I will use this module to share with you some of the latest news or research I learn about. The postings will be short and may include a link to where you might go for further information.

August 4, 2008
Maine's First in the Nation Drug Mail Back Program

The University of Maine at Orono's Center on Aging, along with 19 other partners, recently launched a first in the nation pharmaceutical mail back program. Already heralded as a success, the program's first phase saw the distribution of 1,800 self-addressed drug mail back envelopes to older adults through 11 pharmacies in four Maine counties. The envelopes are used to mail unused, unwanted medications to the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency for disposal.

Phase 2 of the program, scheduled to begin in the Fall of 2008, will see the distribution of an additional 7, 200 envelopes to participating pharmacies across the whole state. The project is funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and is designed to keep medications out of the trash or from being flushed down a toilet where they eventually end up in the environment.

For further information about the program visit the program's Website at: http://www.SafeMedDisposal.com

We have known for some time now that Americans are poor savers. This applies to both savings in general and saving for retirement. The lack of saving for retirement is one of the reasons the Pension Protection Act of 2007 requires employees to be automatically enrolled in their company's 401 K plan.

According to a July 2008 report by Ernst and Young, "Retirement Vulnerability of New Retirees," retiring baby boomers will face significant challenges in maintaining their pre-retirement standard of living in retirement. According to the report.
* Almost 3 out of 5 middle class retirees will outlive their financial assets in retirement if they do not reduce their standard of living in retirement. To not outlive their financial assets, middle class retirees will have to reduce their standard of living, on average, by nearly 25 %.
* Guaranteed financial income will cover a decreasing share of the costs in retirement. Those living on Social Security income alone have, according to the report, a 90% chance of outliving their assets during retirement.
* Employees looking to retire in 5 - 10 years from now will face a higher risk of outliving their financial assets.

Compounding the problem of inadequate savings is the problem today of an increasing number of employees tapping into their retirement savings in order to meet today's living expenses. According to the consulting firm Mercer, the percentage of 401 K plan participants who have made hardship withdrawals from their retirement account jumped 21 % during the first six months of 2008, compared to the same period last year. During the same time period, the number of new loans taken out by plan participants increased by only 4.5%.

While some employees may always desire to remain in the workforce for non-financial reasons, the majority of workers probably wish to retire at age 65. But many of those 65 or older cannot afford to retire. For them, it is either continue to work or reduce their standard of living.

As I mentioned in the Lens Introduction, I am taking a class on wellness and the baby boomers. The class will focus on both the mind and the body. The first session on the body was led by Mark Hyman, M.D. Dr. Hyman is a functional medicine physician. Functional medicine is an approach to medicine that looks at the body as a total system, not just individual systems commonly found in todays dissective or specialty based medicine. Functional medicine is based on systems biology - the basic laws of nature and the unified theory of biology.

Functional medicine views illness as arising out of a dysfunction of the bodily systems rather than from a disease. New scientific discoveries are changing the way medicine is thinking about diseases and health. With this paradigm shift, a new road to health is emerging: UltraWellness.

UltraWellness is about understanding and treating causes, dysfunctions and imbalances rather than treating the symptoms of a disease. UltraWellness is based on answering two questions:
1. Does the individual need to get rid of something toxic, allergic or infectious?
2. Does the individual have some unmet need particular to them?

What do you need to get rid of?
* Toxins
* Allergens
* Microbes
* Poor diet/lifestyle
* Stress

What do you need to get?
* Quality Foods
* Vitamins, minerals or nutrients
* Light, water or air
* Sleep
* Rhythm
* Relaxation
* Love, community meaning or connection

Functional medicine believes that the root of illness is when our core bodily systems are out of balance. When the core systems are in balance, they are the keys to UltraWellness. The seven keys to UltraWellness are:
1. Environmental Inputs - diet, lifestyle, toxins, stress and trauma
2. Inflammation and Immune Balance
3. Hormone and Neurotransmitter Balance
4. Gut and Digestive Health
5. Detoxification Imbalances and Function
6. Creating Energy
7. Mind-Body/Body-Mind Connection
> Change your mind - change your body
> Change your body - change your mind

Dr. Hyman believes that the relationship between the functioning of the body and the mind (the body-mind effect) is the new frontier. From Dr. Hyman's perspective, an individual's wellness needs to be created outside of the healthcare system and the individual is solely responsible for doing it.

Dr. Hyman indicated he has a lot of free resources on his Websites. They are:
http://www.drhyman.com
http://www.ultrawellness.com

Ernst and Young consultants has just released its 2008 Top 10 Business Risks. The issue of aging consumers and workers made the list. Ernst and Young see aging consumers and workers as an increasing strategic risk for the majority of business sectors.

