Executive Summary

For many women, the combination of newly empty nests, extensive professional experience, and financial freedom make their 50s the perfect time to reinvest in their careers. The author offers 4 questions to ask that can help anyone rethink and achieve their professional goals. First, consider what your career would look like if nothing was in your way. Next, think about what assumptions youre making about yourself and who you could become. Third, conduct a relationship audit to better understand your own support network. Finally, figure out what you need to learn to get from where you are to where you want to be.

As an executive coach for a number of female leadership development programs, I work with purpose-driven women in every industry to identify their strengths and growth areas.While Ive helped women of all ages, Ive found that for many women in their 50s, the combination of newly empty nests, extensive professional experience, and financial freedom make it the perfect time to time to finally accelerate their careers.

But thats often easier said than done. As a 50-something woman, what can you do today to reenergize your career and make the most of your remaining professional years?Here are four questions that Ive found can help anyone rethink and achieve their professional goals:

Your 50s are the time to invest in the second half of your life. Find a quiet, reflective moment to ask yourself:

Some of my clients dream about advancing into more senior leadership positions, some envisionjob craftinga new, more fulfilling role for themselves, while others have considered leaving their organizations entirely to become entrepreneurs or focus on personal projects.

For example, Isabelle*, a senior technical lead in a regional office, enjoyed an impressive career with several published books and key industry reference pieces. At 52, she had just sent her son off to college, and she came to coaching for advice on how to make the most of her next 10 years.She recognized thatshe had more time, energy, focus and freedom to reinvest in [her] work life, and she wanted to push herself out of her narrow technical comfort zone and focus on leading others.

With her son out of the house, she was no longer limited to local opportunities, so shestarted applying for jobs globally. In less than six months, Isabelle landed a leadership position in another country.

Another client, Florence, was a senior manager in a multinational organization who came to coaching to talk about a troubling trend shed been experiencing: less competent, less experienced men kept moving past her into leadership positions for which she felt more than qualified.She was deeply committed to her organization and believed that by taking up a leadership position, she would be better poised to affect change both directly and by influencing others.She began actively promoting herself and applying for leadership positions within her organization, andafter 14 months, she was asked to lead a major department.

Many women get stuck in some version of theauthenticity trap: They hold on to too-rigid definitions of a singular self that dont permit them to engage with and develop other potential identities (e.g., a leader) or skills (e.g., networking).

For example, Isabelle never allowed herself to ask for help, feeling that it would run counter to her core values of independence, autonomy, and strength. Florence prided herself in being someone who put her head down and got the work done, not someone who sought the spotlight.By interrogating these limiting beliefs and exploring how they created unnecessary professional roadblocks, each woman was able to expand her identity and enrich her skillset.

Isabelle started to appreciate asking for help as an important component of good leadership, rather than an indication of a lack of independence. Instead of attempting to find a new job entirely on her own, she reached out to her boss, who turned out to be a supportive ally and actually introduced Isabelle to the hiring manager at her new organization.

Similarly, when Florence reframed her negative assumptions about self-promotion, she was able to find ways to promote herself that aligned with both her goals of increased visibility within the company and her values of humility. After becoming more open to being in the spotlight, she enlisted her bosss support to present her teams work at a senior management retreat, joined a high-level working group, and presented her research at an international conference.

At first, neither Isabelle nor Florence leveraged their networks to further their ambitions, so I urged them both to conduct a relationship audit. The process is simple: Open a Word or Excel file (or grab a pen and paper), and write down as many names as you can for each category:

After completing this audit, Florence reached out to colleagues who helped her identify new opportunities and connect with key decision-makers. Similarly, this exercise helped Isabelle leverage existing relationships to connect with important people both inside and outside her organization, ultimately leading to her new role.

The exercise was valuable not only because it helped both women to identify useful contacts, but also because it allowed them see how they themselves routinely supported others in their organizations. This enabled them to reframe networking as a shared, reciprocal activity rather than a purely transactional pursuit, making them feel more comfortable and confident with the process.

Good leaders are constantly learning. What skills, information, or self-knowledge do you need to get to where you want to be?

For example, both Isabelle and Florence found that they had toupskillin order to meet their late-career goals.Updating CVs, preparing bios and LinkedIn profiles, and engaging on social media were all skills they needed to refine and/or learn from scratch. Not only did they gain valuable technical skills through this process, but the exercise also helped both women refamiliarize themselves with their professional accomplishments, building confidence and improving their ability to self-promote.

