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Ready Set Collaborate with Wanda Pearson
Ready Set Collaborate is a podcast with a wealth of knowledge on networking, collaboration, and partnership, unlocking the secrets to successful teamwork and Innovation. Whether you are an entrepreneur, a creative professional, or just someone who can understand the power of networking and collaboration. This podcast is your go-to resource. Join us as we explore the stories, strategies, and insights from experts, entrepreneurs, and thought leaders who have experienced the magic of networking and collaboration to achieve successful results.
Ready Set Collaborate with Wanda Pearson
Bridging Generations with Marianne Bailey: Fostering Collaboration, Embracing Inclusivity, and Celebrating Senior Contributions in Business
Join me, Wanda Pearson, as we uncover the secrets to successful multi-generational collaboration in the workplace with our esteemed guest, Marianne Bailey. Marianne, the founder of the Senior Success Advocate and the Hip Senior, shares her expert insights on how businesses can bridge the generational divide to unlock innovation and productivity. This episode promises to enlighten you on the distinct work styles across generations like Gen Z, millennials, and older employees, and how open communication can pave the way for mutual learning and understanding. Listen in to discover how the Senior Success Advocate certification can transform your business into a haven of inclusivity and appreciation for the wealth of knowledge that senior employees bring.
In this episode, we navigate the path to creating senior-friendly workplaces, extending beyond industries traditionally focused on older generations. Marianne and I delve into the value of the Senior Success Advocate badge as a testament to an organization’s commitment to inclusive practices. We tackle the nuances of supporting senior employees, particularly those facing challenges like dementia, and emphasize the importance of maintaining their cognitive health and engagement. This lively discussion highlights the necessity of preserving a company’s legacy through senior contributions while ensuring that every generation has a voice and a role in shaping the future.
Connect with Marianne Bailey
Marianne@TheHIPSenior.com
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Welcome to Ready Set Collaborate podcast with Rhonda Pearson, where we will dive deep into the world of networking, collaboration and partnership, unlocking the secrets to a successful team working within innovation. Whether you're an entrepreneur, a creative professional or just someone eager to understand the power of networking and collaboration, this podcast is your go-to resource. Join us as we explore the stories, strategies and insights from experts, entrepreneurs and thought leaders who have experienced the magic of networking and collaboration to achieve successful results.
Speaker 2:Tune in to Ready.
Speaker 1:Set Collaborate podcast on a journey towards achieving your goals with host Wanda Pearson.
Speaker 2:Welcome. Welcome to the Ready Set Collaborate podcast with Wanda Pearson. I am so excited to have my girl, marion Bailey, with the Hip Senior that's going to tell us some great information about to get our year started right the 2025 for seniors. We all need help being seniors and she got all the facts. She got all the information that you can share with us. So welcome, marianne. Tell us a little bit about yourself and then I'm going to talk about your bio yeah, absolutely, my name is Marianne Bailey.
Speaker 3:I live in Ohio and I've been involved with Senior Citizens since I was like five years old and I have a daughter. I work 24-7, just about, and I'm really passionate about being able to help businesses and seniors alike.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and she is my editor y'all of my podcast.
Speaker 1:So that is true.
Speaker 2:Welcome, marianne. She wears so many hats that she actually could do anything that you ask her to do. The rack up there is full, so let me talk about your bio here. Mary Ann Bailey is the founder of Senior Success Advocate and the Hip Senior, dedicated to fostering inclusive multi-generation workplaces that empower senior employees and strengthen workforce harmony. With a passion for bridging generations, marianne helps businesses embrace senior-friendly initiatives through training, certification and strategic resources. Based in Dayton, ohio, she works with companies and professionals across the United States and beyond to promote collaboration, communication and inclusivity.
Speaker 2:And I love that, marianne, because I'm all about collaboration. So you gave me some great ideas as far as even going forward with my podcast, so thank you so much, but I truly appreciate you, so we're going to talk about that. I'm actually part of her group, too, hip Senior, and she always shouts me out. So this is what I'm talking about collaboration. How can we work together? How can we do things together, especially with the seniors?
Speaker 2:Seniors be left behind a lot, and it's time for us to move up and then be in the workforce and do what we, what we, what our passions are. So a lot of us, like I worked for Aitman for 36 years I knew it was time for me to go because they start bringing younger people in and I'm just glad that I had the old pension plan to be able to leave but also to do my passion of being a social worker and also getting in the community to let people know what we do, our services with Legal Shield. But I wanted to make sure people are protected and you are epitome of a senior advocate of what you do and I truly appreciate that. Thank you for your service Service you do so I'm going to ask you a couple of questions here. What specific benefits does a senior success advocate certification offer to businesses that employ senior workers and support multi-generational teams?
