Changes of profession, employer and work tasks in later working life: an empirical overview of staying and leaving

Abstract

Occupational change encompasses change of profession, employer and work tasks. This study gives an overview on occupational change in later working life and provides empirical evidence on voluntary, involuntary and desired occupational changes in the older workforce in Germany. The analyses were based on longitudinal data from 2,835 participants of the German lidA Cohort Study, a representative study of employees born in 1959 or 1965. Multinomial logistic regression analyses were performed in order to characterise the change groups in their previous job situation. The findings indicate that occupational change among older workers is frequent. In four years, 13.4 per cent changed employer, 10.5 per cent profession and 45.1 per cent work tasks. In addition, the desire for change often remains unfulfilled: the share of older workers who wanted to but did not change was 17.6 per cent for profession, 13.2 per cent for employer and 8.9 per cent for work tasks. The change groups investigated differ in terms of their socio-demographic background, health and job factors such as seniority and leadership quality. In times of ageing populations, the potential of occupational change among older workers requires more consideration in society, policy and research. Special attention should also be paid to the group of workers who would have liked to change but feel that they cannot leave.

Job quality trajectories among baby-boomers in Germany and their consequences for the motivation to work – results from the lidA cohort study

“…They may – at the most – explain MTW differences between the trajectories only to a small extent. Other forms of occupational change, such as changes in work tasks (Wong and Tetrick, 2017; Garthe and Hasselhorn, in press), may alter a worker's job quality characteristics. They may occur voluntarily, when initiated by the employee, or involuntarily, e.g.…”

“…They may occur voluntarily, when initiated by the employee, or involuntarily, e.g. when imposed by the organisation (Garthe and Hasselhorn, in press). They may be further associated with cascading effects, when leadership quality changes due to a new supervisor, which in turn might lead to secondary changes in other job quality characteristics (Wong and Tetrick, 2017).…”

“…They may be further associated with cascading effects, when leadership quality changes due to a new supervisor, which in turn might lead to secondary changes in other job quality characteristics (Wong and Tetrick, 2017). For several reasons, the desire for occupational change often remains unfulfilled for large proportions of workers in the years preceding retirement (Garthe and Hasselhorn, in press). This could provide another possible explanation why quality of work continues to be low for some groups of employees.…”

It Is Better for Younger Workers: The Gain Cycle between Job Crafting and Work Engagement

“…The first one would be managing the diversity of the workforce. Since age diversity highly increased during the last decades, differences in available resources and specific demands from younger and older workers should be taken into account in order to maintain sustainable work ability and organizational performance [ 2 ]. The second one should be maintaining motivation at work.…”

A conceptual framework addressing the complex labour market dynamics of the work-to-retirement process

“…Overall changes in employment, without simultaneous reductions in work duties, could in some cases also be perceived as being a part of the work-to-retirement process. However, long-term career jobs can no longer be expected to be the norm and career changes may also occur at later stages of working life (Riekhoff 2018 ; Garthe and Hasselhorn 2021 ). Later-life career changes may therefore not necessarily reflect the process of withdrawing from the labour market.…”