Encore Careers are a Healthy Ageing Innovation
- Victoria Hewitt
- Apr 3
- 4 min read
When it comes to getting older, the prevailing narrative is one of preparing health systems for increasing demand as the population ages, rather than seeing the benefits and opportunities this brings for individuals, communities and society.
The healthy ageing agenda is a global policy and practice framework focused on supporting people to live longer and healthier lives. It is most closely associated with the UN Decade of Healthy Ageing 2021–2030, which calls for coordinated action across governments, health and social care, communities, and the private sector.
It recognises that ageing outcomes are shaped not just by healthcare, but the way societies think about age and ageing - including tackling ageism - in areas as diverse as housing, transport, social inclusion, age-friendly environments and work.
The healthy ageing agenda shifts the focus from simply extending lifespan to maintaining functional ability, dignity, independence, and wellbeing in later life
The impact on the health workforce
For health systems, this is an urgent matter, as it feels the impact of workforce attrition to earlier retirement and increased demand from an ageing population. Losing the human capital of senior doctors and other expert professionals exacerbates the strain on systems already under pressure. When they leave, the NHS loses not only the collective economic value of their skills, knowledge, experience and abilities, but also stability, culture, and hope.
This is where the concept of encore careers could transform the narrative, by combining purpose, learning, and social connection with paid and/or meaningful work in later life. From a healthy ageing perspective, an encore career offers protective factors, such as routine, social contact, cognitive stimulation, and a sense of contribution. It preserves and builds upon professional identity, which is often a major challenge in later life transitions.
Health influences work and work influences health
Staying engaged, feeling valued and making a positive impact in work is good for everyone, but it's too simplistic to say working longer is always healthier. Gen X-ers are learning, as did the Baby Boomers that went before them, that the benefits of work depend on health and functional ability, as well as job quality.
In their systematic review of doctors' retirement planning, Silver et al (2016) found that poor health and excessive workload were major reasons to retire early. That study is 10 years old, but the situation does not appear to have changed, with burnout being cited as a major factor leading to retirement (Jung et al, 2024). On the flip side, both studies, nearly a decade apart, demonstrate that doctors who felt they were in good health and were satisfied with their jobs were the most motivated to continue working.
Encore careers are more than adapted main careers. Writing ten years ago about the Boomer Generation, Phyllis Moen described a distinct life stage between traditional career work and full retirement, with an emphasis on flexibility and purpose rather than simply extending one’s old job. A recent study of later-life career transitions concluded that encore careers are most likely to facilitate healthy ageing when they are meaningful, workload appropriate and match a person’s skills and capacities.
Encore careers may offer a middle path between work that adversely affects your health and full retirement, allowing senior doctors to stay engaged without the strain of their previous role.
This means workplaces take a life-course approach and support wellbeing across the whole working lifespan (Shulte et al, 2019).
Capturing the windfall of time, talent and experience
But the literature also suggests caution: if the work is insecure, low quality, or taken on out of financial necessity, the benefits may be smaller and stressful. The British Medical Association believes that many doctors are being pushed into early retirement, rather than freely choosing it, through taxation rules, workload pressures, and pay erosion. This is a loss to patients, the NHS, the public purse and society.
Yet in their report When a doctor leaves: Tackling the cost of attrition in the UK’s health services, the BMA does not refer to the concept of an encore career at all, focusing instead on ageism and workplace adaptations in a system that we know is not working. It's not wrong to do this, but omitting Moen's idea of a different and purposeful work in the distinct life stage between traditional career work and full retirement is missing an opportunity for healthy ageing innovation.
This is despite Marc Freedman coining the term "encore career" back in 2006, in his seminal book Encore: Finding Work that Matters in the Second Half of Life. He argues that older adults aren’t just people with extra years left to give to the grind; they represent a resource that communities can benefit from. Back in 2001, he described “a new movement mobilizing these individuals to bolster our communities” as something driven by mutual benefit, not just financial gain or altruism.
Now is the time for all organisations involved in health systems - government, employers, trades unions, not-for-profits, charities and community groups - to capture this windfall before we lose it forever.
Watch this video to hear Marc Freedman talk about encore careers.
If this post has resonated with you, why not join the Encore Career Club on Linkedin?
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