While Ive focused on helping women who are looking to ramp up their careers in their 50s, this advice can apply to anyone. If you are a few decades into your career and looking to accelerate, think about what you want to be, do, and feel; recognize the beliefs and assumptions that might be standing in your way; and identify what new knowledge or skills will help you reach your goal. And when you inventory your supporters, dont forget to include yourself. You are your own strongest ally so move forward boldly, and with no regrets.

*Names have been changed to protect privacy.

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4 Questions to Help Women Navigate the Second Half of Their Careers - Harvard Business Review

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Joanna Orban

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Debs Brereton got her first soccer ball when she was two-years-old. Since then, its never left her feet. In Breretons native England, soccer very much was, and still is, a mans world. After playing soccer on all-male leagues for most of her life, Brereton started playing with a female league, oftentimes with girls that were older than her.

Eventually, her path led her to the United States and Northeastern State University. While there, Brereton was the most valuable player in 2003 and she still holds the record for the fastest goal.

After her time at Northeastern State, she played her 2004 season at Middle Tennessee State University, where she would later coach as a graduate assistant.

After her collegiate soccer career, Brereton played in the Premier Soccer League from 2006-10. She played for teams such as the Nashville Lady Blues, Hampton Road Piranhas and the San Diego Sunwaves. Eventually, however, she turned her attention to coaching.

Brereton loves coaching because it allows her to keep playing the game she loves but she also loves being able to interact with and help her players grow.

I get to serve people. I get to bring awesome people into the program and help those people develop into strong women and see those people graduate, Brereton said. It gives me an opportunity to teach them about life through the vehicle of soccer.

While serving as an associate coach at Ohio State University, Brereton was contacted by the Idaho State University Athletic Director Pauline Thiros and asked to come tour campus.

Once I arrived in Pocatello it was the end of the story. I love this place. I want to be a part of this family, Brereton said. The Bengal community is very unique, Ive never experienced anything like it.

Breretons second season at ISU is significantly different from her first. With the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the season has been pushed back until spring. According to Brereton, her players are disappointed with the season being pushed back.

Its just trying to make sure we stay in a positive mind frame, said Brereton.

Although the season has been pushed back, Brereton can see how it has been a blessing in disguise for the program.

The team that would have come out as Bengals in August to play our first game is not going to be the same team that will take the field in early of next year, Brereton said.

Due to the season being canceled, the team and the staff has had the opportunity to really integrate the new freshman players, as well as refine the way they want to play.

Another challenge the team is facing is a new practice space. Davis Field is currently under renovation which means the soccer team is sharing the Idaho Central Credit Union practice field with the football team. The practice field is made of turf, also known as artificial grass.

According to Brereton, the soccer ball moves faster on turf than it does on real grass, which has helped the girls improve their reaction times.

Even the surface were playing on is making us better on a daily basis, said Brereton.

Davis Field will be ready by the time the team starts their season, and the players wont have to worry about turf burn anymore.

Prior to the university shutting down in March, both Brereton and her team had another opportunity.

The ISU Theatre Department was working on a production of The Wolves, a play about a high school soccer team with an all-female cast.

The director of the play, Vanessa Ballam, reached out to Brereton and asked for her help in helping the actors learn more about soccer.

We would meet up once or twice a week where my players would take the cast through a warm-up and some basic soccer skills and teach them the basics, Brereton said. Its such a cool collaboration.

The Wolves opens September 18.

Breretons staff is made completely of women which is a different environment than the one she grew up with in England.

The incoming players and the returning players are surrounded by very strong, assertive females. Its unusual to have that at a Division 1 level, said Brereton. I feel as if the players live and see and breathe these mentors. They know on a daily basis what its like to see assertive, strong women in front of them. Its a womans job to empower other women and to help them get better. I feel like myself and my staff takes that very seriously. Its no longer a mans world.

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A Conversation With the ISU Soccer Coach - ISU Bengal Online

Dallas Wings assistant coach and former WNBA player Crystal Robinson is a basketball stateswoman who has been around the league for practically its entire existence.

