The training gap threatening senior talent: businesses need experience, yet still invest less in developing those who have it

A company can say it values experience while leaving experienced people outside its learning plans. That contradiction becomes clear in the training data reported by the OECD: across the European Union, 35% of workers aged 55 to 64 participate in formal or non-formal job-related training, compared with 48% of those aged 35 to 54, looking at the previous twelve months. This is not a new survey conducted this week, but an indicator available in the organisation’s documentation. Its current significance is strategic: it raises the question of how businesses prepare to transform their operations when access to learning continues to vary with age.

The comparison does not, on its own, explain the causes of the gap or allow it to be attributed to a single business decision. Different working contexts and career histories require detailed examination. But it does challenge an overly comfortable assumption: asking everyone to adapt is not the same as giving everyone the means to do so. An organisation can introduce tools, change tasks and raise productivity expectations without examining who has the time, support and opportunities to learn. From FIFTIERS’ perspective, the problem begins when training is treated as a reward for particular profiles rather than as part of the infrastructure people need to perform work that is changing.

The age of the workforce and the age of the strategy

The OECD puts the employment rate for people aged 55 to 64 across its member countries at 64.6% in 2024, below the 80.1% recorded among those aged 25 to 54. Its Employment Outlook 2025 examines how to make the labour market work better for older workers, including retention, working conditions and learning. These figures do not turn every country into a single market or automatically describe the situation of an individual Spanish business. They provide context: discussing longer careers requires an examination of the conditions that make them sustainable, and updating skills belongs in that conversation alongside job quality.

Within a particular organisation, a useful review could start with straightforward questions that are asked surprisingly rarely. Who receives invitations to train, which departments can release working hours, what are the entry requirements and how is learning evaluated? If a course is available only outside working hours, participation may depend on family responsibilities the programme has not considered. If selection rests on a vague idea of “potential”, it is worth examining how that term is defined and who is excluded. Identifying a barrier does not require assuming bad intentions. It requires observing how the opportunity is actually designed and whether its results match the stated objectives.

Artificial intelligence makes learning in context more important

The introduction of artificial intelligence into work processes makes that review particularly relevant, although the OECD indicator cited here does not measure AI training alone. In FIFTIERS’ editorial analysis, an effective programme should connect tools with recognisable tasks: preparing a proposal, checking information, reviewing a procedure or improving customer service. Teaching a sequence of functions without context can leave participants without criteria for deciding when to use them and when to distrust their output. Professional experience can supply precisely that context, helping people identify plausible errors, practical consequences and quality requirements that a technical demonstration does not always make visible.

This does not mean that age guarantees sound technological judgement, any more than youth guarantees mastery of a tool. A serious learning strategy should start with the skills and requirements of each role rather than replacing assessment with a generational label. Mixed-age teams can provide valuable opportunities to share knowledge when organised around clear goals and responsibilities. Making a younger employee the office’s informal IT support is not a training programme; asking a senior colleague to transfer experience without recognising the work involved does not solve the problem either. Learning together requires design, time and an explicit expectation of reciprocity.

A longevity policy is tested in everyday decisions

The productive-ageing approach outlined by the US National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health places work adaptation within a perspective that can benefit people of different ages. For a business, this can mean reviewing learning, organisation and job conditions together, rather than expecting all adaptation to fall on the worker. Offering a course is insufficient if the subsequent process prevents people from applying what they learned, or if every initial error is treated as evidence of permanent inability. FIFTIERS sees training as a journey: identifying needs, supported practice, workplace application and evaluation of improvements, with genuine opportunities to correct mistakes and try again.

The gap in the data ultimately raises a question of business consistency. If an organisation needs to retain knowledge and navigate technological change, excluding some of the people who understand the business from opportunities to update their skills may undermine both objectives. The first step need not be a major campaign on generational diversity: it could be measuring participation, listening to those who lack access and removing specific barriers. Longer working lives are built through ordinary decisions, from allocating a course place to recognising time for practice. Valuing experience means allowing it to continue developing; otherwise, a business risks admiring a resource it is itself failing to nurture.

Sources: OECD, Ageing and employment; OECD Employment Outlook 2025, chapter on older workers; NIOSH, Productive Aging and Work. The management proposals are FIFTIERS editorial analysis. This article was prepared with artificial intelligence assistance. The image is an AI-generated conceptual illustration and does not identify a real company or training session.