As an executive search consultant I spend all day every day sourcing, evaluating and presenting candidates to a wide variety of clients.  Our firm represents a wide swath of industry as a whole:  Retail, Banking, Insurance, Manufacturing, Technology, Healthcare, Distribution, and Services.

In every search assignment we receive, one theme is becoming increasingly clear.  Regardless of industry, we are now in a "mini war for talent" which is on a path to accelerate over the next ten years.

A number of recent and growing trends including the globalization of business, the "technologification" of business and retiring baby boomers are driving the need for more talent and more educated/experienced talent.

Just a few short years ago, many of my contemporaries (age 50+ baby boomers) were worrying about downsizing, mergers and consolidations and never having a "real job" again.  While there has been a lot of shifting in the job market, and hundreds of thousands of displacements over the last 10 years, another trend is quietly emergingÉ.the need to "bring back" much of the knowledge, maturity and expertise that has been "retired".

Add to these disruptive forces, one more major element.  The "baby bust".  Baby boomers are now aged 45-60.   Remember that "baby bust" we all heard about way back when?  That generation is now 35-45 and there are simply not enough people to go around.

What does this mean for that leading demographic group that has been, as the media likes to put it, "a disruptive force" since childhood?  It means that now, in your fifties and beyond there are real, meaningful and often very flexible career opportunities.  In just the last year, our firm has placed several "retired" executives in to unique second career opportunities.  This year the trend is increasing.

What are these second careers?   They are as varied as the skills of our candidates.  Some are in traditional executive roles but within a new industry.  Many have been in the not for profit and public sectors.  Some have been interim contract assignments that have evolved in to permanent positions.  All full time, many being done "virtually" from remote locations, the opportunities abound.

So what does this mean for you if you find yourself retired and restless, unemployed but needing a job, bored and looking for a major step change in your work life?  It means that the opportunities are there, you just have to know how to find them.  Below I have outlined some of the ways that the best jobs are found, and as with most things, it starts with networking,

• Networking is an under-defined and over-used term in the world of career management.  Effective networking does include:
• Consistently maintaining business relationships/contacts with individuals with whom you no longer work.
• Consistently being engaged in the community through volunteerism, advisory councils or neighborhood leagues.
• Being open and honest about who you are and what you want to do next.  The single biggest networking mistake I see people make is failure to "tell their story" when the opportunity presents itself.
• Avoiding what appears to be the "easy answer" (often that includes calling a recruiter.  Keep in mind, the recruiter is working for his/her client, not for you.)  Some of the best referrals come from the least likely places: your children's friends' parents; the neighbors; the high school coach; that long lost water cooler friend from twenty years ago.
• A clear, concise and chronological resume.  While this, I know, flies in the face of advice from some of the best career counselors, "talent inventory" resumes are not helpful to a prospective employer.   Think journalism 101 :who, what, where, when and why.
• Make it easy for the prospective employer or network contact to understand what, exactly, you were responsible for.
• Don't try and "hide" your age by only going back twenty years on your resume.  You have a lot of company in your age group, leaving out significant portions of your career and personal development risks appearing disingenuous to many employers.
• Keep it simple, to the point, and bottom line oriented.
• An open mind.  Some of the best second careers don't pay what the first career did.  That doesn't mean you are going "backwards", it means you are doing something different.  And keep in mind the economic value of:
• Healthcare
• Retirement savings plans
• Stock plans
• Flexible work hours
• Virtual work space

So there you have it.  The trends are in your favor.  That doesn't mean it will be easy to reap the rewards of the trends, but with focus, persistence and optimism, the fifties (and beyond), can, in fact, be fabulous.