Speaker 3:Let me start out with a little bit about what Senior Success Advocate actually is, with a full description. It's not just keeping seniors protected, right, it's actually opening the doors of communication between multi-generations in the workforce. So you see Gen Z and millennials walking around with their head in their phones and then the older generation start in on why does that person always have their phone in their hands? Who are they texting with? What are they Snapchatting? Why can't they just sit down and do some work? And the seniors are at their desk doing work, because that's what they've been trained through all these years to do is work at a computer. They feel like they have to be grounded and focused in working at a computer, where the younger generations they can be off in a park doing the same amount of work and getting it done. They just have different focuses and different ways of doing things. And so Senior Success Advocate is about making sure and this has been in my head for 20 years and I've been teaching seniors how to use technology for 20 years 25 years now and I kept seeing these different issues in the workforce and I was like someone's going to have to step up and teach both these different ways of the senior, seeing why the Gen Z and millennials are doing it that way, and the Gen Z and millennials are doing it that way and the Gen Z and millennials understand why the seniors do it that way, and bridging that gap between them and it really helps businesses. So I figured, okay, let's bring in, go into the workforce and get HR and get the ownership and get different diversity groups within the company to bring these generations together to focus on what's important and that's keeping these lines of communication open.
Speaker 3:Because if outside companies are looking at a company and they're saying, oh, everybody there is 25 years old and running the ship and they're going to run it into the ground because they don't understand the past history that we have with these older people, they don't understand the values and the blood, sweat and tears that the older generation put in to make this company what it is, then it's just going to fail.
Speaker 3:So we want those companies looking in and saying, okay, look, there's still seniors in place, there's still people in the workforce there that are mentoring and training these younger generations to understand the background of this company, to understand how they work and to understand what the true value of that company is, with the relationship with that other company and then understanding vice versa, the younger people teaching the older people how to keep up with the technology, how to translate into jobs that are more comfortable. If you're a warehouse worker, how can we make that worker into an office staff? How do we keep them up to date with software and different stuff like that? So it's multi-generational back and forth. It's not just protecting the seniors, it's protecting the business and keeping them inclusive, of everything going together right, of working together and understanding each other.
Speaker 3:Because if it's one pitted against the other, that's never going to work in a company. It just doesn't happen that way. And a lot of companies are bringing in these younger people that just they don't want to show up for work. And I'm not against younger people, it's just how they are. They want to go work in a park or they want unlimited time off and whatever. And the seniors are like no, that doesn't work that way and it's somewhere coming to a compromise somewhere in the middle and understanding each other. So what the badge does is it helps retain the experienced senior workers so that they can be in that position of mentorship. It improves the team collaboration. It reduces turnover costs. The certification badge also highlights the company's commitment to inclusivity, attracting both job seekers and customers.
Speaker 2:That's very interesting. It's so true. I appreciate that. I mean you're sharing it. It does make sense. I know when I was working in corporate. Yeah, the young ones may know that new things is going on, but the hard work we didn't want to work hard, which is what I spent all those years through what I was doing. We dedicate our lives to doing well in a business and it was just sad to we dedicate our lives to doing well in a business and it just it was just sad to see how we've been pushed out for that to take Part of.
Speaker 3:That is it's the new stuff is great. Don't get me wrong. I am all about technology and working smarter, not harder. I'm all about that. Okay, one of the things that I've been hearing is that millennials and Gen Z's don't want to hear hey, in my day, I worked 40 years to get to where you're at now and you don't deserve it because I had all the blood, sweat and tears. Hey, if they can work smarter and not have to suffer as much and be able to support their families and themselves easier and all that other stuff.
Speaker 3:Let's not hold them back and say, in my day, that's just old fashioned talking. Right, it's okay, there's a reason. We all evolve. We're not out there chiseling away a wheel for our wagon anymore. We have rubber wheels and tires and different stuff. Right, things evolve, they get better, they get easier. Let's not hold them back.
Speaker 3:Let's say embrace new technology to make the job easier and that way they can get more done in the same amount of time than making them go the slow way of doing it. But at the same time let's reverse that and say, okay, great, you're really great at technology. You work with Bob over there and help him understand and learn that technology and be there when he gets stuck and has questions and isn't sure how to make this easier even for himself. We don't have to hold on to that old fashioned thinking of in my day. So I get 100% what you're saying the older people generation they are hard workers and no shame to anybody at any age during any of this conversation. I try to be very impartial both ways for this and the seniors are Like in my day I worked really hard blood, sweat and tears. I worked 60 hours a week and stuff. But, like I said, evolution takes place. Let's try to do more and better in the short amount of time so we can do more.