Robinson was born in Oklahoma and played basketball for Southeastern Oklahoma State University. She was Southeasterns first three-time female All-America and holds many of the schools basketball records. The Oklahoman wrote in 1999 that Robinson is considered by most to be the best basketball player to ever come out of Oklahoma.

In 1996, Robinson was drafted by the Colorado Explosion in the now-defunct American Basketball League (ABL) and promptly won Rookie of the Year and named an All-Star. However, the ABL folded in 1998 and Robinson entered the 1999 WNBA Draft.

The New York Liberty selected Robinson sixth overall in the 1999 Draft and she became an important part of the mini Liberty dynasty. The Liberty made the playoffs every season from 1999-2002 and went to the Finals three times during that period. Robinson played around All-Stars Teresa Weatherspoon, Becky Hammon, Sue Wicks, and Tari Phillips.

Robinson averaged 10.2 PPG, 2.7 RPG, 2 APG, and 1.1 SPG over 30.1 MPG during her eight-year WNBA career. She led the WNBA in three-pointers during the 1999 season while finishing in the top 5 every season from 2001-2003. Robinson is currently 19th all-time in three-pointers made.

After six years with the Liberty, Robinson briefly spent some time with the Washington Mystics before retiring. When Robinson retired, she became an assistant coach for the Mystics.

Robinson told Sports Are From Venus in a media availability about her decision to become a coach after her playing career.

I never wanted to be anything other than a coach, as a kid. I am very fortunate, very few people can say hey I want to be this when they are seven years old and end up actually being that. I got to do something that I wanted to do forever so thats how I ended up in coaching. I retired at 34 and started coaching early because I knew I wanted to coach one day.

After spending the 2007-2008 season as an assistant coach for the Mystics, Robinson coached girls basketball at McAlester High School in Oklahoma. From 2010-2013, Robinson was head coach of the girls basketball team at Murray State College. Robinson spent the 2013-14 season as an assistant coach for Utah State and the 2014-2015 season with the TCU Horned Frogs.

Robinson spent the 2015-2016 coaching HS basketball in Atoka, Oklahoma, where she grew up. After almost a decade of coaching college and high school, Robinson joined the Seattle Storm in 2018 an assistant coach.

As an assistant coach with the Storm in 2018, Robinson won her first WNBA Finals. After making the Finals three times as a player, she won her first championship 19 years after making her WNBA debut.

Robinson then joined the Dallas Wings coaching staff under head coach Brian Agler in 2019. When Robinson was first hired, Coach Agler said Crystal knows the game and she knows how to transfer her knowledge of the game to the players. She understands the intangibles that make great players and great teams. She also has a great work ethic and Im excited to add her to the staff.

Robinson joined a Wings team that was in the midst of a rebuild. The Wings had just drafted MVP candidate Arike Ogunbowale and added another young piece in Satou Sabally a year later. The Wings are one of the youngest teams in WNBA history, and if anyone can help develop the Wings roster into contention, it is the former player Robinson.

Arike Ogunbowale told Sports Are From Venus about Robinons impact on the Wings.

She helps everybody with everything. She is a great shooting coach, a great basketball coach. She has a great basketball mind. Shes been in our position. Shes played in the WNBA for years, been in WNBA championships, like done all that. She knows basketball, been overseas, so we can relate to her really really well. She loves us, she supports us with everything, always has our back. As I said, shes one of the smartest basketball minds Ive known and shes hilarious, she really helps the team a lot, just her energy and everything she brings to life. We wouldnt have as much fun if Crystal wasnt on the coaching staff.

Fellow Wings coaching staff member Bryce Agler, son of head coach Brian Agler, highlighted what Crystal brings to Dallas with her playing experience.

She is one of those people that gets along with everybody. She does a really good job of creating a relationship with the players. She knows what theyre going through, shes been there, shes been through the league, shes one of the top players in the league when she was playing. She can relate to both sides, them and us, as coaches, and I think its a good happy medium. What she brings to our team, our staff is invaluable. You cant put a price on it just because she understands these players are young. Sometimes we take for granted when we tell them to do something, they need to be shown how to do things. She understands that because she was at that point at one time, so that helps a lot. She is also a great person as well, on top of that.

Brian and Bryce Agler, as well as Arike, all mention how Robinsons experience playing in the WNBA helps the Wings roster. Everything that Robinson has learned, all of that basketball knowledge she has accumulated over the last 25 years is available and transferable to the team. Robinson understands what the players are experiencing in ways that the other coaches who did not play WNBA in the league do not.