With the average age of consumers world wide rising, significant shifts are being experienced by a number of business sectors in the areas of demand and growth. According to Ernst and Young, the sectors most affected include asset management, insurance, pharmaceutical, biotech and consumer products. As the baby boomers age and retire, their needs are, of course, changing. Boomers will be seeking out new or innovative products to meet their new and changing needs. Successful companies will be able to identify, understand and adapt to these new needs by delivering products or services that meet these needs.

An aging population also brings with it the strategic challenge of an aging workforce. The fact that baby boomers say there are not likely to retire at the traditional retirement age brings to the employer the HR challenges of likely increased healthcare costs, age related safety issues, along with the need for different types of benefits. As boomers do retire, HR will also be faced with finding replacement workers from a smaller pool of available workers.

As a baby boomer, one of the resources I utilized transitioning from grad school student to the workforce was Richard Bolles' classic, "What Color Is Your Parachute? I have also referred to the book on several occasions during transition points in my professional career. As I approach retirement, it seems only logical that I read the new book, "What Color Is Your Parachute - For Retirement?" also by Bolles and John E. Nelson.

John Nelson left his career as a pension consultant to pursue a Ph.D. in adult education at the University of Wisconsin - Madison. During his studies, Nelson developed the Retirement Well-being Model upon which the book is based. Since baby boomers are so familiar with Bolles' book, using it as a career guide, Bolles and Nelson wrote the new book to help prepare and guide boomers into the retirement phase of their life. While there are many definitions out there for well-being, Nelson defines well-being as having three components: health, prosperity and happiness.

In an article about the book in the October 2007 edition of Employee Benefit News, author Jill Elswick reports Nelson as saying he thinks his definition of well-being is useful because each of the three components is not interchangeable and "you have to create each one of those things in its own right." Personally, I found it very interesting that my work and focus encompasses two of the three components identified by Nelson - health and happiness.

While geared to baby boomers approaching retirement, the book's content is relevant to the work - life, employee health and wellness and the creative aging processes. In the article, Nelson made an interesting comment about why he included social relationships as part of the book. He stated: "People are so used to having social relationships at work. Most retirees are taken by surprise to realize that they are not part of that social network once they are retired."

The book includes exercises and resources for each of the three components of well-being. In addition, Nelson reports additional resources are available on his Web site at www.retirementwellbeing.org. Individuals, as well as work-life, employee wellness and financial planning professionals can benefit from reading this book.

The Retirement Confidence Survey (RCS) has been tracking the attitudes and behaviors of American workers and retirees since 1991. As Americans live longer and healthier lives, this will hopefully result in many active years in retirement. The shifting workplace employer - worker paradigm is having implications for retirement as well. As employers cut back on providing defined benefit retirement plans, workers become more responsible for ensuring that they have adequate financial resources with which to enjoy retirement. According to John Nelson, (What Color Is Your Parachute - Retirement?) the number of traditional employer sponsored defined benefit plans have decreased from a peak of 114,000 plans in 1985 to just over 35,000 in 2001.

Unfortunately, the proportion of American workers who have saved for retirement has remained unchanged since 2001 at approximately seven in ten. According to the 2006 RCS, four in ten workers age 55 and older say their assets (not including the value of their home) total less than $25,000. The most interesting point in the survey is that 44% of the workers who have not saved for retirement are confident about their financial security in retirement. 44%! Nearly ½! What are they smoking? Overconfidence and overestimating appear to be rampant in this population!

Within the employee wellness arena, Knowing Your Numbers is a nationally recognized campaign to help employees obtain and understand their basic health numbers like weight, BMI (Body Mass Index), blood pressure, cholesterol and blood sugar levels. So what numbers are applicable in retirement? Obviously knowing your health numbers remains important in retirement, or at any age for that matter. In retirement, what number is important on the financial side?

The standard rule of thumb has been to say that people needed about 70% of their pre-retirement income to maintain their same standard of living in retirement. According to Nelson, "The latest research on people who are actually retired suggests that it may be costing them more like 85% of their pre-retirement income." This is based on a 2004 study coordinated by AON Consulting and Georgia State University.

Like everything else today, this percentage is only likely to increase in the future. Even the employer sponsored defined benefit plans I am aware of do not provide 85% of the members' pre-retirement income. I don't know about you, but I am not keen on having my standard of living decrease significantly in retirement.

