MARGINALIZATION

MARGINALIZATION

Another Way to Face the Inevitable

Unchangeable. Irrevocable. Unstoppable.

As a late-age professional, you will be marginalized. That is your fate. That is your destiny. Marginalization of the late-age departing professional is inevitable in our western business culture.

If you're coming down to your exit wire, you'll experience being treated as insignificant or peripheral. You'll gradually be relegated to unimportant or powerless positions within the group. And without question, you will have a strong emotional response.

Marginalization of the late-age professional has a myriad of causes. At the top of the chart is stymied professional advancement of others. This situation is absolutely zero-sum.

Your marginalization is needed to make room for the career advancement of the next tier. You're now being seen as an impediment. You're the plug holding them back. You've become a hindrance to their career progression and financial enhancement. You've gone from "us" to "them."

You can tell your marginalization is occurring when the listening of you shifts. There is a plummeting eagerness and receptivity to hearing what you have to say. People are somewhat dismissive, sometimes even a bit rude. Your voice has been moved to the nose-bleed section of the bleachers.

Get it straight - marginalization is inherent in our western, profit-driven, materialist business culture. Marginalization is the way it is. Businesses have an unquenchable thirst for talent. Talent that delivers the "greatest and the latest." That's not you anymore.

In today's world of rapid change, accelerating technological breakthroughs requires increased technical competencies, and the use of different languages to speak the changing contexts. Furthermore, distinct generational core values now exist. All interlocked with the "more is better" culture's DNA. As a result, you're now seen and therefore treated as obsolete.

Marginalization occurs both consciously and unconsciously. It leaks out into the entire business culture. Unfortunately, people are unaware of the changes in themselves when they participate in the marginalization of another. As a result, they become unsuspecting co-conspirators in marginalization.

The actions are clear, to alienate and disenfranchise you as a late-aged professional by sidelining you from the group's activities and decisions. As a result, you are left out of meaningful participation in the group's processes and outcomes—a devastating assault on the ego. You go from being valuable to valueless. Self-worth becomes worthless—a downward spiral.

Marginalization can and does impact your physical and psychological well-being. Who you have been for thirty to forty years is unacknowledged and unappreciated, and a deep sense of abandonment occurs. Disturbing emotions - anger, anxiety, fear, depression, self-blame, sadness, stress, and isolation occur. Being marginalized is painful and, many times, draining.

When these unsettling feelings dominate, when you feel excluded from the group, the reaction is often to disassociate as much as possible. Dissociation results from disenfranchisement. It's the common coping mechanism.

But unfortunately, disassociation can sometimes lead to deception, sabotage, undermining, and revenge in one form or another. Unhealthy and expensive to both yourself and the company.

Marginalization cannot be prevented. Late-age exiting executives, directors, and managers will have this happen. But you don't need to be at the effect of marginalization. It might be more opportunity than threat.

MARGINALIZATION – THE OPPORTUNITY

One aspect of our work is to develop and empower late-age professionals to undertake a larger purpose, a more courageous mission, and a difference-making objective. This moves them to a new frontier. This opens a new wedge of freedom. This has them stand on new ground.

The heightened purpose, daring mission, and impactful intended results allow their development as elders. An elder for these times, this reality, this culture, this world. An elder who can impact the future.

The elder coin has two sides. One side is purpose, mission, and difference-making intentions. On the other side, wisdom, piety, experience, compassion, and equanimity. That's how the elder coin is forged.

As an elder, you don't feel threatened, abandoned, or discarded as marginalization occurs. You'll stop grasping for who you used to be. Not feeling threatened, you'll be much easier to be around. You'll contribute rather than contract or cause confusion or conflict.

Look, you're going to get marginalized. It is inevitable. It's normal. It's inescapable. It's nobody's fault. You will become an anachronism. But being marginalized can be an enormous opportunity to create a new future for yourself and a new self for that future.

The Contemporary Elder Retreat www.requestingwisdom.com/retreat