Robinson was around the WNBA at its youngest, and now after the league has been around for 23 seasons, Robinson has seen it all. Robinson told Sports Are From Venus how the WNBA has changed since she played in the league.

Its really funny, me and Tamika Catchings just had this conversation this morning by the pool. I think that the talent level in the WNBA has gotten extremely better than the talent level when we played. Theres definitely an evolution of players in this league. I think that our generation was much tougher. We did things a little bit differently, that was in the era of hard fouls and a lot of hustle. Now, I think the more skilled players get the more the game starts changing and evolving. There are so many things that we did in our era that still make this game. I think you see the top teams have the necessary grit and toughness that it takes to win high at this level and those are some things that we have to adapt those things to our style and our culture and learn to understand how much they help you out.

A former pro athlete calling the current generation of players soft? Never heard that before!

With Coach Robinson on staff, the Wings have surprised the WNBA as they are in a great position to earn the 8th seed and final playoff spot. Sitting at 7-12, the rebuilding Wings are setting themselves up for a fruitful future, one that Coach Robinson will help mold into success.

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Former WNBA Player Crystal Robinson Always Wanted To Be A Coach - Sep 8, 2020 - Sports Are From Venus

Chris Boucher looked very well-prepared for his second window of opportunity in the series.

While hed been only a whisper in the Toronto Raptors rotation plans through the first four games against the Boston Celtics, head coach Nick Nurse was looking for a spark with his team in an early hole. Boucher got the call in a hybrid starter-bench unit that had played two possessions together all year and zero so far in the postseason. Boucher is not young by prospect standards, but he remains fairly inexperienced in high-leverage situations. With his first run in several games and unfamiliar linemates plus a shift to power forward, away from his more natural centre position he would have been forgiven for taking a few possessions to find his footing.

Instead, Boucher looked like the readiest Raptor on the floor. Stationed in the short corner along the baseline, Boucher read the Celtics plan early, yelling and pointing for teammates that...

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How the Raptors 'scout team' is adjusting to life inside the NBA's bubble - The Athletic

The pause in appraisal and revalidation during the covid pandemic offers an opportunity to reflect on their value and consider their future argue Victoria Tzortziou Brown and colleagues

The General Medical Council adopted a more flexible approach to regulation at the start of the covid-19 pandemic, with revalidation and appraisals largely suspended to allow doctors to focus on clinical safety and workload.1 With reinstatement planned, we argue for urgent clarification of their purpose, an evidence based approach for their implementation, and ongoing evaluation.

No consensus exists on the definition, mechanisms, and appropriate design of revalidation, and practices vary widely.2 Some countries have no formal process in place 3 while others rely heavily on evidence of continuing medical education.2

The GMC is the first regulator to implement a compulsory and comprehensive revalidation process4 and has over 335000 doctors on its register.5 According to the GMC, revalidation gives your patients confidence that youre up to date.6 A cost-benefit analysis in 2012 showed that, in England alone, revalidation would cost the NHS nearly 1bn over 10 years.7 The expected benefits included increased public trust and confidence in doctors, improved patient safety and quality of care, reduced costs of support for underperforming doctors, reduced malpractice and litigation costs, better information about care quality, and positive cultural change in the medical profession,8 but there is no evidence these have materialised.

Appraisal is the only route to revalidation and must contain supporting information under six defined categories: continuing professional development, quality improvement activity, significant events, feedback from patients and colleagues, and complaints and compliments.9 Most doctors (97%) revalidate through annual appraisals and a five yearly recommendation to the GMC from their responsible officer, based on the outputs from their appraisals.9

Disagreement remains about whether the mode

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Appraisal and revalidation for UK doctorstime to assess the evidence - The BMJ

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On Sept. 5, 2015, Braxton Miller made a play Buckeye Nation isn't soon to forget. Going against Virginia Tech in the season opener on Labor Day night, with the whole country watching, Miller, the two-time Big Ten GrieseBrees Quarterback of the Year, made his debut at H-Back in Urban Meyer's offense.

The story is well known by now. Miller suffered a shoulder injury just days before the start of the 2014 season and had to have surgery on the shoulder for the second time in eight months. Miller was sidelined for the year as he watched J.T. Barrett and Cardale Jones lead Ohio State to a national championship.

