Employee Development in Small and Medium Enterprises in the Light of Demographic Evolution

Trends in the job market taking worker knowledge, abilities and skills into account show that the demand for qualified, experienced workers has been rising and that the trend will continue into the future. Accordingly, companies must put a life-long learning and development strategy in place so that even older employees (55+), the proportion of whom has been rising in organizations and in the marketplace, may maintain their positions in the job market for as long as possible. This paper aims to assess how small and medium enterprises in the Czech Republic reflect current demographic developments in terms of age management support and employee development. The data was obtained from small and medium enterprises in the Czech Republic (n = 432). The results show that age management is not an official primary focus of small and medium enterprises; but they naturally act in line with age management practices nevertheless. Any efficient solution to demographic development in the enterprises studied here, however, must be based upon an overall change of attitude coming from both entrepreneurs and company leadership focusing on young employees, as well as older employees themselves, where their ability to pass on their experience to younger coworkers is stressed. To maintain economic prosperity, continuous development is important for both categories.