Speaker 2:Overall, I, I totally agree, and it's funny because, as you say, that my and it's this thing that comes on Alexa and it says in my day I wore blood, sweat and tears. He was trying to work. It was actually an alarm clock that was trying to work on my grandson and I was like, oh my God, this is really but exactly what you just said in my day. But no, I have nothing against it. That's what collaboration comes in. We learn from our younger generation as far as what we can do, and I am all about working smarter, not harder. But thank you, thanks for that. Thank you for the explanation. So let me ask you another question. So how does a certification program help improve communication and collaboration between different generations in the workplace? And I think we already touched on some of that already.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it teaches practical strategies like active listening and conflict resolution, instead of being bitter and resentful towards the way something was said and then was misunderstood Because often that happens a lot between different generations. So it bridges those generational gaps and improves teamwork. It creates a more productive and respectful workplace is basically what the end result should be.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Teamwork is hey, that's exactly what we and that's what we get in corporate teamwork Me going over to Rio to train our team in Rio and they coming over here to the US to train us about our processes. That's what it's all about, teamwork. No matter how old you are.
Speaker 3:That's why a lot of companies these days are getting people together and doing team exercises. Whether it's getting a lot of that is just getting people in the same space, whether it's online or whether it's in a bowling alley or in an escape room right, it's getting them to not only just work together but also get to know each other a little bit better, and that's really what it's about is just learning about each other's ways and how. Oh, you know what? I learned something about Susie tonight. She's got three kids at home and she's got a senior mom and she's trying to take care of herself that sandwich generation, right? Some people only see what they see at work, right, they don't see the full picture, and so when that teamwork comes into it, they start to get to know each other a little bit more and can be a little more empathetic towards the whole picture, not just the project at hand.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, because the judgmental comes into play and you don't know what that person's going through until you talk to them. So no, I totally agree, and that's really great. That's why it doesn't matter. I have grandkids. My daughters, I learned a lot from them. I'm not saying I know everything. My daughters, I learned a lot from them. I'm not saying I know everything. Look, I learn something new every day, no matter how old I am, and it's good to have that knowledge.
Speaker 3:I mean you've got a granddaughter. You can learn TikTok from.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, yeah, I'm learning stuff from her, and they're so smart. That's the thing about it. This new generation is so smart, starting from four years old, which is one of my granddaughters, to 19 years old, which is my oldest grandson, and I learned a lot from them, you know. That's why I say communication is the key. You have to communicate with each other to be able to learn from each other. So let me ask you this next question here. So what industries or type of businesses would benefit the most from earning the Senior Success Advocate certification the most?
Speaker 3:from Ernie, the senior success advocate, certification. When I talk to people, their first thoughts are like oh, this is senior related, so it's got to be senior businesses. And that's exactly the opposite way of thinking about this, because I was talking to a human resource business owner and she said I don't have any senior business. She says none of the companies I work with are senior related, and I said no, it doesn't have any senior business. She says none of the companies I work with are senior related and I said no, it doesn't have to be senior related.
Speaker 3:Think of it this way there's two folds to this picture. If you have anybody over the age of 50 working in your workforce, we want those lines of communication being open. So that would be things like healthcare, home care, which are senior related, but also manufacturing, retail and professional services, hotels, insurance agents, retail stores you name it right. And part of that issue is the fact that seniors are having to work longer than they have ever had to, and because we've got so much stuff that's so expensive right now that 65 age mark, 67, I think it is at now 67 and a half before you can get full retirement different stuff like that benchmark gets pushed back. So any company that has any seniors on their staff at all can benefit from the certification and badge.
Speaker 3:Right On the other side of that, we want seniors being aware of this badge on businesses' websites, and so when they look at a website and they don't see a badge showing the senior success advocate badge, is that company advocates for seniors. Are they empathetic towards the way seniors think when I call? Am I going to get somebody who is compassionate if I get confused and ask a bunch of questions? Are they selling products that are inclusive of how seniors would use them? Different things like that, right? So it's twofold. It's companies that carry senior products or deal with seniors in any way. By the way, hint, that's any company out there, right? And then companies that hire seniors as well. So it's very twofold on that. And then companies that hire seniors as well.
Speaker 1:So it's very twofold on that.
Speaker 2:That's very interesting and that's great, especially with the senior. And tell me about the badge again. How do you get the badge?
