“There is a knowledge problem in organizations. All the history is going out the door” – William C. Byham, president and chief executive of human resources, Development Dimensions International

What would we all have lost when Richard Attenborough would have been forced to retire at age 62 or any other age?

We are in the early stages of a human capital drought that companies need to address to have any hope of retaining valuable talent past their intended retirement age. This impending demographic drought has already been recognized by the more sagacious companies in our culture, who are already making the necessary changes needed to retain valuable experience and knowledge before it walks out the door. It is a coming corporate crisis that was characterized by Business Week magazine as a “brain drain”.

Older executives, who were given generous pensions, are getting set to leave the workplace en masse just as many of their companies are facing management crunches. Firms like Deloitte Consulting are responding by allowing some of their valuable partners, who have less fiscal incentive to stay, to literally design their dream job. Deloitte is allowing these individuals to restructure their jobs almost any way they want. Some are shifting from working full-time to part-time, and others are moving from consulting to mentoring up-and-comers in the organization. Douglas MacCracken, Deloitte’s managing director for the Americas at the time, said: “We looked at the demographic risk of losing significant partners: the firm was vulnerable. We’re dealing with it.” Deloitte has been early in its recognition and response to a problem that all organizations are about to face head-on: the age related brain drain. Add to this picture that most companies are already feeling the crunch of a shortage of competent managers.

Some companies, including Prudential Insurance, are now tailoring contracts for senior employees to work parttime and on a consulting basis. The wisdom and experience of their senior employees has been utilized to temporarily fill critical skill gaps, to travel the world as corporate diplomats, and to transfer their lifetime of learning to younger colleagues. It is hoped that this shift in attitude toward maturity and age as a source of wisdom and experience will spill out into other industries – and into our society as a whole. The time has come to bury ageist biases that have relegated older individuals to spectator status in our society.

“If companies continue to require that working for them is an all-or-nothing proposition, they will find people reaching 55 and going to work for competitors who are offering flexible employment opportunities.” – Dennis R. Coleman, principal PricewaterhouseCoopers

Flexible, part-time, the virtual office, telecommuting, innovative consulting arrangements, and phased retirements are all signs that old ideas about employment have turned to ashes. Although the majority of companies do not yet practice all these fluid and flexible employment principles, their adoption rate is on the rise. Companies have no choice but to become more flexible or risk the exodus of top talent to companies that are. This is especially true of those employees who possess the greatest asset of all: experience. This fact portends more self-designed employment for all of us as we reach ages and life stages where we want to slow down, change course, change settings, or experiment with new challenges.