If you have been following my socials you might have noticed I seem to be having a minor meltdown over turning 65.
I could say its a gender thing
Women of my generation understand, without having to be told, the pitfalls and perils of owning your gender, of sharing the universality of experience that comes with being a woman trying to rise in male-dominated fields
But I don’t think it is
I am part of the missing link – the untapped potential ( men and women everywhere 65 and over.)
The path to a more equitable society must be paved by the business community. The missing link is the pathway to do this in a way that makes business sense
I am currently working with a cohort of extraordinary women who are equally dedicated to tapping into untapped potential – men and women everywhere no matter what their age, demographic, region and industry.
What Will It Take to Lead in the Decade Ahead?
The successful CEO of the future will be the one who can effectively manage through the coming talent shortage. That leader will understand the nature of this challenge, develop strategies to attract, develop, and retain a workforce, and inspire every level of company management to follow. Source
If this is something you feel strongly about I am just an email away
Magnificent read from Avivah Wittenberg-Cox
The fabulous news is whilst ageism is alive and well and many women of this age will complain of their ‘invisibility.’ Remember it was JK Rowling that turned the invisibility cloak into a super-power. Look around the world. See at what age significant numbers of women emerge onto a larger stage (see table).
Some Global Female Leaders, by Age
They are only the tip of the first massive wave of educated women moving through life. They are the role models of our collective, more gender-balanced futures. There are more on the way, each wave more educated, more powerful and more connected.
This phase isn’t limited to the 50s. With longevity, it stretches ever longer. The women in visible leadership roles around the world are more often over 60 than under it.
- Barbara Beck, a role model, worked full time running The Economist magazine’s Special Reports section into her late 70s.
- Scilla Elworthy, at 76, continues a half-century’s work in conflict resolution and peace-making.
- Germaine Warkentin, Emeritus Professor at the University of Toronto, after contributing or co-authoring 17 books, is writing her first solo book, at 86, on the history of the book as an information medium.
Who knew? And that’s one of the challenges. We mostly aren’t aware of the shape of women’s careers. And because their shape is unrecognised and unacknowledged, we’re too often found wanting and under-performing in our first halves – even by ourselves. But pre-50 may just be the warm-up act to our new, 100-year lives.
The message for women in these decades? Relax, pace yourself, prepare strategically for the peak. Let time be your friend, rather than your foe. You’ll want a backpack full of strong relationships, happy couples and families, deep knowledge, wide ranging experience and networks. Enjoy building, adjusting and fine-tuning them. They are worth every bedtime story, every couples’ therapy session, every negotiation with resistant employers. Your time is coming, just not when you think.
You can have it all. Just not all at once. It might just be later than you were planning. Luckily, you’re likely to live a lot longer than you thought. So wherever you are in these four phases, pace yourself for a marathon.
The world needs you.