Speaker 3:So when you sign up and for small and medium businesses under 1,000 employees, it's $1,200 a year. It's uber cheap. That's our introductory price, since we just started this project, right, they sign up and they take a course, they go through some videos, they answer questions showing their knowledge about it. That's the initial step. That certifies them and it gives them this badge to be able to put on their website, on their marketing products, on their social, showing the world we are senior, friendly.
Speaker 2:Okay, that's awesome.
Speaker 3:That's step one, and then step two, three, four, five down the road is going to be things like training your aging employees how to use the technology that you need them to use, and I'm not talking like, oh, we're going to teach them how to use Word or Facebook or Excel. We're talking things like A your software within your company, or modern things like Canva and AI and different stuff to really help your business grow. So, whatever it is the needs of yours. And then it's bringing in other people into the fold. We're going to have, like free webinars available by people that are part of it's not just me, part of Senior Success Advocate.
Speaker 3:We're going to have people coming in and doing different webinars about health, about money, about benefits. We're going to have benefit specialists on board that are able to help your HR team know what the best way to go about figuring out what the benefits are for the aging people. Are they going to go with government supply benefits? Are they going to go work 40 hours and get from your company? What are we going to do? Because most HR people only know what their company offers, right, they don't know Medicare and all that other stuff. So how do we involve all that into the picture as well, and then just doing different training things, different software, all different kinds of different things that the workforce would possibly need.
Speaker 2:That's awesome. That's awesome. I love it. So we're winding down here, but I want you we have two more questions I want to ask you here and tell us about your. So can you explain how the certification and directory listing work together to position a business as senior, friendly and inclusive and I think you talked about that a little bit already.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but we didn't talk about the hip senior. So the hip senior is my parent company and we have a directory at the hip seniorcom and businesses join the hip senior and they get their own page. It's like a little mini website, right? If you didn't have a website, you could send people to this page and you can include on that page anything about your business that you want to include. Them Get whatever messages you want.
Speaker 3:You could upload covers like you do on Facebook. Those can be big selling banners for your page, right. You can upload videos to help explain stuff or sell stuff. You can even create web pages within that listing to help sell products as well. And then there's different products so you can upload all kinds of stuff videos, articles, jobs for seniors that you're. If you're hiring, you can upload your own jobs in there and list those. I'm trying to get more businesses out there doing that because that's so important for seniors to be able to say what companies are inclusive, what companies can I go apply for that are going to help support me. So that's part of the Zenith's infancy. The directory has been around since 2020. There's all different kinds of categories and stuff, so you can be part of that $1,200 introductory cost includes that $500 directory listing. You can share those pages out with your social media. But we also have tons of seniors coming to the directory looking for different services wanting to be part of it. Good stuff like that.
Speaker 2:That's great and I think I believe I'm part of that right. I'm part of the director.
Speaker 3:Yes, I am Go on to thehipseercom and you click up in the right hand corner in the search and you type in Wanda, you will find Wanda's page.
Speaker 2:Yes, so make sure you do that and make sure you look at all the other businesses that's in there.
Speaker 3:We'll link that in the description as well.
Speaker 2:Okay, that sounds good, that sounds good, but thank you so much. I appreciate that Because, marianne, she's always helping me to make my business better and getting me out there, so I truly appreciate it. It's amazing how God just put us together from another group and how she became my editor and now I'm part of her group, I saved her from the devil. So let me ask you this last question and then you can tell about your future research. So what resources, tools or ongoing support do businesses receive after completing the Senior Success Advocate certification?
Speaker 3:Yeah, we pretty much covered that in those last couple of questions there. But just know that if you join Senior Success Advocate and we named it that because we wanted businesses to understand that everybody can be an advocate of seniors it's not just me being out there promoting this in the world as an HR rep. Every time you support a senior, every time your team members support a senior, no matter what the situation is, they become advocates. Right? We're bringing talent into the program, such as our dementia specialists. Even so, imagine you've got an employee that's just been diagnosed with Alzheimer's and you're like this person's not going to be around much longer. They need to be working. They still need to be bringing in an income, they still need to be valued, they still need their neurons firing and their brain functioning and engaging in things to keep them active, to slow down that process. So our messaging there for that type of thing is don't let someone go just because they've gotten a hard diagnosis of something. Encourage them and do that.
