Age no barrier to changing careers
Encouraging older staff to retrain could ease the sector’s recruitment issues.
Encouraging older workers to retrain and continue learning could provide a potential solution to the recruitment crisis currently facing the industry. And staff are proving there is no cut-off when it comes to adapting to change. Formerly a construction manager and then a project planner, Joe Kelly MCIOB recently qualified as a solicitor at the age of 61.
After finding himself out of work, and having also witnessed a number of serious accidents as an on-site first-aider, Joe decided follow an interest in law sparked while he was studying to take the direct CIOB Membership exams in the 1990s.
Changing career
Originally from Limerick, Ireland, Joe moved to England in the 1980s after studying to become a Civil Engineering Technician at Limerick College of Technology. Initially finding work as a labourer, he moved into various roles before taking his direct exams for the CIOB between 1989 and 1993, under the CIOB’s previous application system.
“We had to do one module on law and had an inspirational solicitor lecturing us,” he says. “That piqued my interest in law.” However, Joe parked this curiosity as he continued to work his way through the construction sector, working as a setting out engineer, construction manager and project planner.
However, he began studying a certificate in law through the Open University in 2006, before progressing to the diploma and later the degree. The process was not easy, especially while working and raising a family, and Joe often found himself writing essays early in the morning.
“On holidays, I used to get up at five in the morning and study and write essays,” he says. “And then I would then be free for the rest of the day to socialise with the family.” However, after four years of work, he was awarded a 2.1 honours degree in law, before going on to complete the Legal Practice Course (LPC) in 2017. “Due to the volume of the course material it was difficult to keep up,” he says.
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Training opportunities
Having gained his legal qualifications, Joe says he initially struggled to find a training contract despite applying to more than 100 companies, partially due to his age alongside the results of his LPC.
His breakthrough came when he was looking to change the terms of his mortgage, and approached a solicitor about supervising him while he renegotiated the terms himself. The solicitor instead offered him an unpaid internship, where Joe worked for a year and three months before he received a speculative email from an agency looking to provide maternity cover for an in-house solicitor at Kelly Communications Ltd (the name is coincidental).
Joe got the job, and was then offered a training contract which allowed him to qualify as a solicitor on 24 February 2024. Now working as an in-house solicitor, he deals with a varied workload including construction law, employment law, immigration law, and some county court litigation.
“One of the benefits I had from being in construction comprised negotiating deals with subcontractors, low level stuff, but constantly bargaining and haggling,” he says. “Amending contracts and negotiating contract terms is basically just an extension of what I had been doing on-site in a more formalised setting.”
He also isn’t stopping there, and is now studying his Higher Rights, which would allow him to represent litigants in the higher courts. “That’s my next goal, it keeps my brain active,” he says.
Sector changes
Joe’s situation isn’t unique, and the concerns about the role age can play when experienced professionals are making career decisions were raised by attendees during a recent “Qualifying the workforce” webinar debate, run by Construction Management magazine.
“There is a wider acknowledgement within an ageing workforce that there are going to be a lot of career transitions,” says Marc Fleming, academic delivery manager in construction management at UCEM.
Umar Farooq, project manager at AtkinsRéalis and a member of the CIOB’s Tomorrow’s Leaders community, agreed that there should be “no age limit” to lifelong learning. He added that experienced professionals have a lot of “valuable life skills” they can bring to a new role or a new industry.