Oliver Mallett talks about Olderpreneurs on Radio 4’s Thinking Allowed

Having caught the last few minutes yesterday I have just listened to Oliver Mallet discussing his research on ‘Olderpreneurs’ on BBC Radio 4 ‘Thinking Allowed’.  The interview was based on his paper with Robert Wapshott , published earlier in the year in Work Employment and Society: Making sense of self-employment in late career: understanding the identity work of olderpreneurs.

In the interview Oliver highlighted the struggle for legitimacy of those beginning their entrepreneurial journey later in life, particularly in terms of how they compared themselves to the popular images of entrepreneurs that we are familiar with from programmes such as Dragon’s Den.  He highlighted the issue that stereotypes of entrepreneurs (as creative, risk taking etc.) tend to differ from how we seen older people (as being in decline) which creates tensions for these individuals.

It was great to also hear some of the interviews themselves within the programme though I think these were read by actors from the transcripts – but perhaps I’m wrong.  One issue here was how Thomas struggled with ageism in his previous workplace and then having become an entrepreneur found he experienced ageism, just in a different way.  It was also interesting to see how these individuals felt that they were not successful when compared against the popular images on the television and web.

It’s well worth a listen to the programme and of course a read of the paper on especially since it is Older People’s Day.