Dal Lavoro al "Retirement": il ruolo dell' Employability nella gestione della Carriera. Un contributo di ricerca sui Lavoratori Maturi

This research is part of the trend of studies relating to the management of career paths and in particular to a specific target audience of workers that older workers. The interest, in this issue, stems from a series of recommendations from the scientific literature on the topics of career where there are specific references to paying attention on strategies to make effective and successful career paths that extend over time. In this sense, associated with this theme, emerges the concept of "employability" as a key strategy to promote active aging of older workers in their organizational contexts. In support of these scientific indications, there are many initiatives at the level of the European Community to support the dissemination of a culture of aging in all the industrialized countries of the old continent where you are experiencing an increasing life expectancy and a decrease in birth rate. In this general framework, from the literature is emerging as a stronger interest in the category of workers over 45 but there are still conceptual models with regard to late career management practices as well as the incentive of employability of those workers. The title of this research can be seen as the specific focus placed in conducting the above work consists in understanding the role it can play by employability during career paths in which the final goal that pension is gradually moving far beyond the line drawn in the past and the past generations of workers. How to approach this issue? Starting from a reflection on the characteristics of older workers and especially by a thorough analysis of the relationship between older worker, the bearer of an identity of its career and a wealth of skills and experience, and the organization is precisely the relation considered the continuum on which psychological research is to develop specialized studies in which you take into consideration those factors that might facilitate a better adaptation in the time of older workers and the organization of the latter to the worker "older" in terms of an effective fit between productivity and well being at work. The approach used for the conduct of this research work was that of "methodological triangulation" in which qualitative methodologies have been used to support instruments of a quantitative nature with the intent of being able to have a double and more thorough reading key of results and the topic under investigation. In this sense, in the first study, was used the focus group discussion to detect participants opinions in reference to concepts such as work, career, skills, competencies: the data obtained have allowed us to more fully understand the meanings attributed by older workers to key aspects of the work experience. The type of career proved is traditional in line with the characteristics of the organizational context in which public participants included: the most exciting aspects relate to different and dual perspective with which the work process is addressed. The youngest among the participants appear more related to career progression that occurs primarily through competitive examination and in this sense, claiming a lack of attention of the organization in evaluating the performance of each in the appropriate forums. The older ones, however, show an increased attachment to the intrinsic aspects of their work and a vision of their career that ignores the work itself and promises at a later stage in which to reused skills developed at work, as in volunteering: the latter, in this regard, in turn, surged as such experiential baggage is absolutely valued by the organization, even in foster collaboration and supervision with younger colleagues to which they could pass on their "knowledge work" . The relationship between older worker and organization, they built, however, over time, emerges largely agreed between the results of this first study quality as a factor on which play to achieve a positive outcome for both parties. On the other hand, it outlines an organization's role in the management of career paths and not just share a positive factor. This first qualitative study allowed us to understand the peculiarities of the organizational context in which it would take place the second quantitative study. The second study was carried out with the intention of starting a first path d 'investigation regarding the exploration of an orientation to' employability in reference to the target of older workers: the reference model has been that of Employability Orientation of van Dam (2004), applied on a target with different characteristics. The main goal was to conceptualize a theoretical model of the case in which there were antecedents that could favor or influence the development of this approach in the organization. In addition, this model is investigated in this report due to the development of employability orientation namely that between this approach and the employability activities understood as a series of activities aimed at promoting and maintaining their own employability work. The results are critical aspects but are sweating out new items of considerable value for the purposes of a review of the whole model theorized. This confirms the theoretical model for which there is a significant relationship between Employability and Employability Orientation Activities for older workers affected by this study: that is a first confirmation in the boot path of research in this direction. Moreover, in this sample of older workers, the identity of carrier turns out to be a good predictor of employability orientation of the fact that although it has engaged from time to work, there is still the desire to be able to make it useful for the organization and to higher job satisfaction: this figure is in line with the results of the qualitative study. The most critical aspects concern the other predictors, based on the literature (Nauta et al., 2009; Battistelli & Mariani, 2011), were thought to be antecedents with a specific gravity of encouraging the development of employability in the organization and individual that were not relevant for this purpose in this specific sample. These predictors, the perceived organizational support and the employability cultures, strongly linked to the image of the organization in the eyes of the older worker, indicate that the older worker and his organization, in the working environment, they live on two levels different such that there are moments of meeting. The results arising with respect to Employability Activities are placed, in particular, on this line of interpretation of the relationship between the older workers and the organization: in particular, a greater support and an incentive through supplementary benefits are referred to as elements through which the workers were in favor of the relationship with the organization in the pursuit of their career path: to be supported and economically harnessed their skills with a view to an economic return for the same organization. Integrating the results of the first and second study, it is evident that this category of workers is not passive and monsters ready to invest more of the same for the subsequent stages of career development. There is a continuous reference to the organization that is perceived absent and that, instead, you want more involved because such participation would mean more involvement for older workers and therefore an active aging at work. This research has limitations that you should highlight. First, the sampling procedure: the use of a procedure "convenience" certainly has some limited analysis and maintain certain results. For future development of this research path, definitely will be important to consider this information to expand the sample as well as evaluating the theoretical model conceptualized in most organizational contexts of the same type that is public or on the other hand comparing public organizations and private organizations. Ultimately, this research contribution is meant to represent a first step in the process of developing a research model regarding the orientation employability of older workers.