Encore Careers Are Re-energizing People 50 and Over

Tim Hahn (center) found a second career by teaching kids how to garden.

Who hasn’t been affected by the economic decline of the past few years? Not too many of us. People 55 and over have been especially hard-hit, with historically high unemployment, collapsing pension plans, and shrinking investment portfolios dashing retirement dreams for many.

Less visible in the public eye have been the growing numbers of people in their fifties and sixties starting new businesses, training for new careers, entering the Peace Corps, or joining the Experience Corps, a national program that engages people over 55 as tutors and mentors in low-performing elementary schools in 20 cities, including Portland. Some of these people have retired, some have been laid off, and others are just ready for a change.

Civic Ventures, a national nonprofit founded and led by Marc Freedman, author of Encore: Finding Work that Matters in the Second Half of Life, popularized the term encore careers to describe new directions inspired by a desire to give back. Life by Design NW, a Portland-based nonprofit, uses the term more broadly. “We think of it more like an encore after a band plays,” says Tami Matthews, a Life by Design NW supporter and formerly its communications director. “The band has been plugging away, playing some great tunes. Then they come back after a lot of applause to do some of their best numbers. That work might be a passion, a hobby, starting a business, social entrepreneurship, perhaps moving into a career you've always wanted to. And people may have more than one encore career.”

Gone are the days when people stay with a company for decades and retire with a gold watch and a comfortable pension. Meet some Portlanders who have taken a midlife leap and landed happily.
 

Volunteering Supports Self-Discovery

Susan Gilson, 55, worked at Clark County Educational Service District for 27 years in multiple administrative roles focused on needs of at-risk kids. A few years ago, she knew she had to do something different, left her job, and gave herself a year to figure out her next move. Consulting with a career counselor and volunteering with a hospice program and a retirement center helped Gilson discover a passion for working with seniors. Now she’s the director of the Elm Court Loaves & Fishes center in downtown Portland, where she thrives on interacting with both clients and volunteers. It’s one of 34 sites that serve hot noon meals to people over 60 throughout the metro area and coordinates delivery of Meals-On-Wheels to home-bound seniors.

A piece of advice: “Have a plan for how you will spend your time in the transition and how you’ll pay for it. Volunteering was a great way to explore some new avenues plus keep feeling productive. Also identify what skills you want to use in a new job. Know what things drove you crazy before and stay away from them.”
 

Transferable Skills + New Training = New Field, New Business

Patty Matheny, 56, spent 22 years working for a Los Angeles-based pharmaceutical company, moving up the corporate ladder. For the last 12 years, she has worked from her home in Portland as director of training and development. She received a year’s notice before her job ended as a result of a merger in 2004. She knew she wouldn’t be a good fit for another corporate job after working on her own for so long. “I thought about beauty and aging in our culture, and how I could use my background in training and my ability to communicate to offer something not usually found in a beauty salon.” Matheny had enjoyed the relaxation of facial treatments and decided she wanted to recreate that experience for people “while getting great results with their skin.” With a severance package and savings, she enrolled in a yearlong cosmetology course—later augmented by other courses. She opened Facing Grace salon in Ladd’s Addition and later moved it into a live-work home in the Woodstock neighborhood of Southeast Portland. Although the business was successful early on, Matheny says it helped that she was willing to adapt to a lower income than she previously made. One thing she really enjoys about her business: working with clients of all ages and from all walks of life.

A piece of advice: “Develop a strong level of trust in you innate abilities to learn something new and follow your passion!”
 

Earlier Work Leads to a New Business

Judi Yamada retired as soon as she could, at age 58, from Benton County Juvenile Department. She felt burned out after 15 years as a juvenile court counselor working with at-risk teenagers. After moving to Portland, she took a look at her earlier working life—at her associate degree in restaurant management and years of food service and restaurant experience—and realized she wanted to do something new that would help her local community. “I researched the issues relating to local farming and the local economy. Then I thought to myself, I’ll teach people to eat seasonally, shop locally and cook simply.”

Yamada has taught classes at her local community center, led corporate team-building groups using cooking as a team-building tool, and will soon be teaching in a new kitchen with bed and breakfast loft behind her home in Sellwood. She also writes an online column about eating well and eating locally for Examiner.com, writes a blog for her website, and develops recipes for cooking contests. The second contest she entered resulted in an impressive first place win: an all-expenses-paid week for herself and her daughter at a luxury health spa in Mexico.

A piece of advice: "Feel strongly about what you do. Take stock of your experience, training and skills to find your passion. Then, one step at a time, earn respect, build trust and discover your niche."
 

Reinventing Oneself Time and Again

Don Tarbutton, 74, has taken multiple twists and turns in his working life since completing his undergraduate degree at Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration. Today, he’s an on-call hospital chaplain for a Portland hospice program, working five or six days a month. He moved to Seattle from the East Coast in 1969 for a teaching job at a community college and then became director of dietetic services at Harborview Medical Center. At 40, Tarbutton left the job to pursue a master’s in health care administration, which eventually led to a position as executive director of a new hospice program in nearby Kitsap County. It was a good fit for him, he says, because “as a gay man, I had a special interest in AIDS and the program served many people with AIDS.” The difficult part was that he lost his partner of 16 years to AIDS during his time with the program.

Tarbutton decided to retire when he turned 60. Soon after, a flier on a bulletin board about a Buddhist retreat led to his next life chapter—deeper study of Buddhism and a decision to move to New Mexico to study with a teacher there. After several years in New Mexico and Maui, he decided to return to the Northwest and shore up his finances by going back to work. He enrolled in a one-year Buddhist chaplaincy training program, then completed a yearlong internship in Seattle before taking his current position three years ago. The work with hospice, he says, is “perfect for me.”

A favorite source of inspiration: Soul Food: Stories to Nourish the Spirit and the Heart by Jack Kornfield and Christina Feldman.
 

A School Project Sows Seeds for a New Direction

Tim Hahn, 58, had not planned an exit from his 30-year teaching career with Portland Public Schools, but, in his mid-fifties, a small gardening project he began with his fourth graders at Buckman School led him to discover a new passion: teaching kids to garden. He wanted to work with other teachers to develop new curricula for teaching students to use critical thinking to understand the many issues food encompasses—from land use to health. This new direction prompted him to take an early retirement and he hasn’t looked back.

“I found I had something to offer which I didn’t even realize was in me,” says Hahn. “Kids and teachers need to know about food banks, CSAs, obesity and much more.” He’s worked with educators at the Learning Garden Lab in Southeast Portland, a collaborative project of Portland State University and Portland Public Schools, developing and presenting food- and garden-based lessons for middle and elementary schools. He’s served on the board of Sauvie Island Center, a nonprofit that offers school field trips, and played a leadership role with the Learning Gardens Institute, a nonprofit formed to support local school-based initiatives in food and garden education.

A piece of advice: “It’s okay to try out something brand new—I hardly knew a weed from a bunch of greens when I first began gardening with kids.”
 

Resources

www.CivicVentures.org

www.encore.org

www.aarp.org/tv-radio/your_life_calling/

Life by Design NW: a local nonprofit that operates through the PCC Foundation; classes, workshops, affinity groups, job seeker groups, volunteer opportunities.

Don’t Retire, Rewire by Jeri Sedlar and Rick Miners.

Encore: Finding Work that Matters in the Second Half of Life, by Marc Freedman.