Recruiting Boomers: Lessons from the Marketplace

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Recruiting BoomersLessons from the Marketplace
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The Practice of Marketing

• Surprisingly disciplined!

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Simplifying the Process

• Understand the Target Audience/Customer
• Determine the Customer Benefit
• Crystallize the Message
• The Creative Brief

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Understanding Boomers

• Differences certainly exist within the Baby Boom
  generation
• But their shared tendencies have profoundly
  transformed whole industries...
• And, assuming those tendencies continue, we can
  learn from them

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Boomers...

• Youth-Oriented
• Shifting Definitions

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Boomers...

• Time-Pressured
• Results-Oriented

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Boomers...

• Expect Science and Technology

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Boomers...

• Disrupt the Status Quo
• Challenge Authority

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Boomers...

• Fulfillment at work and work at play

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• Boomers
• Buy experience

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HSPH/Met Life Foundation Research Leading Edge
Boomers Envision Retirement

• Only a tiny minority look forward to
  conventional retirement
• Others are very anxious about retirement, and
  retreat to an uneasy default modeplanning on
  continuing to work
• Its part of my life to work

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The Un-Retirement

• Most are proud of their generations history of
  disrupting the status quo, and are sure that they
  want to live out the next stage of their lives
  differently
• Although they are not sure what that will mean
• Source HSPH/Met Life Foundation Research

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The Boomers Story Is Yet to be Written

• More adventurous types have begun to figure it
  out
• Not an all-consuming passion for service
• At least, not yet, for most
• But a role for service, within a larger landscape
  of interests and activities
• Family, travel, learning, volunteering
• Special attraction to supporting the most
  vulnerable
• And the most vulnerable within this generation
  may represent the most active volunteers
• Source HSPH/Met Life Foundation Research

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Terms of Engagement Recognize Us

• Baby Boomers do not especially feel a sense of
  obligation to serve
• although they may choose to do so
• They expect to be recognized and appreciated for
  what they do
• Acknowledgment will be critical
• Source HSPH/Met Life Foundation Research

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Terms of Engagement No One Size Fits All

• Some want to do something radically different
  from what they have done all their lives some
  want to use their professional or personal
  expertise
• Customize opportunities to serve
• Source HSPH/Met Life Foundation Research

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Terms of Engagement Tell It Like It Is

• Boomers may well choose to perform tasks that are
  beneath their capabilities, but they clearly
  want to know what theyre in for
• Clarify expectations at every turn
• Source HSPH/Met Life Foundation Research

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Terms of Engagement No Politics, No Duplicity

• Boomers have had enough of the corporate scene
• They will be immediately turned off by cliques,
  threatened/ hostile staff people,
  misrepresentation of roles, abuses of their good
  will
• They will resent anything they perceive to
  represent arbitrary payment or stipends
• To the extent possible, minimize the politics
• Source HSPH/Met Life Foundation Research

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Terms of Engagement Respect My Freedom and
Autonomy

• Boomers want to be valued, but they dont want to
  be used
• They resent the sense that its never enough
• Understand that Boomers want boundaries to be
  established and respected
• Source HSPH/Met Life Foundation Research

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Different Strokes

• Throughout this journey, we have seen marked
  differences by segment...
• Men vs. women
• Inner city African Americans vs. Suburbanites
• Types of employment

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RSVP - I
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Other Considerations Tone and Manner

• The Greatest Generation and the Boomers have
  very different sensibilities
• Bob Hope versus Saturday Night Live
• This will be a critical part of appealing to the
  new generation

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Recruitment Messages for Boomers

• Not your fathers retirement
• Appeal to this generations pride in upsetting
  the status quo
• Parody the leisure fantasy
• Service, packaged as part of a richly-textured,
  deeply rewarding experience
• Part of a lifetime of adventure
• Highly specific help wanted

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THE WHO WHAT WHAT
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Disciplined Message Development

• More important than ever, given the tidal wave of
  Baby Boomers coming of age
• Understand the target
• Determine the customer benefit
• Crystallize the message
• The Creative Brief