Successful Aging at Work: Empirical and Methodological Advancements

Abstract

The workforce is aging in most developed and many developing countries, and there is a need to further extend and improve older employees’ working lives. Organizational scientists and practitioners, therefore, have become more and more interested in the topic of successful aging at work. Over the past few years, scholars have introduced theoretical frameworks that help distinguish successful from unsuccessful aging at work and that explain how workers can age successfully at work. To move research in this area forward, this special issue focuses on rigorous empirical contributions and methodological advancements. After introducing the topic and its theoretical background, we summarize the 6 empirical studies included in this special issue. A remarkable feature of this collection of articles is the diversity of topics related to successful aging at work addressed (e.g., motives, emotion regulation, action strategies, performance, and human resource practices) and research designs used (e.g., experimental vignette methodology, experience sampling, randomized controlled interventions, and mixed-method designs). We conclude this guest editorial by outlining implications for future research and organizational practice.