Changing Demographics

Highlights From this Segment

We focus sometimes too much on millennials, but the customer of tomorrow will be the senior manager. Many developed countries will soon have a majority population of over 50 years old; life expectancy as well as retirement will be extended for current workforce and senior managers will thus need to continue their education to extend their knowledge and skills. The more immediate future of business lies in this part of the population, so we should encourage traditional institutions to realize the many opportunities to focus on this demographic, who can bring many benefits to the workplace, including extensive experience and a vast catalog of contacts.

A liberal arts curriculum—which is more present in the U.S. than in other countries—provides a very good knowledge base for professionals and is something that some institutions in Europe and elsewhere are trying to resurrect to combine with a more professional and vocational approach. Positions of today will look very different in the future.

Given the evolution of many different industries/jobs, a CFO today, for example, will have little to do with same position in a decade. Aging workers must adapt to new discoveries of technology, which requires them to go back to school and learn new skills to prepare for the inevitable changes in industry. We have a responsibility to prepare managers how to think and apply knowledge, regardless of the job they may have in future.