Boomer career reinvention - an interview with John Tarnoff

By Neil Patrick


Back in 2012 I stumbled across a wonderful TEDx talk by John Tarnoff, which simultaneously amused and informed me about the critical difficulties facing baby boomers today in the second half of their careers. I liked it so much that I asked John if I could share it here and he happily consented.

Because it’s such a good watch, here it is again:





Since then, John and I have kept in touch and pursued our individual yet broadly parallel paths in trying to help people tackle this issue. We picked up again recently and I was intrigued to find out what John had been doing. He’s certainly not been idle!

So I chucked a few questions at John and he provided me with his answers which we’re happy to share here.

NP: What have you discovered are the biggest problems boomers are having with jobs and careers?

​JT: Many people are shocked at how challenging it is to get a job after they've been "downsized" or forced into an early retirement "buy-out." During the Recession that we are still recovering from in many ways, it took boomers on average twice as long as younger generations to find jobs.

Companies go to a lot of trouble sometimes to wash their hands and alleviate their guilt by including out-placement counselling through large HR firms that specialize in helping workers transition to new jobs, but many boomers I've talked to find these counselling sessions and classes depressing and overwhelming​.

For people who have worked in one job or in one company for ten years or longer, it is extremely disorienting to be let go from what has become a second home, and a virtual family. Recovering from the initial shock can take time. One woman I interviewed pretty much stayed inside and slept for two months after she was let go.

The longer-term question, even for people who are able to weather the transition, is: what to do as a second-act career? Few of us can afford to completely retire. Many of us are going to need to keep a full-time income going for as long as we are able. Fewer jobs are available for older workers, a phenomenon that has something to do with ageism, but I think also simply reflects an outdated cultural norm, which is this assumption that people stop working at 65. If you ask younger recruiters and HR people, they just accept this as part of the way things work, and don't really stop to think about what a multi-generational work place would look like.

The reality of 21st century careers. 

NP: How are you helping people deal with this?

JT: My mission is to help boomers take a more entrepreneurial attitude about work, and to think more expansively about the kinds of businesses they could launch, and services they could provide, in what is now known as the "gig" economy. I believe that after so many years in the work force, we do indeed have the experience, wisdom and understanding to be successful. There is a new job or calling that is inside us, and we just need to do the introspective work, and the external networking and interaction, to figure out how to manifest it. This is not about "follow your bliss." If that were a viable strategy, every contestant on a TV talent competition would be a superstar. Rather, this is about "follow your usefulness." Particularly now, after so many years, we know where we can provide value. We know what we're good at, and what we like doing. That's how we should be proceeding.



NP: What are the most alarming stats you have come across about this subject?

​JT: I never think of stats as "alarming" per se. Stats are valuable information​ ​that present us with opportunities to act constructively, or to complain and point fingers. Yes, currently the retirement picture here in the U.S. is not pretty, with 25% of those 55+ having no retirement savings, and no company pensions. Another 25% have some kind of company pension, but still no savings. For the 50% that have at least some savings, and some form of company pension, the average savings account has around USD 100,000 in it. For most people, this means that they are going to have to continue working after "retirement" in order to make ends meet, as their Social Security government pension will not be sufficient.

I'm actually optimistic about the future for this generation, because I think it is going to make better business sense to retain us in the workforce, than to keep us out. There are some small indications that this is happening. Some companies and government agencies are instituting "phased retirement" plans to keep people in their jobs at reduced hours while they build a bridge to a second-act career.

In the U.S. by 2022, 4​0% of the U.S. population will be over 55.​​ This means that to avoid economic collapse, as well as the default of the Social Security government pension fund, the retirement age will need to rise (it's currently 66). To avoid being a burden on the economy, boomers will need to continue to work, and businesses will ultimately recognize that there is a lot we can still do. Every day, I see another myth about aging getting debunked, whether it's about brain function or physical condition. The truth is that we are all living longer, and largely more capable lives. 40% of people who are 65 years old today will live past age 90.

