Patrick Vestner

The age structure in organizations is changing and the share of older employees that remain in the job market is increasing. As a result, organizations need to actively manage the different motives and needs as well as knowledge, skills, and abilities of an age-diverse workforce. On multiple levels (organization, team, individual), the inclusion of all employees regardless of their age must be ensured.

Businesses are undergoing a digital transformation as new technologies are introduced in rapid circles (i.e. artificial intelligence, digital collaboration, data-driven decision making, robotic process automation), blending digital and human interactions in the workplace. Such transformation often comes with technological change in the core business processes, job descriptions, and organizational structures. Consequently, how well age-diverse, technologically dependent teams are managed can be essential for future performance of an organization.

My motivation is to help decreasing the gap between theoretical knowledge and practical implications within the described topics in organizational management: digitalization and age diversity. As the demographic and socioeconomic change as well as technological development is going to further impact the way organizations manage their staff, my research will look at questions in the intersection of those two megatrends.

Keywords: age diversity, ageing workforce, digitalization, digital transformation