Prepare for a Career Crisis in your 30’s
Ready for an early mid career crisis? If you are in your mid thirties you just might need to be concerned about being “Aged Out”.
That’s right – 30 is the new 40. Ready for an earlier mid career crisis?
The other day I was binging on one of my favorite Hulu series – Casual. One of main characters, Alex, a low energy – low motivation ‘upper’ millennial was being interviewed by two women in the their mid twenties for a job as CTO of their small startup. The two women were hesitant and suspicious of why he wanted the job since he had previously sold his internet startup. They just assumed that he was set for life financially (unbeknownst to them he had squandered away most of the proceeds).
At one point during the interview they noted that this senior technology position was not right for him because he was on the cusp of being ‘aged out’. Essentially, he was too old already at age 36.
Holy cow – Aged out at 36!! Now that’s an eye opener. AARP – take heed and immediately low your entry age to 40.
Turns out that this situation is being played out a whole lot these days. It’s not 50 or 60 year olds that are feeling the heat. That’s old news. It’s the older millennials and younger Gen-X’ers. Not surprising that the median age of the workforce at Facebook is 28. At Google it’s 30. Amazon is 31. That’s just barely a few years off of mom and dad’s health care plan.
Yep – You may need to kick it up a notch before you become “Aged Out”.
Now what does this phenomenon of being “aged out’ really mean to our economy? And why should we care? After all this dynamic has been going on for sometime.
If being ‘aged out’ in your mid thirties is going to be the norm, then there are some serious reprucussions that will reverberate across our economy and society as a whole.
There is no doubt that the velocity of change in business has accelerated and is approaching warp speeds. The over-emphasis and value placed on youth is risky as it erodes the basis upon which our economy is built upon.
It takes time to acquire knowledge and education, develop a skill set, gain experience and perhaps most importantly gain perspective. These are the building blocks for long term success of any business endeavor. And without them it will be difficult to build or sustain an economy.
If ‘aging out’ means that the time horizon to achieve a return on these investments is getting shorter, then the chances that people reach their career potential has been severely truncated, and with it businesses, our economy and our social fabric will suffer. It’s symptomatic of the ‘immediate gratification’ syndrome. And we see it time and again with new company start ups that don’t have the time to ‘ripen’ into a healthy sustainable entity.
Like a good wine, careers, business growth and investments need time to ‘ferment’ – to get better with age. Good wine comes from ‘aged’ grape vines. Where would we be if we ‘aged out’ these vines because they couldn’t keep up with the younger grapes?
What is being lost and diminished by pre-mature ‘Aging out’? – Experience, Perspective, Maturity, Communication, Honesty and Loyalty. All the intangibles that move the dial forward.
In the end – it’s the sum total of hard skills, soft skills and experience that become the added-values of a career.