60 Is The New 40

Is 60 the end of your story? Not by a long shot.

OPINION PIECE

Uzair Hassan, CEO THREE H Solutions., Dubai

7/27/20262 min read

A profound shift in the way we approach and experience aging today. It has implications and opportunities specifically for HR and the workforce in general.

After decades of sacrificing, carrying responsibilities, achieving your own personal milestones, building, providing, nurturing, there is a significant shift in your priorities. Other people’s approvals, expectations and opinions do not hold the same weight they did back in the day. A certain sense of calm has descended on you. Your life belongs to you. Your choices are yours to make. Health has become your greatest wealth. Positive thinking and an optimistic approach lend well too. Emotional baggage, regrets, frictions, disappointments etc. are way back in the rear-view mirror of your life. You need to look ahead. Forgiveness, to others and to yourself, is the deliverance you seek.

Life expectancy has nearly doubled in the past 2 centuries. Have we plateaued, one may ask. Advances in medicine, nutrition and lifestyles have shifted gears in the longevity dialogue. With potentially decades ahead to live, this may well be a hugely underutilized resource.

Although we reframe this existential part of life, it does raise uncomfortable truths as well. The quiet heartbreaks that define the human journey and the question of purpose that shifts tectonically.

If HR could come up with a framework to harness and channel these expansive experience, insight and energy into a workable model, there could be significant advantages.

The book of life may be imperceptibly extending, the haunting truth is that it still has a known finite end. Why not utilize the later part of life to do what we enjoy doing. Not a full job, part of something that you enjoy only. The rest is done by others. Mutually beneficial collaborations if you will. HR receives the full weight of decades of stories, experiences, knowledge at a fraction of the cost, delivered from the comfort of their home. Other options need to be investigated that channel this abundance of acumen and proficiency into something that provides the opportunity yet allows the senior members of our community to pull back from the pressure and stress while delivering value. Providing online coaching and mentoring, working on strategy or case studies etc. Maybe advisors on call / retainer. Maybe sit in on monthly or quarterly meetings to guide / provide input / inspire.

Essentially disseminating their hard-earned expertise and competencies instead of letting them go. A transformative phase where the ego's ambitions yield to the soul's deeper questions.

Is HR going to wrestle with their long-held beliefs on life past 60 or will they pivot towards the future and harness this incredibly underutilized resource?

At least this is worth looking into, and, let the chips drop where they may.

Uzair Hassan

CEO

Three H Solutions, Dubai.

Uzair.hassan@3hsolutions.biz

https://www.linkedin.com/in/uzair-hassan-6451024/