Speaker 3:Most HR reps are going to be like I have no clue about dementia, I don't know how to support this employee. Okay, that's HR reps are going to be like I have no clue about dementia. I don't know how to support this employee. Okay, that's when you're going to bring us in and we have those extra programs. Now they are going to cost more because we're bringing in specialists to work with you, right, but how am I going to help support that employee? And are we going to keep them in the office, engaged around people?
Speaker 3:What if it becomes a danger where they can't drive to work every day or they don't have a ride? Okay, are we going to transition them to work at home? Are they going to be remote? And then what kind of surroundings are we going to put with that person? Or what kind of consultations are we going to have to where we say, okay, we're going to put this into their workspace to keep them safe, whether it's a new layout of their workspace, is it daily reminders? How do we engage? What level of knowledge are we comfortable? Letting their coworkers know about the situation so they can help support them as well, and training them to help support this worker as well? So the certification is just literally the ground level, part of being part of a bigger initiative for seniors and other generations in the workforce, and then we're going to be building on that to make sure that we're helping support the younger generation, the sandwich generation, the older generation, and making sure that everybody is bringing their best to the table.
Speaker 2:I love that. I love it because when I did retire from IBM, I retired young, but I went to visit my father who was a regional sales manager of a company. But he stopped working and then he got dementia and I really wish this program, we knew about your program before. But when you stop working, that's when your mind slows down and you don't do anything. Looking at him like that it really was very hurtful. But then I said, okay, I can't do this and retire and just sit in the chair and not do anything. You know me, marion, I am all out here. Um, they call me the networking queen. I keep myself busy. That's what keep your mind going, and you got to keep your mind going as far as just making sure that you're staying busy 100%.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:If you slow down, it's anything physically, mentally, emotionally If you slow down, your brain slows down. There's connection to that. Right, you got those neurons firing and you want to keep people engaged. It's like people are like oh, they're just, they're older and they don't have as bright of ideas, or they're not, or they've got opinions of their own and they're not saying a hundred percent of what we want them to say. We don't all have to be businesses that have minions that don't have any thought processes and any of the opinions of their own.
Speaker 3:I recently the reason this started was because two years ago I got laid off from a job from a company that I was working for Google five of us and then the rest of the team eventually got riffed and when I went to go get hired again, everybody was saying you're not going to be part of this culture. And I'm saying the team you're developing isn't even developed yet. It hasn't started. You don't haven't hired everybody. The team you're developing isn't even developed yet. It hasn't started. You haven't hired everybody. You're creating that culture. You're not letting it develop organically.
Speaker 3:And when that happened, I interviewed for jobs within that company. They hire for all the tech companies and I interviewed for all these different jobs and I got told the same messaging over and over. And I'm like I am 52 years old, I have crazy tech skills, I have all of this stuff. How am I not part of this culture? Ask my last manager. I got along with everybody, just fine.
Speaker 3:Yeah, they're imposing these different ideas and thought processes way too soon on people. They're creating this narrative that between 50 and 75, 85, whatever it is I know somebody who just quit working at 90 and she's brilliant and they're creating this so that these people are going to have a hard time finding jobs if this pattern keeps continuing. And they can't afford that. At 55 years old, you cannot get any form of subsidy from the United States government or a lot of other places and be able to sit at home and do nothing. It just doesn't work that way, and so they're creating this crisis of people not being able to afford to pay their bills. It has to stop, and if it means that I'm advocating for all that, then bring it on, because I'm ready for it. It has to stop.
Speaker 2:I love it and you said it all, Marianne. Thank you so much. So how can people get in touch with you to connect with you? Smoke signals.
Speaker 3:They can go to seniorsuccessadvocatecom and all my information is on the website.
Speaker 2:Yes, and we're going to have that in the home show notes as well as the website for contacting Marianne. But, marianne, thank you so much for being on this podcast, ready Set Collaborate podcast. Make sure you follow, share and let people know about this, because this information right here is so important. Especially, all of us have our families, our parents, our grandparents, and this is something that we all need to know, and she gave us a lot of tips and nuggets to really pay attention to Marianne. Thank you once again for being on the Ready Safe Collaborate podcast with Wanda Pearson.
Speaker 3:Thank you, wanda, and thank you for the opportunity to get the word out, because it is very important.
Speaker 2:Yes, absolutely, thank you. Thank you, happy holidays, you too.
Speaker 1:Thank you for tuning into this episode of Ready Set Collaborate. For more information about the host head to WDPearsonAssociatescom. And that's P-E-A-R-S-O-N. Want to connect. And that's P-E-A-R-S-O-N. Want to connect. Send an email to Wanda at WDPearsonAssociatescom and, as always, stay tuned for the next episode of Ready Set Collaborate.