After returning for his fifth year with the Scarlet and Gray, Miller elected to move positions, becoming a wide receiver in one offseason. When he stepped on the field at Lane Stadium that night in 2015, Miller was just happy to be healthy and back playing.

Recently on FOX Sports' Ring Chronicles series, Miller and Meyer joined host Rob Stone and discussed that game and the spin move, which Bucknuts remembered on Labor Day 2020, that had the college football still hasn't forgotten.

"I think that was the first time I opened up and cried in front of a whole group of men like that," Miller told Stone. "Because, you know, I didn't know what to expect and I think the good Lord willing, I was praying the whole week ahead of time and having the guy that we're talking to tonight, the king of college coaching (Meyer), have him behind you and just telling you how good of a game you gonna have, I believed him but I've got to go out there and perform myself. And he gave me chance after chance after chance and every chance that I got I took advantage of. I don't know what it was, man. I think I was just so determined to showcase my talent. I think coach Meyer was too. He knew what was inside of me, man, because he is one of the greatest coaches."

Miller was relatively quiet leading into the third quarter, and with just over two minutes to play in the period, Eli Apple recovered a fumble, giving Ohio State the chance to build on its 21-17 lead.

It didn't take long for Miller to take advantage of this chance. The H-Back took the ball to his left and found a hole. The play might have been done after about 12 yards except that Miller had other ideas. He wanted to find the endzone. That's when he hit the spin move.

"I remember we were coming out the huddle," Miller began recounting the play. "It was an H-Back sweep but who knows what to expect, man. I was supposed to go to the C-gap and I went way out there to the Z-gap. So it's like, here we go. And I just turned it on, man. It was just like a moment in my life that slowed down for me and honestly I did see those two guys coming and something just told me to spin and that was honestly I think like the spirit that hopped inside of me and that's what it was. And if you remember, when I put my feet down, I'm looking like, woah, I ain't touched. So I just kept running. So I'm like, 'Wow, this is crazy.' Then having that whole game just in my hands. I'd scored a regular touchdown. I'd been doing that in practice, little league, it is what it is. But when somebody sees you do that at a different position, the whole world erupts."

Standing on the sideline, Meyer was overjoyed. After coaching players at the position like Percy Harvin and others, Miller was a unique athlete who he envisioned making plays such as this one. But Meyer also knew what Miller had overcome with the two shoulder surgeries and the position change and was happy to see him doing his thing on the field again.

"Well, to this day, the worst part of coaching to me is when a player gets hurt, the injury factor," Meyer told Stone. "And Braxton's like family, man. I love Braxton Miller. I always will. That's my guy. I used to yell '5' at him all the time and I love Braxton Miller. So I'm always that way. When I see a player do what he did, the selflessness, he changed positions, and to have him rewarded. You know, at the end of the day why do you coach? That's why I coach. That's why I was doing this for 33 years because of guys like that and to see that."

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For Buckeye Nation, that was a special moment and one fans will likely think of any time the 2015 Virginia Tech game is mentioned. For Miller, that game, that play meant a whole lot more.

"It was probably one of the best moments of my life, honestly," Miller said. "Because without that, I don't know if I would go as high as I did in the draft as a receiver/athlete. That was like an emotional game for me. So it was a blessing, I'm very thankful and I'm always grateful."

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Miller on the spin move: 'One of the best moments of my life' - 247Sports

Having previously travelled the world as a flight attendant and designed hats in Kerry, Niamh Stack has made Madrid her home with her family of seven.

Stack, originally from Killarney, studied banking and insurance at the Cork College of Commerce in the late 1980s, before taking up a job at the ill-fated PMPA insurance.

Cork was an amazing place to be in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Michael Jackson came there. So did Nirvana. There were great clubs and nightlife. It was a great vibe.

But Stack had itchy feet so she got a job with Ryanair in Dublin in 1992.

At the time they only had a few routes to the UK, and I worked in the office for a year. It was short, but it gave her an introduction into life in the skies.

When Virgin Atlantic Cityjet started operating a business-class flight between Dublin and London City airport, Stack was on the plane as an air stewardess. It was a fantastic service. People would get Champagne and hot towels before take-off. It was a different experience than it is now.

After two years she spread her wings and started working for BA in 1995, first out of Gatwick Airport, then out of Heathrow.

