hello and welcome to what's going on i'm jan night host of this morning show and with me today are martha fields and henry parker who are going to be talking about operation able and the new and exciting program age works welcome thank you welcome to what is going on good to have you here so martha can you introduce us to operation able absolutely operation able able in our name stands for ability based on long experience and we're an organization that's been around since nineteen eighty two so we're still celebrating our thirty fourth year and we've helped about thirty four thousand people to get back to work and these are people who are age forty five and plus and the new and exciting one so i'm going to talk today about my program which is a new program called able  works and we're also going to talk today about a program that has been around for a long time called c seven senior community service program and those are the two things we're going to talk today about in terms of operation able excellent and henry in fact is a program participant in c seven and operation able and he's going to talk with us about his experience with that program and that will be bringing us all together on what we're going to the depths of what is a very important program in this society today so which i start with  age sixty five but he wasn't really ready to give it all up and so he was very interested in working with older people who wanted to continue working and he founded operation able and today our programs are very very varied in terms of the work that we do in working with people who are forty five plus and trying to get back to work or also to keep their careers my program specifically is called able age works and as i said just a moment ago it is the newest program of operation able and this is a program that's geared very specifically to individuals who are professionals managers and executives who are forty five plus and we help people not only to to  get a job but also to get and keep their job and their career which i think is very important for the older worker many older workers are not just looking for for a job but they're looking for career and something that  can help them as they're trying to integrate their work and their life and how they balance the two and also their legacy where they're trying to move things forward very interesting  can you tell us a little bit about how you happened to get into the abberation oh well graham one sure all the work and unemployed it's a whole new world yes so we have to learn how to ok that was that was a shock to me years ago people thought you know you get a job and spend you know it was long term nowadays people do spend two point five years on a job off and that was a shock for me also so that you have to update a lot of all the work was the computer skills and networking social networking skills not up to date or  nonexistent and that's a big problem so i was laughing is to myself a serious talking because when i first started to hunt for jobs as a professional after college in the late seventy's you know it was the day when you go to the personnel department and have these little index cards with the job done and then you would fill out a paper application but like you said now if you really don't know how to find a job online and what to do then that's a problem for you and that's something i have to say we're very proud about at operation able because we help people as they're going through their careers to to do some of that stuff in terms of mastering the digital divide and and trying to understand both how do you apply for jobs online but also how do you get jobs that may require you to have certain skills computer skills absolutely and networking on line you know not just applying for a job but just networking and looking for about is it's about just what you said is helping people to look at how they network these are short educational programs like a boot camp you go in you work real hard it's intense but you come out and immediately you have the skills to move things forward we actually are just launching this program and we have a great linked in program that we're going to be doing for the next two months one program is coming up and it's about linked in from the top which believe it or not linked in is that one of those social media tools and that employers use to help people to find to help them to find people for jobs and also it helps you to get out in terms of your message by by the way that there are employers now if you do not have that social media presence that linked in presents they won't even give you a chance in terms of looking for a job so one of our programs were actually helping people who you know find it very terrifying and oh my gosh ass so we a program that we're doing as i said soon that helps people go through the top and learn how to create a linked in profile and then for those people who are more advanced or we have programs that will do that some of our other training programs that operation able also we have program managers that work with our students that are in these programs so that they also have those social media skills and are able to go online and find a job excellent people who are professionals managers and executives who are age forty five plus and we really are taking a real holistic approach in terms of the programs that we're offering to these people and one of the for upcoming programs we actually also just launched it's called a professional career networking club finally notice p c n c and this particular program meets the third thursday of the month and it's a group where we're trying to build a community of people who need support as they're looking for a job as they're looking to continue their careers they may be in a career where you know they're getting tired of it and they need to know how to revitalize it or they need some help and support because they've been unemployed for a long time and they need to find out how do i you know how do i find a job or where are the jobs so we hold these at employer organizations so tough health plan has been a huge supporter and we hold them at the employer organization so employers can talk with our participants also so that they find out about what is it like to work in some of these companies because there are companies out there believe it or not that really are friendly towards individuals who are who are who are older  also we have speakers that come in that tell people about what are the best practices what are some of the things the tips one of our programs coming up is one of the realities of trying to find a job at age forty five plus so that's a program i talked about the career advancement boot camps and we have been the other programs aside from the linked in programs that will be coming up around them another thing that operation able does really well is we work to try to link our  people to employers and we have a group of people called the abel friendly employers and he's a very impressive group