A group of DCI employees enjoy a shaved ice truck during a kickoff event for the company’s rebranding. The fintech is looking for ways to retain workers, including offering a part-time program for retirees.

Collaboration was a core tenet of DCI’s founding more than 60 years ago, when four banks in Hutchinson, Kansas, came together to build a core processor for institutions of all sizes.

Those ideals remain important today. DCI has created a loyalty program for employees who want to reduce their working hours but not retire completely.

The birth of the company’s part-time retiree program came in early 2022, after a conversation between Janet Seiler, then head of development for DCI, and her manager Sandra Schmitt initially led to the prospect of helping employees to make your way in the world of work. next stage of their life. Seiler was close to retirement age but was interested in staying with the company in some capacity.

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“Through many discussions, [Seiler and Schmitt] talked about hearing from friends and former retirees that they were enjoying retirement but feeling a sense of boredom. … That’s what drove them [boss] toss out the idea to see if a part-time arrangement might be possible,” said Katie Albers, vice president of human resources for DCI.

To determine whether an employee is eligible to remain on part-time, they must first meet program-specific criteria. This starts with making sure the opportunity is mutually beneficial for both the DCI and the individual. This includes a discussion of the employee’s interest in the arrangement and determining whether there is a business need that could be addressed with the person only partially retiring.

After initial discussions, both parties work together to build an appropriate plan for what the reduced workload will look like, help train the employee’s successor, and set a potential target date to leave the company completely. Seiler, who was the first employee to take advantage of the program, ended up working for two more years after her original retirement date and resigned earlier this year.

“This first use case was so successful that employees nearing retirement age began asking about the possibility of a similar arrangement,” Albers said. “Although it is not suitable for all cases and scenarios, it is a great option to explore and use when the conditions are right.”

Overall, four staff members participated in the part-time retiree program.

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Employee retention and succession planning are two big issues the financial services industry has grappled with in recent years. Top executives who delayed their planned retirements due to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 resigned in a wave of departures, creating a shortage of experienced talent.

More recently, institutions such as Zions Bancorp in Salt Lake City, Toronto-based TD Bank Group, Navy Federal Credit Union in Vienna, Virginia, and JPMorgan Chase have appointed new heads or have begun to grapple with the question of who to appoint to positions senior managers.

Allowing the partial retirement of veteran workers can help facilitate these transitions within an organization and preserve important institutional knowledge so that it can be passed on to the next generation of workers.

And it’s an issue that companies will likely have to address in the coming years as baby boomers outline their retirement plans.

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According to the Pew Research Center, about 62 percent of older employees, those who are 65 or older, work full time, up from 47 percent in 1987. Last year, the nonprofit analyzed the data on earnings, hours, and employment characteristics from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey, as well as findings on employment, retirement, and gig participation from the Federal Reserve’s 2022 Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking to better understand the current situation. role of the 65 and older workforce in the United States

Factors such as higher levels of education, better healthcare standards, and advanced pension plans have allowed older Americans to remain in the workforce. Wages have also risen, averaging $22 an hour in 2022, nearly double the $13 an hour rate in 1987.

The combination of these market conditions led older workers to account for 7 percent of all wages and salaries last year, more than triple the 2 percent share in 1987.

But beyond the financial and employment benefits offered to both employers and employees, experts say retirement experiences are individual to each person, and programs like the one offered by DCI can help dispel negative stereotypes against workers older.

“Semantic memory, that is [storing and recollection of] facts and information, it’s something we know is well retained into old age,” said Dr. Laura Richmond, a psychology professor at Stony Brook University in New York. “As you might imagine, it’s not uncommon for older workers to serve as mentors or leaders in their field and help hire new workers, help get [them] integrated and provide guidance on how to think about solving complex problems in the workplace.”

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Richmond, who specializes in research into everyday cognition, said older members of the workforce, by virtue of time spent in their respective fields, presumably have more skills than others.

Programs like these that help use a knowledge base about aging to support ongoing projects and train successors “speak against some of the typical ageist attitudes that we might see pervading the workplace and I think Western culture as a whole” , Richmond said.

Hiring employees with diverse skills and knowledge remains a key focus for many organizations in the financial services industry, prompting leaders to develop programs like mentorship, employee resource groups and more in hopes of attracting and retaining talent. The part-time retiree program is just one example of concerted efforts to strengthen staffing.

“Even after they’re gone, how many companies can say they stay in touch with their retirees at the level that we do… It’s the relationships we’re building with those people as they work here and within our four walls” , Albers said. “Let’s be a family.”

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DCI has taken other steps to help ensure smooth transitions as staff members consider retirement. Earlier this year, Fintech surveyed all 307 employees to gauge interest in taking on a management or leadership role, as well as what the ideal timeline for such a change would be.

They found that by allowing employees to express those goals without the need for an in-person interview, more staff members than expected were interested in leadership positions.

These opportunities are not exclusive to early-career professionals, as many experienced employees are also eager for advancement.

“It was really cool to see [those responses] and then be able to start sifting through responses to match interested employees with current experiences “to make them better suited and ready for when that opportunity comes knocking on the door,” Albers said.

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