growth in this job category is 50.7% and 23.4% of the workforce is already over age 55.  This also seems like an area where one could easily find part-time work without a lot of prior experience or training.

2. Personal Financial Advisor. This won’t be for everyone but if you have a business background in the financial services sector, it would not be overly difficult to obtain a suitable credential for providing personal financial advice to others. The projected growth in this category over ten years is 40.9%. 18.8% of existing workers in this field today are over 55.

3. Social and Community Service Manager. This job field would include working for a non-profit or for a government agency that provides services to the community. The over-55 crowd already has 24.4% of these jobs and the BLS predicts a 10-year growth rate of 24.6%. According to this government Partnership for Public Service website, there will be a high demand for federal workers in this area in the next few years. More information is available at that site and at USAJobs.

The bottom line is that if you are thinking about a second career or transition job for a phased retirement, it helps to identify where the demand is likely to be.

Are any of you planning for a phased retirement in a second career?

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This blog is one example. I enjoy the research and writing to be sure. If I do a good job with my writing, that brings readers and causes Google and its advertisers to display helpful ads on this site. If readers are interested in what is being offered, I can make a little side money. That’s a win-win for everyone involved.

One of the advantages of being a baby boomer is that we have years of knowledge and experience to draw upon in finding sources of alternative income. I have written in the past about some of those supplemental income options, including selling your expertise online and teaching online. But we shouldn’t overlook the creative side of alternative income.

Many of us know how to create “things”  that others might like. What we lack is the ability to convert that creative talent into actual products that people can buy. This post is for those of you in that category. I want to call your attention to a few online resources where you can use your creativity to develop an alternative income stream.

Selling Products with Your Custom Designs for Alternative Income

If we are artistic or clever with words and images, maybe folks would like to buy stuff that display our work. There are easy ways to find out. The most well-known is Cafe Press.

Using Cafe Press online tools and your own words/designs, you can create a variety of customizable clothing and gift products. The best part is that you can begin selling them immediately. You don’t have to actually manufacture or make anything. Cafe Press does that for you and your customers, on demand. The revenue is shared between you and Cafe Press. Of course, you can’t just do the “design it and they will buy” thing. You will have to find ways to let folks know what you are selling. But if you have the time to do a little marketing, you can have a complete product line for sale at your own online store, with no capital investment.

Other options similar to Cafe Press but with their own flair are Zazzle, Spreadshirt, and Pikistore.

Self-Publishing Books and Music for Alternative Income

You can be a published author, songwriter, or musician. There are online resources that make it easy (assuming that you have the creative energy and talent). One of those resources is Zulu, which says this about itself:

Publish

Go ahead, unleash your inner creator.

Just upload your manuscript, photos or digital files, use our formatting tools to get everything set up just the way you want, from size to binding to cover art, and… well, that’s it. You’re the proud parent of a brand new digital creation, ready to publish and cherish. The publishing process couldn’t be easier.

Create a keepsake just for yourself, full of favorite photos or your own stories. You’ll end up with a professional-looking finished product that’s a match for anything you’ll find on the shelf at your local bookstore.

Lulu offers free book publishing services. No set-up fees. Ever. We make the book publishing process simple.

You can publish all kinds of books, calendars, DVDs and CDs through Zulu and sell them right there on its site.  Instant online income source.

Other self-publishing options for creative boomers include CreateSpace (owned by Amazon), Blurb, and TasteBook (for cookbooks).

If you are one of those folks who like board games and card games, there’s a brand-new place for you to make and sell your own:  Game Crafter.

Selling Artwork and Designs for Alternative Income

Maybe you are more of a true artist who can create attractive two and three-dimensional designs. (That’s not me for sure!) There are places for you as well. Imagekind is an online community where you can create, display and sell all kinds of creative imagery, including photography and framed and poster art.

Imagekind is owned by the Cafe Press folks so the user interface is somewhat familiar. Other sites for selling your own artistic creations for secondary income include Spoonflower (for fabric designs), Shapeways (for three-dimensional designs), Ponoko (for turning designs into usable products), and deviantArt.