who is very i was very impressed it's a long list of employers who really are interested and absolutely they're committed to it and to not just you know hiring people but developing them and promoting you know people who are forty five plus and so if you go on our website all the programs that we're going to be talking about today plus information on are able friendly employers  is there it's w w w operation able dot net and people can literally with are able friendly employers what's wonderful is you can go on our website and just click on the icon for a particular company and you will go directly to their career website so you can find out about what the jobs are that are available to individuals and again i think that's something that we that sort of set us apart from some other people doing this work is that we really work hard to put people in touch with organizations and the program that henry is and he may want to talk a little bit about that it actually places individuals in programs so that they can get their foot back in the door and they can also get paid for doing that while they're doing well i went through the career source in cambridge mass and the the national senior network enables this sort of like um it's a whole different generation thing but you just have to learn how to navigate around certain things so we're able when they tried to find you the develop certain skills well put you in find a place where you'll be called nonprofit organization so that helps you get a foot in the door for what of a career change whatever you want to do which helps and i think it's really important too because you know we talked earlier about the index cards or what so much has changed in the workplace and for individuals who may have been unemployed and who are trying to get back again or people who have taken a hiatus maybe you to you know stepped out of because you had you know a loved one that had all simers or you may have had something and you're trying to get back in the workplace and trying to navigate your way through that may be really difficult so one of the things that we do it enable is to help people to understand what the new workforce is about and especially with my program said abel age works so that they can you know become gainfully employed if they're individuals who do not know how to maneuver their way with them else we have a program a program called able beginnings where that individual for a six week period of time can go in and they go in not even understanding what a mouse is and they leave understanding that understanding how to go online and find a job and they even have their resume completed we have an instructor mr wayne jones who is very very good with that older worker i know for me when i first started learning how to go on the computer i would really take the time to do it and our instructors do that we also have a woman by the name of surely thicket who runs programs like skills to work programs where she teaches people how to get certain skills so that they can divide there is also the fact that you may find yourself in a position of reporting to someone who is young your grandchild say and and  not and that person might not have the same risk well the same outlook but also the same assumption of your abilities as that would have been the case many years ago when we were growing up because they would assume that we had a lot of experience in that and that that should be respected and so you've got you know communication yes that will be constructive yes but you have to work until you know even up a really i think important point particularly for that mature worker and that is for the first time in history we have four generations who are working in the workplace so that may mean as you said that you are working for for someone who is your grand child's age and they may be supervising someone that's their grandpa or their nana's age and you know you're not going to have been any respect it works both ways yet and sometimes people do but often you know again there's there is there's the generation gap and there are different ways that people communicate and so we talked about this earlier and you had said but is it discrimination if you know the employer says you have to learn certain technical things and you don't really know them and but the reality is is that if you don't know them you're not going to get anywhere whether you're trying to find a job or not trying to find a job and also understanding how do i deal with that young person who i've got to respect because there are my manager there my supervisor or how do i respect people who i may be managing you know in the workplace who may be younger and have different ways of communicating they don't necessarily communicate face to face but they have to understand how do i communicate through face or those kinds of things and the point that you made about the relationship going into directions i mean there are some there are also seniors who need to have some coaching and the fact that these people these young people really do know a lot so don't disrespect them and don't you know we don't want them disrespecting you absolutely so it goes in both directions what this  this new program that you just come out with sounds so exciting and you've got so many different things going on like a weekly weekly meetings and different things like this can  know you know where you now have a life expectancy in this country of seventy nine years in massachusetts i think it's eighty years so you know we're living longer we want to work longer but you know we may want to do something different so how can i explore my career i may want to stay where i am but you know maybe i want to do something different or how can i if i'm just getting back in the workforce in this employer is doing things remotely where i have to work at home by myself and i'm always used to i don't know that i can work by myself but it's a great job opportunity how can i look at those things so being able to have programs where we're putting people into our p c and see job clubs where you can come and you can network with experts people that are professionals as well as your peers around you know how do i approach those kinds of things and then also you know listen to employers directly talking about what they're going to be doing we're going to have a program later this year with mass general hospital and as i said our programs we're really having them right on site with those employers they're going to bring in their recruiters you know some of the heads of human resources they're going to answer any question people want to know about working in that environment as well as you know that's number one of the number one hospitals in the entire united states and so what are the kinds of jobs that are available for me so some of it for the senior person is about understanding for example and health care and health plan also is wonderful at this there is just about every job imaginable in health care everything you know