So I like to play around with positive stats that paint a more positive picture, and then do my best to see that this picture becomes a reality.​



NP: What news can we report about your development of the Boomer Reinvention program?

​JT: As you know, this all started because I was asked to give a TEDx talk on the subject of transformation. Realizing that the retirement story we were raised to believe has turned out to be a myth, I started to look into what means we could use to transform ourselves in order to keep working.

I'm finishing up a book that lays out the program called: "Boomer Reinvention: How to Create Your Dream Career Over 50" which goes into my five reinvention steps. The program is based on my crazy career as an entertainment business executive in Hollywood, and also draws from my Master's degree in Spiritual Psychology.



NP: Do you have any success stories we can recount?

​JT: Well, I'll share part of a story of a gentleman who I profile in my book. This is a guy who worked for decades as a sales executive for a handful of companies, and had risen to very senior positions. But he became very disillusioned with the way these companies were being managed, and found the lack of integrity and short-sightedness disturbing. He knew that he was going to have to figure out a different career solution for himself and his family, but he didn't know where to turn. To make a long story short, this guy had always been a savvy investor, and had learned the investment business by trial and error through trading on his own account. He never thought of this as a business until a friend suggested he look into registering as an investment advisor (a much easier process in certain U.S. states than becoming a broker/dealer). The timing worked out because he was fired from his job soon after, and in the few years​​ has built a lucrative - and very personal - business managing the investments of a small group of clients.​

John Tarnoff

What John's and my own work has confirmed I think is that despite working more or less independently on this issue in different ways and on different sides of the planet, we have both found more or less the same thing; boomers have immensely valuable skills, but they are struggling to figure out how to manage their careers in an age where job loss isn’t a risk, it’s a certainty. And once they fall off their ladders, they can find it very difficult to get back on.

John’s a master of reinvention and in his own words he’s had to be, because he’s had no fewer than 18 jobs in his 35 year career! There’s nothing like experience to teach us how to solve a problem!

If you recognise or are struggling with any of the issues touched on here, then John is a great guy to have in your network. John will be launching his book before the end of 2016. You can register your interest on his website. Please also feel free to connect with John on Twitter or LinkedIn.

My thanks go to John for this update and for sharing his findings and thoughts. Boomers can get back in the game, they just need to know how to do it – and the first step is knowing the right people who can help.

Why boomer careers will never be the same again (VIDEO)

By Neil Patrick

The threat to baby boomers' careers and financial outlook won't go away even if the economy improves. Here's why and and what we must all do about it.

Thanks to this blog, I keep on running into amazing people who help inform and shape my view of the way mature professionals can deal with the career crisis.

A few weeks ago I hooked up with John Tarnoff in California. He's spent most of his career in the entertainment and film industry. John first came to my attention when I watched his highly entertaining and thought provoking talk at So Cal TEDx.

John's had 18 jobs in his 38 year career. And he's been fired from 39% of them.

He's changed jobs therefore on average every 2.1 years. So among his many talents, he's also a master at career reinvention. And if you think with all your qualifications and accomplishments you don't need this skill, I beg to disagree.

John Tarnoff

As we chatted on Skype and emailed, it was clear that we'd reached the same conclusions about the critical career challenges the boomer generation faces.

Personal reinvention isn't an option - it's a critical 21st century survival skill

This is going to be possibly the most important career skill you'll need to survive and prosper in the 21st century. Did anyone ever teach you this at school or university? No, me neither.

The trouble is that the education system that the baby boomers went through was geared to a different century and a different set of global economics.

As I talked about here, we are at the end of the second industrial revolution and are entering the third. And in the third industrial revolution, the key technology is the internet and digital media. Just knowing how to send emails, set up your Linkedin profile and browse stuff online isn't enough.

It doesn't matter what sector you work in, if you are not savvy about the way digital technology is reshaping your profession, you need to be. And you need to be at the front, not behind the curve if you are to have any chance of continuing to practice your other hard won skills.

