Older Academics and Career Management: An Interdisciplinary Discussion (Report‪)‬

INTRODUCTION The ageing academic workforce is one of the many challenges facing Australian universities. Over 40% of all Australian academics are aged 50 and over (Department of Education, Employment & Workplace Relations (DEEWR), 2008b), signalling that a large proportion of academics will exit the workforce with in the next decade. This is a critical trigger for univer-sity management to be responsive and proactive, and raises crucial sustainability issues for Australian universities in relation to human resource management (HRM), knowledge management and the role of the university within advanced modern societies. In a global, dynamic and competitive environment, universities cannot afford to ignore any of their human resources. This paper considers Australia's ageing academic workforce and the HRM challenges and implications this poses for Australian universities through an interdisciplinary discussion of the literature from three key areas: higher education, psychology and career and establishes that there is a paucity of research in the older academics/career management area, despite the demographics pointing to an ageing phenomenon.