It was an incredible time to fly. I was doing long-haul routes, often going on seven to 10 day trips. Wed fly to Antigua and then lie on a beach for seven days, then fly home. It was just before mass tourism and low-cost flying changed aviation for ever.

Stack commuted at first, but moved to the UK in 1996, living in Guildford in Surrey. Its nice and leafy but has easy access to London for a night out. There were lots of Irish girls commuting, but I was happy to live in London during that time.

Stack says she worked mostly in business or first class and particularly enjoyed an occasion when Jude Law took over on-board service, much to the joy of travellers in coach. On another occasion, the late Princess Diana was travelling home from Antigua.

The upstairs of the 747s were often economy, while first class was up the front. She sat upstairs, and I was looking after her and the boys. Upon seeing her, paying guests in first class wanted to swap seats but she insisted upon staying. She didnt want the boys to think life was that simple. So after chatting to guests and having dinner, she settled them across the three economy seats and she lay on the floor below. She flew with us regularly. People just loved her.

Now, the princess and the BA Boeing 747 are gone.

Stack says she stopped flying when she was pregnant with her first child and had an emergency landing into Heathrow her second in total. Overhead lockers flew open and that sort of thing.

She moved back to Killarney in 2004 to look after her dad and have three more children all boys.

I really wanted to do something creative and founded Hy Brazil Creations designing hats and jewellery. I was very busy with all the horse-racing events taking place across Ireland designing huge hats. It was fabulous.

But in 2009 the family six decided to move to Spain. We always wanted the kids to have a second language, so we flew over there on a whim.

It was a bit crazy, to be honest. We ended up renting an apartment with no furniture in it. When we landed we had to go to the furniture store. But everything just fell into place. We just clicked with the place and fell in love with the lifestyle and the people.

The move was tough for the boys at first. The first six months in school were the hardest, but suddenly they got the language and now you wouldnt even tell they were Irish.

Stack got a job teaching English conversation at the Montealto School in Madrid in 2010, which she still continues. It piqued an interest in education, and in 2015 she went on to form life-coaching enterprise Think Communicate Lead, which helps increase success at school, at work and in personal life.

We help increase self-awareness, set and pursue meaningful goals and develop positive personal qualities such as self-esteem, a positive attitude, self-discipline and self-motivation.

I also had a fifth child in between a daughter, who is more Spanish than Irish.

Things were going well, until 2020 came along. My husband was working in Ireland, so when the lockdown occurred in March, I was alone with five children in an apartment, trying to work and home-school with bad internet.

It was pretty intense. Our only highlight each day was clapping at 8pm for the health workers on the balcony.

Stack and her family had to stay indoors for six weeks as Madrid was hit hard by Covid-19.

My two youngest didnt leave the apartment during that time. Id go shopping every two weeks and not touch certain shopping bags. Wed have to ration everything. Because there was no traffic, youd just hear all the sirens and see people getting stretchered out of buildings by people in hazmat suits. It was beyond belief. I was terrified Id get sick and no one could look after the kids.

Once lockdown ended things went back to normal, but Stack fears they arent out of the woods. I still havent bought the kids uniforms just in case they dont go back.

Stack, who is a director at her husbands company OpticalRooms, an optical testing company based in Ireland, says she is working on reducing digital exposure.

So many of us especially children are spending more time in front of screens for the purposes of home-schooling and entertainment so we offer tips on how to find better home working solutions.

Despite the pending winter of uncertainty, she and her family are happy in Spain. Even though we endured the worst of a pandemic, we still love it here, and have chosen to stay, despite the odds. Its just such a great place to live and we are prepared for whatever comes next.

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We wanted the kids to have a second language so we flew over on a whim - The Irish Times

The summit of Camelback Mountain rises some 2,700 feet above Arizonas Salt River Valley, accessible by a trailhead that attracts serious hikers and aspirational amateurs alike. The journey takes about an hour. The climbers range from pre-teens to AARP members. On mornings in the winter before the 2012 baseball season, the bottleneck included a 30-year-old man whom many in Major League Baseball never expected to see again. Oliver Prez scrambled across the mountains brown rocks and caked his sneakers in its red dirt.