If you're behind, you can be sure that you are or will be at risk of losing your place to someone much younger even if they don't have all your years of experience.

A cozy retirement starting in your sixties is going to be a rarity

If we were all coasting comfortably towards retirement, this wouldn't be so much of an issue. But 2008 and it's aftermath has changed all that. The professional middle classes in the US and Europe were struck by a tsunami so  huge that it has devastated their personal assets.

Property asset values tumbled, investments had billions wiped off, pension plans shriveled, savings interest rarely even matched inflation. All the while, living costs and particularly food and energy bills rose and rose. Hardly anyone in the professional classes became wealthier between 2008 and today.

Few are currently able to look forward to a comfortable retirement when they reach 65 unless they drastically reevaluate what they are going to do to keep the money coming in..

The skills required to be employable in today's jobs, let alone those in 10 years time, have changed beyond recognition. Because technology, communications and media have changed beyond recognition.

An economic recovery can't rectify this damage

Whilst there are encouraging signs about economic recovery in the US and UK, don't be tempted into thinking all may be coming good again and the terrible threat to our future is receding. It isn't. Because the root of the current economic woes of the baby boomers, isn't the trashing of their balance sheets, it's something much harder to quantify. It's the dawn of a whole new industrial era. And that means a whole new set of survival skills are called for.

If you've not seen John's talk, I am happy to share the video below. If you wonder what your career future holds for you...then watch it. It's also probably the most fun you'll have today (with your clothes on anyway).

And more importantly, it might just get you thinking.

Here's John's introduction:


On July 14th, I was asked to give a TEDX Talk for TEDxSoCal in Long Beach, CA (home of the big TED event) on the theme of "The Alchemy of Transformation ... Our Selves, Our Work Places, Our Living Spaces." In looking at this question, it occurred to me that while my professional work is focused on helping the next generation of media content professionals adapt to the amazing and pervasive paradigm shifts introduced by digital technology, here was an opportunity to discuss some of these same paradigm shifts for an audience that I had never really addressed: my own Baby Boomer generation.

While the students that I work with (and the schools they go to) are trying to figure out how to prepare for entering the media industry and developing new careers, the Baby Boomers are on the other side of equation, looking at how to wrap up their careers and transition into what we commonly refer to as "retirement."

The well-known problem for the Boomers (those born between 1946 and 1964), is that, as a generation, we have not prepared for this transition. There are many statistics available here, but the most striking number to me is this one: 80 percent of us have saved less than $100,000 for our retirement. Given the economics of the last five years, and the prospects ahead of us, what this means is that the Boomers are going to have to keep working - and the problem there is that neither we nor society at large are prepared for us to remain in the work force.

My point in the TEDx talk is propose some ideas on how to reinvent ourselves in order to maintain our relevance in and relevance to the workforce. We need to start reframing who we are and what we think we're capable of doing, and to reject the idea that old dogs can't learn new tricks.

After all, we have some pretty amazing life experience to draw from. If our kids are actually listening to all of our music (my daughter is currently negotiating vociferously for access to my 600 hundred-album stack of vinyl...), then we can't be all that out of touch. If we were able to piss off our parents and master the art of talking on the phone, doing homework and listening to the radio, we should be able to figure out how to multi-task between Text, Email, Voicemail and Skype while sitting at Starbucks in between meetings.

As I know from working with my graduate students, there's a lot that they know, and there's a lot that they don't know. They and we want and need guidance from one other. It's one big ecology: our wisdom and experience + their digital awareness and limitless passion.

In the midst of so many paradigm shifts that I'm observing in the digital age, one emerges out of this situation that I'd like to share. In the 20th century, we thought of life in three broad stages: Education, Career and Retirement. In the 21st century however, I believe that these three need to be replaced by Self Awareness, Creation, and Service. While this is guidance for young people starting out, it is also an important concept for those of us on the other side of the curve.

I invite you to view the TEDx Talk to hear some specific suggestions on how the Boomers can take back some control of our careers as we press on into unexpected and uncharted territory. Hint: The kids can be alright!