Maturity Works Society is celebrating its first year anniversary, and had its AGM on the 24^th of February. We’re looking for submission of ideas, new members, and developing a business plan and funding development strategy for the new year. All members and potential members are invited to attend or contact the board members with their ideas, concerns and initiative. We are after all a society to serve Victorians. Email: maturityworksvictoria@canada.com or phone 383-5144 and be part of the solution!

View of the Town

by Brigit O’Leary

Congratulations to the Immigration and Refugee Centre for surviving funding cutbacks by having a well thought-out diverse funding plan in place. Viet Tran, a charter member and administrator of the society sees mature workers facing the burden of abuse as one of the key problems that older immigrant workers face in the job market. He points out that younger workers have more confidence about their abilities to find jobs, so they do not take the abusive situations that sometimes happen in the workplace, whereas older workers, often limited by language and Canadian cultural understanding, will most often put up with bad treatment and poor pay. Here is another area that Maturity Works might be able to help in encouraging membership and a new sense of community to new Canadians over the age of 40 years. We can all learn from and support each other.

New programs and initiatives by the Provincial Government to get persona back to work. Several employment service providers have disappeared and others have had revamped programming to offer their clients in 2003. The HIRE VALUE by Aspect, is one that provides training for the job clients want, truck driver, chef, seismic slasher or office worker. They take referrals. Worklink Employment Society in Colwood serve Victoria and the Western Communities, phone 478 9525 and the Peninsula Community Service in Sidney serve the peninsula and Victoria. Other programs to do with Bookkeeping are taught at Sprott-Shaw and general job readiness and insurance agent Level 1 training is being handled through Spectrum.

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“People with open minds must be careful these days. There are
a lot of others around intent on throwing rubbish into them.”

Mark Twain

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Renew/Restart

Sheila Walker, Spectrum Job Search Centre

Just when many mature workers are taking steps toward retirement – by choice – or not – we hear predictions of impending skill shortages in our labour market. The reality is that there are not enough younger skilled workers to replace experienced workers who will be leaving work over the next ten years. Employers are already saying they are having a more difficult time finding qualified staff.

Why then, do older workers experience such difficulty landing a job? Is there an unspoken bias in our youth oriented culture? Are employers really less than enthusiastic to hire older workers?

Not so, say staff at the Spectrum Renew/Restart Program. Employers are saying they value the stability, experience and reliability that older workers offer. The Spectrum “Older Worker Project”, called Renew/Restart, has just completed its first year of operation. Funded by Human Resources Development Canada and the BC Ministry of Advanced Education, Renew/Restart has helped 50 people into employment to date (78%)!

Finding employment anytime can be difficult. Finding employment when you believe employers are biased is even more difficult. It is important that mature job seekers use effective job search strategies, and believe that their experience is an asset.

Josie (pseudonym) came to Spectrum’s Restart Program with enviable achievements. But, she found it difficult to identify her obvious skills, a phenomenon called “unconscious competence”. Through an extensive skills inventory she built a strong resume. Strategy number one: know your strengths – make them obvious.

Josie then sought an employer – “her home in the labour market”. Would she overlook readily available community and business information? With trepidation, she began the process of developing contacts through information interviews – where she asked the questions, not the employer. Her comment? “This is hard, you know!” Her last contact was with a local business that advertises on the TV listings channel – an idea right under her nose! An open-ended chat with their administrative assistant led to a job offer within a week. The employer did not have to advertise. Was she lucky? NO WAY! She found her job through hard work, making contacts and finding her natural allies. They are more obvious than you think.

Spectrum staff have observed that their program participants have not necessarily had to develop effective job search skills previously. Once participants seriously tackle the persistent hard work that cracking the tough Victoria labour market requires, they are usually rewarded with job offers.

The Renew/Restart Program has also made educational presentations to over 100 employers in the Capital Region – to challenge the myths about older workers, and to provide up-to-date demographics, human resource projections, and ideas and options for future human resource planning. The intent was to encourage employers to hire mature workers, and also to keep their existing experienced staff.

The good news is that, judging from discussions with employers, it would appear that attitudes toward the older worker in the workplace are far different than the popular myths. Employers say

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they hire based on qualifications, skills and a positive attitude rather than age. Most employers say they are very open to hiring experienced workers. In fact, employers call the Spectrum Renew/Restart Program to place job orders for more mature workers when they want someone with good experience, or sometimes when their customers are more mature!