Why are people neglecting to prepare for retirement? Aging is one of those realities that happen to us whether we believe it will or not or whether we want it to or not. Every day since birth (maybe even since conception) our chronological age marches forward, regardless of what we believe or want. Even though I don't feel or believe I am 57, it is my chronological age. Since growing older and retirement are inevitable, why do people neglect to prepare for it?

Matthew Greenwald, Ph.D. believes retirement planning inaction can be traced to three things:
1. Ignorance - Most workers don't know how much money it will take to live comfortably in retirement. According to Greenwald, only four in ten workers report they have attempted to do a retirement financial calculation. The 2006 Retirement Confidence Survey (RCS) reports that most workers surveyed, like me, would prefer to maintain or better their lifestyle in retirement. One half of the survey respondents reported believing they can live comfortably in retirement with 70% of their pre-retirement income or less, despite recent research indicating the percentage is actually 85%.
2. Confidence - Many American workers are confident about their retirement financial situation. Twenty-five (25%) percent of the workers surveyed are very confident they will live comfortably and four in ten are somewhat confident.
3. False Assumptions - Workers are basing their retirement financial planning on assumptions that may or may not be true.
a. The average worker plans to retire at age 65
b. Two-thirds of the workers surveyed plan to work for pay in retirement which is twice the proportion of retirees who say they have actually worked for pay
c. Six in ten workers report they expect to receive retirement income from a defined benefit pension program while only four in ten report they and/or their spouse currently belong to a defined benefit plan
d. Four in ten workers expect to receive health insurance benefits in retirement from an employer, even as more employers seek to get out of providing retiree health insurance.

Both the work - life and general media have frequently reported that many baby boomers do not see themselves as retiring. Two specific examples include a 2006 Conference Board study which reported "that 55 percent of the mature workers surveyed said they were not planning to retire because they found their jobs interesting," and "a recent AARP survey of 800 Americans turning 60 found that 80 percent have no plans to stop working."

Since the research suggests that many of us will continue to work past the traditional retirement age and many of us may change employers during that period, the question occurred to me as to how we might find an employer that is mature worker friendly. For several years now, the AARP has been creating a list of the Best Employers for Workers Over 50. I thought that maybe a modified version of the AARP's review criteria might provide guidance to the individual worker seeking to evaluate the mature worker friendliness of a prospective employer.

As a potential employee, how might you use a modified version of the review criteria when considering a prospective employer?

The review criteria consist of the following categories:
* Recruitment
* Workplace Culture
* Continued Opportunities for Career Success
* Health Benefits
* Financial Benefits
* Alternative Work Arrangements
* Opportunities for Retirees
* Organizational Statistics

As you explore and learn more about the potential employer, you might consider the following questions:

Recruitment
* As part of the employer's recruiting efforts, do they specifically target the mature worker and/or retiree?
* Does the company's recruiting materials specifically reflect or target the mature worker/retiree population?
* When you talk with the employer's representative, do they talk about issues, benefits, or other matters related to or of interest to the mature worker/retiree population?

Workplace Culture
* Learning and Development
> What types of learning and development opportunities does the employer offer?
> Does the employer offer learning and development opportunities to all employees or to just full time employees?
> What do the employer's managers and supervisors specifically do to promote available learning and development opportunities to mature/retiree workers?
* Recognition Awards and Celebrations of Service
> What types of employee recognition programs does the employer utilize?
> How does the employer celebrate their employees' long service anniversaries?
* Employee Input
> How does the employer solicit input from employees?
> How has the employer specifically used any of their employee input received to make improvements that specifically relate to the mature/retiree workforce?

Continued Opportunities for Career Success
* What does the employer do for or provide to the mature/retiree workers specifically to help insure their success
* What examples can the employer give regarding either recent accommodation or job redesign implementation in response to the need of a mature or retiree worker?

Health Benefits
* Does the employer offer health benefits and to whom?
* What type of health plan is it?
* What do the health benefits cover?
* What preventive benefits included in the health plan are specifically targeted to the employee age 50 or older?
* For medical, dental, prescription drug, short-term disability and long-term disability benefits, what are the percent of premium, deductibles and co-pays paid by the employee?
* Does the employer offer any programs that cover employee out-of-pocket expenses, deductibles and co-payments?
* Are company retirees offered any type of health benefits other than COBRA? If yes, what are they?
* How do company retiree health benefits differ from the health benefits offered to current employees?
* What type of worksite wellness program does the employer offer to current employees? Can company retirees participate in the wellness program?
* What are the worksite wellness related programs and benefits offered to employees? To company retirees?