By his side was his friend and trainer Rafael Arroyo. Atop the mountain, they gazed across the desert sprawl of suburban Phoenix. After enough trips, Prez started to talk, about mistakes he had made, about lessons he had learned. He needed to cleanse the venom and humiliation he had endured during his last few years as a failed starting pitcher with the New York Mets. The hikes almost became like therapy sessions, Arroyo...

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The second baseball life of Oliver Prez - The Athletic

A busy HR manager is reviewing stacks of applications for a position that just opened in the company. The HR manager knows that a host of factors determine employee performance: prior experience, training, interpersonal skills, personality, IQ, emotional intelligence, and work ethic. But after reviewing hundreds of resumes, as many HR managers do, the details on each applicant blur together. And so the HR manager does what many employers do: defaults to selecting hires based on the prestige and rank of the university from which graduates hail.

Presumably, better universities attract better students and provide better training, so it makes sense to use the university rank as a predictor of employee performance. This, after all, is why employers offer higher starting salaries to hires selected from prestigious schools. But is it a good hiring strategy? Do university rankings predict job performance? Our research suggests yes but only to a degree.

Why top-tiered college graduates perform (nominally) better than their peers

In a recent study, we tested the relationship between the university rank and performance of graduates. We tracked the performance of 28,339 students from 294 universities in 79 countries. The students came from 294 universities that ranked from Top 10 to about top 20,000 in the Webometrics global university rankings that rank over 30,000 universities worldwide. We observed the students performance for two months as they were working in global virtual teams on real-life business consulting projects for a number of corporate clients. Importantly, we captured not only the quality of the output, but a wide range of hard and soft competencies including cooperation with team members, leadership, language proficiency, technical skills, emotional intelligence, creativity, and more.

Our results offer some solace to the traditional recruiters. After controlling for age, gender, and the year of study, we found that graduates from higher-ranked universities performed better, but only nominally and only on some dimensions of performance. Specifically, the overall performance improved by only 1.9% for every 1,000 positions in the Webometrics global university rankings. When comparing the performance of candidates whose universities rank further apart a graduate from a top university versus a global average university the performance differential jumps to 19%.

The 19% difference in performance between the top and the average seems significant, but keep in mind that this is for graduates from universities that are 10,000 university ranking positions apart. At a given organization, candidates are likely to be selected from within a much narrower pool, perhaps from universities whose rankings differ by a couple of hundred positions. In this more realistic case, the predicted difference in performance would be closer to 1%.

We found several reasons why the graduates from the top universities performed somewhat better than those from the lower-ranked schools. The first was selection: higher-ranked universities usually can choose from a larger pool of applicants, which leads to steeper competition and a higher quality of the incoming class. Corroborating the selectivity hypothesis, our data demonstrated that students at higher-ranked universities indeed score higher on general cognitive ability tests, have more international experience, better English proficiency, and higher cultural intelligence. However, competitive selection suggests that these competencies may have been attained earlier in their education and, thus, is not a result of their university studies.

Second, higher-ranked universities should provide better training. Top universities employ better instructors, offer access to better-equipped facilities, attract better speakers and guests to campus, which in turn, should lead to better training and subsequent performance. Indeed, our data suggest that students at higher-ranked universities score higher on competencies that could be attributed to better training, such as superior technical and business writing skills, are more knowledgeable in subjects related to the business project, and score higher on team leadership and coordination.

Finally, while it might be expected that higher-ranked institutions might provide a more stimulating academic environment, we did not document that this had an effect on graduates work performance. Indeed, education is not only lectures and seminars. Having notable, hardworking, celebrity-status professors, along with being around intelligent, highly-motivated, achievement-oriented peers, positively affects self-efficacy, motivation, effort, and work ethic. However, our study revealed no difference in these performance-related attributes. Based on our data, the institutional environment did not seem to play a role in enhancing performance. Graduates from lower-ranked universities showed an equal level of motivation and work ethics, so this could be more affected by personality and other individual factors.

The downsides of superior academic pedigree

Despite their slightly better overall performance, hiring graduates from higher-ranked institutions could have a downside. Our data suggest that students from higher-ranked universities might damage team dynamics, sometimes inadvertently. We found that graduates from higher-ranked universities tend to excessively focus on the instrumental tasks, often at the expense of paying insufficient attention to interpersonal relationships. In some instances, graduates from top universities tend to be less friendly, are more prone to conflict, and are less likely to identify with their team.

