Customer Reviews

Finding a Job After 50: Reinvent Yourself for the 21st Century

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I bought this book last week and have already read it from start to finish. It's the best book on careers for us baby boomers that I've found. I'm a guy who's been in the same job for fifteen years. I hate job-hunting and anyway, and with the economy down, I've been trying to maximize my retirement income. "Finding a Job After 50" is different from the other books I've read because it makes you think about how you feel and what you want, not just how to get a job. It's got very good advice on the job market but the main thing is doing what you really want to do. Although I've seen some of the info in other books, I found a lot that was different. For example, there's a good section about interviewers and what they're thinking when they interview an older applicant. When I came online to write this review, I noticed that another one's been posted. It says something about the book being insulting. It sure didn't insult me! It seems to know right where I'm coming from. I'm not completely burned out but I'm sure bored with my job and ready for a change. One of the things I liked best was a list of questions to pin down what you're really looking for. The idea behind the list is that boomers know themselves better than when they were younger and they've been changing. I'm thinking about starting a small business of my own and maybe moving west. Of course, these are just ideas and I need to do a lot of thinking but reading the book has made me feel like being a little more adventurous.

This book starts insulting people over 50 from the second page. It assumes that everyone over 50 who is in need of a job is seeking a career change, is burned out, and are Luddites totally incapable of handling today's technology like PCs and cell phones. The author harps incessantly about baby boomers' inabilities to integrate computers into their lives. The book reads like it was written 10-15 years ago even though the copyright info says 2007. The giveaway is that the author constantly refers to the Internet as the World Wide Web. Some of us can actually wield a computer with some skill, speed, and focus, and are quite dependent on its calendars, contacts, e-mail, the internet, and application software. I'll gladly challenge a 27-year old to a typing duel, although I will bow to their greater skill with a joystick and keyboard shortcuts. Jeanette Woodward assumes that those who find themselves without employment after age 50 have to go into some pseudo-professional limbo until we retire, working part-time, doing volunteer work instead of getting a paying job, etc. Maybe that's appropriate for the few baby boomers who have passed the 67-year mark, but most of us still need to make a good living, pay down our mortgages, put our kids through college, and desperately add to the retirement funds that we have probably short-changed. How does she expect us to do that with the "easy," "fulfilling" jobs she recommends? The people I see who are looking for jobs are in industries where the jobs are going overseas, or those where the markets have dropped out, like IT, financial services, etc. What I wanted out of this book is how to combat the age discrimination rampant in the marketplace, and to give us ideas how to position ourselves as valuable despite some gray hairs and a bulge around the middle. Ms. Woodward's book should be retitled, "Finding a job after 65" because that appears to be who she wrote it for. On the positive side, the book was short and sweet, easy to read, well-organized, and provided some useful material, although not as much as I wanted.

This book would probably be great if I were employed and looking to switch jobs or careers, or if I were retired and wanted to reenter the workforce. I am, however, an unemployed person just looking to find a job in the same field of work in which I was previously employed. There are a few helpful hints about resume and cover letter preparation, but otherwise, this book just made me feel less hopeful than I had already been.