Profession and Chances
As matters stand: Experience, is it still worth something?
In this country, in more than 50 % of all the companies there are hardly any people older than 50. The wave of discharges we have had in the nineties and the possibility to go into retirement earlier and earlier left their marks behind. Sometimes you get the impression, experience is not worth anything any longer in the business world. Employees and managers alike, once they are over 55 years old, they should leave the company as soon as possible. This is a trend as visible as it is questionable.
But when leading personnel older than 50 is missing in a company, it is not only experience in the tasks and markets that is missing, it is also their setting up as examples in the area of values. Those who bring in the corporate culture and its values are missing and thus the young ones miss orientation. Companies and branches that did not exist until recently, know this problem quite well. In the majority of the IT business the leading personnel is younger than 40. It is great when you make it to the top so early, but when there are no examples and mentors, insecurities concerning the leadership of the company may arise quite easily. Sometimes just by chance there is someone around with whom you could share some of the arising questions occasionally. But you should not rely on these accidental occasions when dealing with these important professional questions.
There is a way out of this dilemma: cross-mentoring. This is a - timely limited facilitation by someone from a different company. He or she can help the young leader by bringing in new impulses, by asking questions, sometimes also uncomfortable ones, and by bringing in judgement that comes out of long experience. This experience is more than welcomed, because the advantage is on both sides: The younger person gets someone that comes from outside the familiar range of experience but knows about the tasks and problems arising in the area of leadership. Suddenly there is a person you can ask, who is not blind in one eye but has experiences in the main areas concerning the leadership tasks. And someone who can help more than one of these smart young consultants with their excel sheets. A mentor - and you should prepare for this role thoroughly - finds respect and appreciation because of his/her successful experience. Thus, mentoring can become a new and quite exciting task for older leaders who don’t want to stay in their day-to-day leadership business any longer. Even though it is not well known publicly, quite some companies already rely on mentoring and are looking for people who can fulfil this important and responsible task.
Experience is a capital that does not show in figures that much, and some might say: "Well, experience means nothing, you can do things wrong for 30 years!" But those, who stayed in responsible top jobs successfully for a long time proof the opposite. Young leaders don’t have to make the same mistakes, be the first to make the direct hit, they have a right to profit from theses experiences.