Numerous studies have shown that interpersonal relationships at work play a critical role in employee motivation, job satisfaction, and, ultimately, performance and career success. As good interpersonal relationships are critical for organizational success, lacking collegiality and a propensity towards conflict could present adverse effects not only on personal performance, but also team and workgroup efficacy, possibly leading to an overall net loss.

Notably, graduates from high-ranking universities tend to share a common identity and could see themselves as different from their team members from a lower-ranking university, and this social categorization can lead to us-vs.-them dynamics. As a result, graduates from top universities could be perceived by their co-workers with less impressive academic pedigrees as arrogant and snobby, and because of that not liked by their peers. Our data did not confirm that this was the case. In fact, students from more prestigious universities tended to be more modest in their self-evaluations than some of their peers from lower-ranked institutions. However, we found that while students from higher-ranked universities generated more conflict, engaged in fewer non-instrumental conversations, and displayed less team commitment and identification with their teams.

So, whom should you hire?

While job candidates from more prestigious universities may slightly outperform their peers, data from Payscale and the U.S Department of Education show that these graduates are also more expensive to hire. For example, the average early career salaries of graduates from the top 10 colleges ($72,160) in the United States are 47% higher than those with degrees from the ten colleges within the City University New York (CUNY) school system ($48,960), many of which are ranked within the top 100. At the 6-year mark, that gap jumps to 108 percent.

Is the extra cost worth the investment? To answer this question, employers need to carefully consider the worth of the increase in performance for the firm. For some companies, the difference between a hypothetical graduate from an average vs. top university may be well worth the extra pay. Yet, for others, the added cost may not result in a positive return on investment and, thus, may not be justified. All in all, our results suggest that hiring graduates from higher-ranked universities would lead to a nominal improvement in performance. However, the university rank alone is a poor predictor of individual job performance. Employers can get a much better deal by hiring the right students from lower-ranked institutions, than anyone from better-ranked institutions. It would also be wise to use additional tests designed to evaluate the technical and interpersonal competencies needed for the job.

Considering the growing gap between skills acquired in college versus on-the-job readiness, any modest performance advantage stemming from the university rank might also be mitigated by on-the-job training. Since employers already invest significant resources into training new hires, such training may be a much better determinant of performance than the rank of the university from which the hire hails.

To a large extent, the answer would also depend on specific job demands. Does the job require a top performer from a higher-ranked university where even a 2% improvement in performance is critically important and offsets any pay differential? Or can the performance criteria be met by graduates from lesser-ranked universities? To make the most strategic decision, an HR manager should know the answer to this question before they look at an applicants college pedigree.

Contributors to this article include:Alexander Assouad, assistant professor of IB and Strategy at Belmont University; Alfredo Jimenez, associate professor at KEDGE Business School; Justin Kraemer, lecturer at Mae Fah Luang University; Anna Svirina, Dean of Engineering Economics and Entrepreneurship School at the Kazan National Research Technical University; Weng Si (Clara) Lei, program coordinator of Tourism Event Management and Assistant Professor at the Macao Institute for Tourism Studies.

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Graduates of Elite Universities Get Paid More. Do They Perform Better? - Harvard Business Review

Early retirement sounds like a great idea if you picture having ample cash to travel the world or hang out at the beach. But in reality, retiring before your mid-60s could cause a whole host of financial consequences that affect your ability to enjoy your later years to the fullest.

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If you don't work 35 years, your average wage will be lower due to the inclusion of years with no wages. And even if you manage to work 35 years, chances are good you'll be leaving the workforce when your salary is higher than at the beginning of your career. By quitting when your salary has peaked, you miss out on the chance to replace lower-earning early years in the calculation of your average wage.

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Early retirement sounds like a great idea if you picture having ample cash to travel the world or hang out at the beach. But in reality, retiring before your mid-60s could cause a whole host of financial consequences that affect your ability to enjoy your later years to the fullest.

In fact, here are three big reasons early retirement could end up being more hassle than it's worth.

It's stating the obvious, but the earlier you stop getting a paycheck, the sooner you must start relying on your investment accounts (and the sooner your balance starts to fall). Not only do you begin making withdrawals earlier when you retire younger, but you also lose some prime investing years when you're eligible for catch-up contributions and may be able to afford to make them.

More here:
Looking to retire early? The move has its drawbacks, here are 3 to consider. - USA TODAY