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My grandma is my queen.
Engineer by education, she started her career as a rocket scientist at 22.
At 46, she became director of a summer camp for kids.
At 69, she left this position, no, not for
retirement, but to become an HR manager for
the rocket science company she used to work before.
She retired only 13 years later, at 82,
beloved by everyone who was lucky enough to work with her.
She's now 88, and my god, you should see the flowers and
veggies she's growing at her country house.
My grandma's career path,
with it's multiple pivots into her 80s, is extraordinary for
her time, but she's a forerunner of how a career should look like.
Nowadays we have a good chance to live until 100 and beyond.
We are ageing so much healthfully, this is exciting.
We can accomplish so much more during our lifetime.
But to take advantage of this gift of a long life,
we must prepare for career longevity.
I want to offer you three ideas of how to do this.
Number one, start thinking of your career as a portfolio, not as a straight line.
For many years, we have thought of a successful career as of something linear,
it has a beginning, a peak and an assumed decline.
The idea of career longevity brings a portfolio approach.
Plan your career as a set of activities, project,
directions, like my grandma.
Portfolio approach guarantees more stability and more fun.
Stability is achieved by diversifying your professional capabilities.
The world is changing so quickly, professions rise and die, so do companies.
Just as in investing, betting on just one thing is risky.
So diversify your career portfolio to gain more stability and
lessen the risk of becoming irrelevant.
But also look at it from the fun angle.
You have gained an additional 30 years of life.
Some of that should definitely go to doing something interesting.
Ask yourself, what else do I want to do?
Create a wish list and start working on it now.
I try to keep the growing list for myself.
Start my own company, do something for climate change,
become a lecturer at Stanford, get a medical degree.
Suggestion number two is to train yourself to be flexible.
It is very scary to adapt to rapid changes, if you're not used to this.
Nowadays, the key competitive advantage is how quickly one can handle
the uncertainty, adapt to new realities, and learn new skills.
My practical advice to anyone, regardless of age,
is to train yourself to be flexible by studying something challenging.
Programming, a new foreign language, arts, somethings that your brain doesn't like.
For me, it became math.
The last couple of years I've made myself working on math problems every week.
In the beginning, it was torture, but now it's fun.
Suggestion number three is more of an ask.
Shape the future by building multi-generational teams.
Multi-generational teams are rare in business now.
Younger people often resist older employees, and
older employees sometimes struggle to work within younger groups.
But actually,
research by Laura Carstensen at the Stanford Center on Longevity indicates
that multi-generational teams are more successful than only generational ones.
One of my best colleagues at PWC was a retired partner,
who continued to engage with student events well into his 60s.
It was amazing having someone like him sharing his wisdom.
His energy was infectious, and I would work with him again in a heartbeat.
I'm sure the people listening to me today are leaders who are hiring.
My prime message to you is not to be afraid to build multi-generational teams.
It is strategic for your business and
contributes to your personal career longevity.
We can confidently say that people in their 30s or
40s today will work another 40 or 50 years.
While we consider a career was multiple pivots, there are basic skills like
communicating and collaborating with people that should be mastered.
But this is an exciting, lifelong journey, and you can start it today.
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