IDEO, the internationally renowned design firm, is all over aging these days.
In the early days of The Purpose Prize, an awards program that celebrates social innovators over age 60, we worked with IDEO to offer free, full-day “design thinking” workshops at our 2006 and 2007 innovators’ gatherings. Many attendees found the workshops truly transformative – including me.
Fast forward to 2015, when two news stories put IDEO front and center – and made me start thinking again about how IDEO-style design thinking could really change the opportunities for encore careers for social impact.
In January, NPR featured a story about Barbara Beskind, a 90-year-old former occupational therapist who was hired after IDEO ran an ad looking for people who like to design. (Beskind was in the news again in March, when she was a guest on the Today show.)
At IDEO, Beskind’s working on products that will help aging Baby Boomers and elders continue to be active, independent and engaged. It’s only logical that IDEO, which brings a consumer-centric view to design, would hire someone who is living that experience herself. Of course, logic rarely affects hiring practices when it comes to workers over 50, much less workers over 90. So, kudos to you, IDEO!
Later in March, John Tarnoff wrote about a talk at South by Southwest Interactive given by Jose Colucci, Sr., Portfolio Director and Associate Partner at IDEO. Colucci’s talk was called “Getting Old: A Job for the Young.” (Unfortunately, there’s no publicly available video of his talk.)
Despite the seeming disconnect between the title of his talk and all the publicity about Beskind’s hire, Colucci argued that young designers need to pay attention to the evolving demands of an aging society. After all, that’s a growing part of the population the designers will be designing for.
It struck me that the advice Colucci offered to younger designers made an equally powerful case for engaging Baby Boomers and older adults in encore careers.
Here are three points from the talk that Tarnoff outlines, which highlight what experience – what my crowd refers to as ‘encore talent’ – can offer:
- Don’t help more than required. Colucci cautions against developing products that take away the independence of older consumers.
My gloss: Older adults aren’t the only group disempowered by products and services that do more than they need to do. This is a regrettable feature of many services offered to all age groups. Having been devalued by ageist assumptions, older adults are well-positioned to design and deliver programs and services that help people of all ages.
- Promote empathy. Colucci advises young designers to empathize with older people who will use their products.
My gloss: Empathy deepens over life’s decades. It’s why older people are excellent mentors. They’ve walked lots of miles in their own younger shoes. If you’re looking for empathy in designing programs, products and services, look to people with lots of experience.
- Promote connection. Colucci argued for intergenerational connections in solving problems and promoting innovation.
My gloss: We know from our research that older people interested in social-impact encore roles prize the opportunity to work across generations. In particular, experienced adults value working with younger people. Intergenerational teams work for everyone. It’s a two-way street.
Colucci’s talk, along with the ripples of media interest in Beskind, made me ask myself a core question: How do we redesign work itself – especially, but not only, in the nonprofit sector – to maximize the talents and experiences of all generations?
There’s a job for IDEO, and all of us.