Best practices: multigenerational workforce, recruitment and retention

"We can teach you a thing or two."
– 65-plus recruitment campaign slogan

Sainsburys reaps the benefits of its age-friendly policies – a flexible and motivated multigenerational workforce and improved productivity.

This UK retailer introduced a retirement plan and pension protection mechanisms enabling older members to draw partially on their pension to top up a reduced salary. Workers can reduce their hours without significantly decreasing their net income and can continue to contribute to their pension up to the age of 75.

The company has also had recruitment campaigns targeted at the over-65, entitled "We can teach you a thing or two." Age is not a factor in redundancy decisions, and anyone recruited up until their 65th birthday will receive full redundancy. As well, age has been removed from application forms, and personal details such as age are used only for monitoring purposes.

These policies have produced a mixed-age workforce that is more flexible and better motivated, which has reduced costs through improved productivity. Overall, almost 15% of the workforce is over the age of 50 and 1.2% is over the age of 65.

Sainsburys has also improved customer satisfaction by more accurately reflecting the profile of its customers.