Employers tell Spectrum staff, and research has shown also, that older workers have many advantages. They are usually focused and stable; they have a wide range of skills; and they have a great wealth of life and work experiences. Contrary to the myth, mature workers are adaptable and versatile. They possess excellent judgment at the worksite – with broad knowledge and wisdom – which translates to the capacity to mentor younger staff. They are very health conscious, which means less absenteeism and more reliability.

We like to welcome aboard a new corporate sponsor – Spectrum Job Search Centre. Presently they are waiting to finalize continuation of the Renew/Restart Program geared to 55 to 64 years of age. For more information about this program or other programs and services, contact:

Spectrum Job Search Centre

1405 Douglas Street

Victoria, BC V8W 2G2

Phone: 250 381-9074

www.spectrumjobsearch.com

Outside the Box!

Ok, that sounds like another fast cliché? Being under or unemployed in Victoria presents

all sorts of challenges, to the pocket book and all its attachments of daily needs: housing, food, clothes, family expenses…the list goes on. For mature persons, those of us over forty…especially over 50 we are also facing the needs of keeping a well balanced life that accompanies the ageing process…that means eating, sleeping and exercising properly. We are not producing so many youth hormones now, yet all these “balanced living needs” become luxuries when faced with worry, crashing self esteem, poor eating habits, sleepless hours in the night. Yes, we admit, lethargy creeps in to the best souls. “I sit for hours at the computer searching for jobs, writing resumes...faking happy to friends and acquaintances………..and keeping the black clouds at bay” is common type of statement we often hear. Oh, yes we understand, walked a mile in those moccasins.

What am I doing about it? Well, I have turned inward and really looking at what I am really doing. In the past I did this, this and this. And it did not get me a job this time? No, not a permanent job or full time job. What is going on? The job market in Victoria is the toughest ever. Yes. But for my part? Well, I have a resume that is a mile long. It’s safer to pound out dozens of resumes, rather than cold calling and actually asking for work or what is needed. Time for evaluation and that includes the ego here. Change is needed. I am now looking outside the box.

If indeed I am looking at ageism, as well as the fact that Victoria is saturated with overqualified people applying for every job under the sun…I have to ‘get with the program’ and develop strategies that are not keeping me running in circles. I

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have to look at my own issues of ageism…what I perceive I am supposed to be at this time of my life. Whoa, what am I doing? What are jobs and careers that accept my skills. Now, action.

Action means investing time and energy into new processes. I joined a professional association that was networking along the lines of the type of career I think I would like. This choice was from volunteer work I did and found rewarding. We need to look in whole new directions for work and develop a new mind set from where we had been. It isn’t there anymore. So where is your passion? Your interests? From here find your skill set. I like challenge, doing for others, working in a team…yet I am alone doing a project alone that I really do not want to develop on my own…OK, so I have to get the courage and the energy up to do this. Argument: I am not 30 I am fifty damn it! Answer: Finding mentors was so important here to encourage, advise and warn me.

Outside the box requires writing down all the stuff or people you really like. Now, write down all the skills you have. Then what are the strengths and needs you have. Then how much freedom or choices do you have…and really challenge yourself on this. Can you rent your house and with your spouse go and care-take a lodge in the Queen Charlotte Islands for a salary? How about working on a cruise ship as a human resource person in Florida, or be a domestic in a very wealth estate in Barbados? Here at home? How about finding ‘the niche’ in a saturated market. I have found research for this niche has its perils, getting blank looks, or great encouragement, and even warnings that someone will steal the ideas if …. Ok, now the work sets in, the business plan, the strategy is developed and the need to keep mentally and emotionally focused. Keep to the positive feedback people…life is tough enough! And read those letters of references! What great boost to the soul and a huge energy in-put to the psyche! Oh, get daily exercise and eat right too!

Being flexible to the new era and allowing for new career paths never considered is indeed something we have to really adjust to. Mentally and emotionally, as well as financially. Yes we’ve been taught that by this age we are supposed to be safe, secure with a financial portfolio. The ads do not work for everyone do they? Life is chaos. Consider we just came from parents who found chaos in first half the their life, WWII and were able to reap rewards in the second half with the huge increase in land values and savings. Those times are over for must. The rise of middle class is done. We baby-boomers followed our dreams in the first half and many are now getting hit in the second half…life is a challenge, we have to be up for the count. Yes, we are experiencing the involution of an era and facing risks that are frightening especially as our physical bodies decline, but we have so very much to offer the world, we just have to believe it too. Thinking and looking Outside the box is what life is challenging us to do. It will come if we surrender our own ageism and prejudices and …….try something new...what the hell!

Brigit O’Leary

Community Relations and Development

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take,