Cecily O'Connor
RedwoodAge.com

What would entice you to put off retirement? Your employer may be itching to know.

Concerned about an looming labor shortage and the loss of retired boomers' expertise, employers nationwide are eager to keep their valued older workers. And most have a narrow window of up to two years in which they may be able to convince workers to stay by offering them a menu of benefits and other incentives, according to a survey the Employee Benefit Research Institute.

“Although no single incentive is likely to motivate the majority of retirees... it appears that employers may be able to assemble a toolkit of alternatives that would be effective in retaining substantial numbers of workers,” according to the report. The study is based on input from 4,981 workers at aerospace and defense industry companies who retired in 2003 or later and are currently between age 55 and 65.

Employers would be wise to communicate with staff about their incentive plans as early as possible. That's because nearly two-thirds of retirees said these offers would have been a lot more effective if they had known about them in the two years before they'd voiced plans to leave the workforce.

Employee benefits typically play an important role in the retirement decision, and most of the retirees surveyed have benefits that are increasingly rare in the private sector: a defined benefit pension plan and retiree medical insurance.

The majority of retirees said they would have been open to an approach from their employer asking them to stay longer.

Different Strokes
The survey tested 19 retirement postponement incentives, and found that making workers feel important, offering pension benefits while working part time, and carving our seasonal work opportunities were among the most effective methods for delaying retirement.

• Half of retirees said they would want to feel "truly needed" for an assignment.

• Half with a traditional pension said receiving full pension benefits while working part time would have been effective.

• Thirty-eight percent said being able to work seasonally or on a contract basis would have encouraged them to postpone retirement.

Company-subsidized health benefits also would have been attractive to 46 percent of retirees, while the ability to do meaningful work and work part-time, respectively, struck a chord with 36 percent.

A pay raise would have convinced 33 percent of retirees to stay. About 28 percent of retirees said they would have surfed back into work if they could telecommute and avoid the daily commute.

Companies participating in the survey included;  BAE Systems, Ball Corp., Boeing, General Dynamics, Honeywell Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and Raytheon.