Final Thoughts on Using Creativity for Alternative Income

All of the resources I have listed require little or no investment except your time and talent. That’s the best way to develop a source of secondary income because you are not risking other assets that you will need for retirement. So what’s the worst that can happen? Perhaps no one buys your creativity. So who cares? No one but you has to know!

Give those creative juices a try!

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The Retired Volunteer State of Mind

Before selecting a volunteer position, we baby boomers should think about the practical side. After all, we are not alone in our desire to help others. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2007 60 million Americans volunteered a median of 52 hours. Most of these hours were donated to churches and schools but sports, environmental, health, community service, civic, and political organizations had more than 30 million volunteers working for them.

You need to ask yourself why are you volunteering. Without that self-knowledge, you may have problems finding a fit for your volunteer goals. There are a number of different volunteer motivations, including a desire to give back to the community, to improve your own life and health circumstances, to meet new friends and expand your social circle, or just to find new meaning to your life. All are worthwhile.

You need to find a volunteer job that you will you be good at it. Do you have the particular skills or experience needed for the position? Can you function inside that volunteer organization and structure? Do you have the right level of empathy for others? Honest answers are needed here or both you and the volunteer organization may be disappointed.

Can your commitment match the need? Be sure that the intensity (hours per week) and duration of the position is suitable for the time you are able to give. After all, you will be retired but that doesn’t mean that you want a full-time job as a volunteer.

Finding a Volunteer Position as a Retired Baby Boomer

To find a good volunteer opportunity, a good place to start is to ask your friends and colleagues in your community. Beyond that, there are a number of sites on the Internet that serve as clearing houses for volunteer opportunities. Here are some of them:

• The federal government sponsors and operates Serve.gov, which features a volunteer opportunity search engine.
• VolunteerMatch is a non-profit service that allows you to search for volunteer positions by location and keywords.
• idealist.org is a project of Action Without Borders, a nonprofit organization founded in 1995 with offices in the United States and Argentina. This is an interactive site where people and organizations can locate opportunities and supporters.
• Points of Light promotes its Hands On Network where you can search for volunteer opportunities, also by location and keyword.
• AmeriCorps is a federally sponsored volunteer organization with a variety of different community outreach programs.  I have written more about federal volunteer and public service opportunities for boomers and retirees.
• AARP operates its Create the Good program, including a volunteer search engine for the 50+ crowd.

Good luck with your search. If you discover any other resources that would help a retired baby boomer find a volunteer position, please leave a comment.

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1. Driving Hunger Away from Our Senior Citizens
2. Choose and Cherish Your Golden Days

The Small Business Administration (SBA) is a source of online courses in small business management. These courses are part of its Small Business Training Network which it describes as follows:

The Small Business Training Network (SBTN) is a customer-focused SBA strategy designed to enrich, educate and empower small businesses. It is an Internet-based learning environment – operating like a virtual campus – offering online courses, workshops, publications, information resources, learning tools and direct access to electronic counseling, and other forms of technical assistance.

The  SBA courses are offered in ten different categories:  starting a business, business management, surviving in a down economy, finance/accounting, marketing/advertising, government contracting, business planning, e-commerce, international trade, and federal taxation.

These are the most popular course titles:

• The Small Business Primer
• Business Opportunities: A Guide to Winning Federal Contracts
• Finance Primer: A Guide to SBA’s Loan Guaranty Programs
• How to Prepare a Business Plan
• How to Prepare a Loan Package

The courses are self-paced and are typically only 30 minutes long. This precludes an in-depth study of the topic. Nevertheless, since they are free, it certainly can’t hurt your career planning to take a few courses before investing precious retirement dollars in a new small business.

Another excellent resource for free online business management courses is the Pennsylvania Small Business Development Center. This site has links to over 90 free courses and learning programs that are available online 24/7.  The courses are from the SBA, IRS, Small Biz U, Virtual Advisor, as well as custom programs from the Pennsylvania SBDC Network. They are all self-paced and include voice-over narration. Some courses also include video. Many are longer than the SBA courses.

I particularly like the offerings in the legal aspects of forming a small business and in using intellectual property protection.

If you are a baby boomer looking to enhance your small business management skills, give some of these online courses a test drive. It could mean the difference between success and failure.

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