from you know real estate jobs to accounting jobs to you know dietary jobs you know all kinds of jobs but if you don't understand that or don't you know maybe you worked in retail and you now want to go to health care or maybe you worked in hospitality maybe you don't know that many health care organizations because they're looking to improve their customer service they're looking for those individuals that are working that have worked in those kind of industries so i think one of the things that we're we're doing is helping to bring that knowledge to people as well as as i said having employers who very much are keyed into what we do and move them forward that is fabulous and this is all federally funded of it's free but it's some of them are federally funded like the program that hillary has that which is actually been around since the early sixty's since john f kennedy other programs we actually have to go out and get the funding and some of  federal some of it's through private private contributions and so it's really a lot of different types of sources that are use but the person coming in to to project or operation able for the first time there is no fee many of them there is still see some of them there is a fee and often particularly with some of our programs we're training people for jobs often people qualify for different types of programs where they can get their tuition paid through by that my programs we do charge we don't charge for all of them like the professional career networking club for the career advancement book camps we do charge but it's twenty seven dollars which is a very very reasonable fee we also offer things we have a referral network of career coaches that give their services at a reasonable price so we're really always trying to look for what can we give to people to help them on their journey as they're trying to either get back to work or stay maintained in a job and the thing is that sometimes a person and entrance into that field even at the really important point because for many people especially the people that are professionals managers and executives they have great education skills experience and believe it or not with the labor shortage that we have now and employers are desperately looking for people who have skills in what's called stem science technology engineering and math many of these people may qualify for jobs many people as you said i worked all my life doing x but now i may want to start my own business or i you know i've always been this high level executive but really what i want to do is i want to be a dog groomer and that's my lifelong journey and open you know and do that and so really how do you go about from being that person to doing something else and so that that is something i think in terms of career exploration and helping the older worker to really come to grips with what i want to do or the other thing as i mentioned earlier sometimes it's also about legacy you know i i have something i want to leave this earth i want to do something that's meaningful in my life i want my work in my life to balance out how do i do that how do i move that forward so going to things like r p c n c group where you can talk and get support and get help and talk out wowed about some of these things i think is also very very helpful oh absolutely and  the life that you live now is maybe very different from the life when you were working as an executive in terms of your relationships with family for instance or whatever and but tying your personal life in with your professional life you also have some things about that that sound very interesting again i think that people it's very interesting because the whole workforce dynamic is changing and you know sometimes we do have younger people that are that are supervising older people and younger older person may come again that has been say that executive and now wants to be that dog d groomer and someone would say well what's wrong with you why would you want to go from doing that to this is because i want to do that so being able to really look at those types of careers and also i think from the other side employers are trying to do more to  train their hiring managers that sometimes the older worker has a lot going for them the we also know from the older worker you talked about this earlier henry about you know many of us grew up on this cradle to grave existence yeah you know when i grew up it was like you went to one job that was job or you got one education you know you got your degree and then that was forever you had one resume and you could use that now you've got to have a resume for each job you've got to be able to be flexible to go from job to job all those dynamics are there  what are the employers looking for now this something different than was the case in previous years you know it's interesting because there was a study by manpower that was done at the end of two thousand and fifteen and it talks just about employers both in this country and around the world and they're all kind of looking for the same thing many of them have jobs that are available but they can't find people who have the requisite experience both in terms of the on time yes you know i know that i can't just you know come you know and go any time that i want to i'm not the important thing that employers and that the survey brought out was the people that employers are also looking for this thing that we say in the business world soft skills and what that really means i don't think they're so soft i think they're really really important it's things like little things like communications you know how i deal with my office mates how i you know present myself how i'm not you know those kinds of skills so they're also looking for for things like that but the important i think message and you know again and you know him or you've had such great experience through the system program the important thing is really you've got to get the technical skills you've got a stand how technology works and how your business works and get those skills and network and network ok the we need to wrap it up i think we  covered most everything here but as anything final one i would just lie and say for your listeners that there are some programs some times that they would can go to information sessions every wednesday at ten o'clock at our location which is one seventy four four portland street right around the corner from t d garden we do have information sessions the sister program every friday at ten o'clock there's an information session so if you're interested in that program and my program the professional career networking club the third thursday of the month we do have that program and for everything if you go on to our web site w w w dot operation abel dot net you'll find all of this and even more about what  hey thank you so much martha and henry thank you for being here and thank you all for watching and listening and being part of our program and and till we meet again stay tuned to what's going on