Your Next Avenue Podcast

In this episode of Your Next Avenue, host Richard Eisenberg talks with Carrie Hurwitz Williams and Jake Nice who offer insights and advice for midlife entrepreneurs about writing a winning business plan. They talk about: what a business plan is, why an entrepreneur needs one, what to include in a business plan and what to leave out, how long it takes to draft a business plan and how often to update it. 

In this episode of Your Next Avenue, host Richard Eisenberg is joined by Lola Rain (vice president of marketing for Embodied Labs) and Josh Bois (CEO of Global Capital Network) to discuss how midlife entrepreneurs can find and reach their target audience, use social media effectively and avoid making mistakes when advertising.

In this episode of the free, 20-minute Your Next Avenue podcast, Elizabeth White (a Next Avenue Influencer in Aging) offers smart, sometimes difficult, advice becoming both resilient and realistic if you’re out of work and over 50. The author of Fifty-Five, Unemployed, and Faking Normal: Your Guide to a Better Lifetalks with Next Avenue’s Work & Purpose channel editor Richard Eisenberg about "getting off your throne," resilience circles and the "new normal" of work.

George Schofield, a developmental psychologist, entrepreneur, career switcher, author of How Do I Get There From Here?, Next Avenue Influencer in Aging and adviser on career planning, retirement and life crafting after 50, talks with ‘Your Next Avenue’ host Richard Eisenberg about: what it means to live a “portfolio life;” the “old normal” and the “new normal” of work; what replaced the traditional four-stage model of life; what’s at risk for older workers; the mismatch between older workers’ skills and expertise and the in-demand jobs of the gig economy; how to keep your skills up to date so you can keep working or return to work in retirement and why he views this period over life — over 50 — as one of the most rewarding parts.

You might be surprised to learn that the ‘Your Next Avenue’ podcast about work after 50 interviewed an associate professor of anthropology for Season 1: Episode 7. That’s because Indiana University’s Ilana Gershon decided to treat the job-search process as an anthropology research project and share her findings in her excellent, enlightening, sometimes maddening new book, Down and Out in the New Economy: How People Find (or Don’t Find) Work Today. In the podcast interview, Gershon talks about: what’s wrong with the job-hunting process; the frustrations of job applicants over 50; the “black hole” syndrome of job applications; dealing with those despicable applicant tracking systems (ATS) that weed out resumés; age discrimination in the job search process; effective and ineffective ways to network to get hired; the fallacy of the “personal brand” that so many career “experts” push and using LinkedIn to get a job.

Richard Eisenberg interviews Lori Rassas, an employment lawyer and author of Over the Hill But Not the Cliff: 5 Strategies for 50+ Job Seekers to Push Past Ageism & Find a Job in the Loyalty-Free Workplace and The Perpetual Paycheck: Volumes 1 and 2. Rassas discusses why she thinks age discrimination towards job applicants over 50 is getting worse; how employers get away with it; what people should do and say when they think an interviewer has doubts about their ability to do the work or accept the salary; how to suss out whether an employer is less likely to consider older candidates and why job hunters over 50 should target small businesses for employment opportunities.

Host Richard Eisenberg interviews Shawn Askinosie, a former successful criminal defense lawyer who switched careers to find meaningful work by starting Askinosie Chocolate in Springfield, Mo., where he’s the CEO. Forbes has called it one of the 25 Best Small Companies in America, and the 16-person small business has a big heart, sharing profits with its farmer partners and feeding 2,600 students in Tanzania and the Philippines through its A Product of Change program.

Interview with Marci Alboher of Encore.org and author of The Encore Career Handbook: How to Make a Living and a Difference in the Second Half of Life. Host Richard Eisenberg learns Alboher's advice on what an encore career is, how to prepare for one, how to find a nonprofit that might want your skills and services, Encore Fellowships and Encore.org’s Generation to Generation initiative where people 50+ assist young people.

Host Richard Eisenberg interviews Marc Miller of CareerPivot.com for advice on making a career pivot after 50, how to switch fields and how not to, what it takes to make a career pivot, who can help you do it. Read the detailed show notes from this episode.     (Host: Richard Eisenberg. Producer: Laurie Stern. Composer: Henry Kaye. Editorial Director: Shayla Stern.) 

Advice on second-act careers, flexible work in retirement, becoming an entrepreneur, the gig economy, visualizing your future in retirement, finding work you’d like to do in retirement, investing in yourself, multiple streams of income, becoming a consultant, running a franchise, encore careers, getting paid to travel and getting benefits as a part-time worker.   (Host: Richard Eisenberg. Producer: Laurie Stern. Composer: Henry Kaye. Editorial Director: Shayla Stern.) 

Kerry Hannon, author of Great Jobs for Everyone 50+, speaks with Next Avenue about finding work after 50, encore careers, age discrimination and switching fields in midlife.    (Host: Richard Eisenberg. Producer: Laurie Stern. Composer: Henry Kaye. Editorial Director: Shayla Stern.)