Older workers cash in on high-tech job growth

Carlene Gibbons is an unlikely dot-com worker: The 56-year-old career nurse has two grown children, a penchant for watercolor and a desire to retire in the next decade.

But when her previous employer, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, asked her to transfer from San Francisco to Sacramento, she opted for a radical change of pace. The asthma and allergy researcher became nurse coordinator at Gazoontite.com, where she answers customers' email and instant messages about respiratory health. Instead of toiling in a white-walled hospital or laboratory, she works in a converted taffy factory full of 20-somethings who overdose on soda and work around the clock.

"One thing's for sure: I'm the only person here with silver hair," Gibbons said. "When I went for my first interview, it was like another world. Everyone wore black. They were playing football in the middle of the office. A football flying over the computers--that's something I had never seen in my professional life."

Gibbons, whose initial shock has faded into nonchalance, is not an anomaly but the future of the digital economy. Although the technology sector in general and Internet start-ups in particular are the stereotypical haunts of dressed-to-distress Generation Xers and fresh-out-of-college roustabouts, older workers are a rapidly growing force.

Over the next decade, mature workers are poised to overwhelm the tech industry by their sheer numbers. According to American Demographics, seven baby boomers will turn 50 every minute in the United States from now until 2014.

Most are not planning an idle retirement. According to a recent survey by Scudder Investment Services, 53 percent of today's baby boomers see retirement as an opportunity to dabble in a new career--not check out of the work force entirely.

Many will be empty nesters with the financial stability to start their own companies or take risky positions at start-ups that offer skinny salaries but large equity stakes. Those were jobs they couldn't have taken when they were raising families and focused on maximizing their salary.

Their presence in technology office parks and start-ups is growing for another reason: The historically low unemployment rate--estimated at less than 1 percent in some tech niches--means that many employers have no choice but to cast a wide net when trolling for job candidates.

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"When you have a shortage, anybody who can walk in and do the job to the company's expectations is being considered," said Ilya Talman, president of Roy Talman & Associates, a Chicago-based information technology recruitment agency. "I had a guy in his early 50s yesterday in my office. The client wanted him to start Thursday. The age didn't matter."

Notorious turnover in the tech sector, where the average company loses a quarter of its work force each year, also casts favorable light on older generations. Employers often perceive mature workers as less inclined to switch jobs as capriciously as 20-somethings.

According to a recent survey from college student tracking firm JobTrak.com, 58 percent of students graduating from college this year expect to stay at their first job for two years or less. Although it's difficult to find comparable data for 50-plus workers, experts on employment and aging say older workers are more loyal.

"When you get married and have kids by your mid-30s, there's usually some sort of career stabilizing," said Rich Hagberg, a psychologist and chairman of Hagberg Consulting Group of Foster City, Calif.

"When you hit 40, you stop thinking about yourself and think more about your legacy and growing the next generation," Hagberg said. "That translates into a significantly higher chance that the older person will stay on the job longer."

Many older workers say the hot economy--and calls from desperate head hunters--lured them to start-up jobs and other tech positions they would otherwise not have considered. Others say their desire to create a legacy in an evolving industry is the primary motivator to stay on the job.

John Salvey, a 59-year-old product manager at Nanovation, relishes his role as a father figure to young engineers at the Miami-based semiconductor company.

"Being fortunate enough to have been around the block a few times, people ask me how I would handle things," Salvey said. "I'm always glad to help. When I started out working at 19, I had a lot of good luck--a lot of older people eager to help. I've taken that with me all the way through my career."

But some seniors say working for youthful tech companies can be awkward.

Several older workers complained that tech companies didn't offer compensation packages that reflected their decades of experience; they were instead offered packages only marginally better than those offered to 25-year-olds, who generally have fewer financial obligations and no short-term retirement worries.

Attitude problems also pester older workers. Not every 24-year-old chief executive officer at an Internet start-up is eager to work with parent- or grandparent-like figures, said George Young, the 63-year-old president of InternetLink of Marina Del Ray, Calif.

Young joined the company five years ago after an unsuccessful attempt to retire from his job as a public affairs consultant. Now the sole employee of the 5-year-old applications services provider, Young makes initial visits to clients, then outsources work to contractors.

"I think they're expecting a 23-year-old whiz kid, but most people are polite and hide their shock," Young said. "There's a resistance on the part of younger people to help older people through some of the jargon. The only way I've found around that is to be my own employer. Then they don't have a choice."

Besides shock, older workers face additional workplace challenges--namely keeping pace with the rapid evolution of technology.

"Those of us in this age group didn't cut our teeth on technology," said Debra Thobe, 52, a tech industry compensation expert at The Thobe Group of Carrollton, Texas. "It wasn't an ingrained aspect of my education. The learning curve is not as steep for a high schooler as for someone older, who is forced to ferret out the newest technology by himself or herself."

Al Gross, an 82-year-old satellite engineer at Orbital Sciences in Chandler, Ariz., agreed that keeping abreast of innovations is a constant challenge. But he said senior workers steeped in an older educational system still have plenty to teach technocratic underlings.

"The quality of engineering is no longer the quality of yesteryear--and it bothers me a little bit," said Gross, who at age 21 spent a week in a physics seminar that included Albert Einstein as a speaker at Princeton University. He also worked for the U.S. Office of Strategic Services during World War II.

"I would go to libraries and get books on Hertz, Maxwell and their principles. I don't think students have that option today," Gross said. "The computer and calculator mask the ability to innovate and research. The kids plug in the numbers and then go home and watch TV."