Human Resource Development and the Older Learner

With an ageing population, one of the key issues in Australia is the learning needs of older people, including older workers. In particular, with looming skills shortages, organisations need to consider ways of engaging older adults in learning, either for transition to new skills or for re-engagement after retirement. This paper explores the learning experience of a group of people over the age of 45 years and examines their learning challenges as they strived to master a complex skill. Using semi-structured interviews, the research explored the learning processes and activities they nominated as critical to their growth. These processes included negative construction, passive learning, modelling, direct guidance by experts, individual practice and experimental learning. The paper concludes with implications for human resource development practices in organisations.