Financial Benefits
* Retirement Benefits
> What types of retirement plans does the employer offer?
> Who is eligible to participate in each type of plan?
> What types of financial planning services does the employer offer its employees and who provides those services?
> What types of pre-retirement services does the employer offer its mature workers?
* Time Off Benefits
> What types of time off provisions are provided to current employees?
> Does the employer offer time off specifically for caregiving?
* Employee Assistance Program (EAP)
> Does the employer offer an EAP program?
> Who is eligible to utilize the EAP program?
> Does the employer offer services or consultation to assist employees with issues related to dependent care?

Alternative Work Arrangements
* What type of alternative work arrangements does the employer offer to its employees?

Opportunities for Company Retirees
* How many retirees does the employer currently have?
* What type of on-going relationship does the employer maintain with its retirees?
* Who in the employer's organization is responsible for maintaining relations with retirees?
* Does the employer offer discounts on its products or services to its retirees?
* Does the employer maintain a contact list of current retirees available for work assignments?
* What types of work arrangements are available to current retirees?

Organizational Statistics
* In terms of percentages, what percent of the employer's current workforce are:
> 50 to 59 years old?
> 60 to 64 years old?
> 65 years or older?
* For employees age 50 or older, what is the average tenure per employee?

Now that you know the questions to ask, where can you find the answers? I would suggest looking at or using the following sources of information:
* Look for information within the company's recruiting materials
* Ask the recruiter or other company officials you might have contact with
* Check the company's Web site
* Check the company's press releases or other information on the Web (Google search)
* Ask your local librarian for resources at your local library
* Ask questions during your hiring interview(s) with company officials

The more information you know about the company, the clearer your decision can be about working for them. Ultimately, only you can decide if you and the company will be a good fit together in today's ever changing employer - employee relationship environment.

Sources:
Andrew Shelfer. "McKesson Specialty's Mature Workforce Initiative: Investing in Seasoned Workers. Workspan, Vol. 50, No. 10, October 2007, pp. 50 - 54.

AARP Best Employers for Workers Over 50 Program. Available electronically at: http://www.aarp.org/money/careers/employerresourcecenter/bestemployers/ Accessed: October 25, 2007

In another post, I wrote about how the 50+ worker might evaluate a potential employer in terms of their being 50+ worker friendly. The post was written from the perspective of being the potential employee. Now employers have the ability to gauge the impact of an aging workforce on their organization.

The AARP has released a new online tool designed to help employers gauge the impact of an aging workforce on their organization. There is no charge to access this confidential, online tool. The tool is designed to help employers:
* Assess their current and future workforce needs
* Identify anticipated skill shortages
* Build on their strengths to attract and retain skilled, experienced workers

The online assessment tool includes 80 questions and takes approximately 30 minutes to complete. When the assessment is complete, a customized, individualized report is immediately generated. The report will contain:
* An overview of how the aging workforce will affect the organization
* A map of the organization's current employment practices and areas for improvement
* Recommendations on how to create an age friendly workplace
* An inventory of the organization's strengths and how they can enhance the organization's brand

Users are required to use Adobe 8.0 to complete the assessment. While access to the assessment is free, users must agree to complete a follow-up email survey of up to five questions. AARP agrees to treat the submitted assessment information as confidential and to neither review the information nor publish it.

You can access the tool at:
http://www.aarpworkforceassessment.org

Barbara Jaworski is President of the Workplace Institute, a Toronto based consulting firm and author of the book KAA-Boom! How to Engage the 50-Plus Worker and Beat the Workforce Crisis. Recently, Barbara held a online Q & A Session with readers of the Toronto Globe and Mail newspaper. Several of her comments are below:
* Chronic disease begins to affect the quality of life for people in their 50's and may limit their ability to work later.
* Statistics Canada tells us that one-third of baby boomers in their 50's leave the workforce because of health problems.
* Many jobs these days are knowledge jobs requiring people to use their expertise and experience and not necessarily their bodies - to work.
* Many people in the latter years of employment often find that they are given fewer opportunities to learn and expand their knowledge. But the reality is the return on investment can be significant for the organization since mature workers tend to stay with employers longer than younger workers.
* Boomers generally see themselves as 12 - 20 years younger than their chronological age says they are.
* From the survey (a survey of 304 baby boomers conducted by Ipsos Reid for the Bank of Montreal), it looks like 40 percent of the boomers want to keep working to stay occupied.
* Many employers tell me that mature workers have the skills that cannot be taught - great customer service, low maintenance for supervisors because they turn up for work, want to see the company succeed, offer helpful suggestions, are willing to learn and are loyal.