CEOs in India are getting younger by the day. It’s happening in two ways. First, thanks to the arrival of an entrepreneurial ecosystem, bosses no longer need grey hairs; in fact, it is a disadvantage. Take a look around you at the Flipkarts of the world. Would the Bansals have gone places if they had been older? Nobody would have extended seed capital and all their plans would have gone to seed. Besides, the 40 plus don’t understand either the technology or the business model, which has gone back to the dotcom days of burning money as fast as you can.
Second, incumbent CEOs feel they have got a mental makeover; they dye their hair or make laughing stocks of themselves wearing wigs and see themselves in their second childhood. They force senior executives – possible successors – to retire ahead of them and then carry on with a cosmetic change in designation, though none in functioning.
The trouble, in most cases, is that these people do not know what to do with themselves after they hang up their boots. For the young entrepreneurs, it isn’t as big a problem. They can sell out and turn serial entrepreneur.
(Those are the success stories we hear; the no-longer-hotmales like Sabeer Bhatia are for the history books.) Or they can turn altruistic and lay a foundation to avoid taxes. It’s the ‘old’ men in their coveted corner offices who are the problem.
Why should it be so? Obviously they have the money to do what they like. But rubber-necking with giraffes in Gabon or taking pride in their holidays in lion territory may not appeal; after all, they have been used to being lionised. Playing second fiddle to their still-working wives can’t be music to their ears.
Perhaps they are being put out to grass too early. According to Wikipedia, the average retirement age in India is 60. As against this, it is 62-67 in the US. (The retirement age refers to when one becomes entitled to government benefits like pension.) By another metric, a senior citizen in India gets a higher rate of interest (0.25-0.50 per cent more) when he turns 60; Air India gives him a concessional fare at 63.
But senior citizens in India feel they are much better off than their counterparts in other countries. A Retirement Readiness Survey by insurance company Aegon finds that Mr. and Mrs. India has the most favourable disposition towards retirement. “The India Index score of 6.96 is the highest of all 15 countries surveyed, although this means that an ‘average’ or ‘typical’ Indian with online access has only a ‘medium’ level of retirement preparedness,” says the report. A caveat is in order here: “with online access” automatically limits the sample to the elite and the young. But that is Aegon’s domain; the poor don’t save for retirement.
Aegon also went into expressions that people associate with retirement (see box). “The Aegon
Retirement Readiness Index incorporates three broadly attitudinal and three broadly behavioural questions covering personal responsibility, financial awareness, financial capability/understanding, retirement planning, financial preparedness, and income replacement.” In India, Freedom is top of the pile with a score of 39 per cent. Enjoyment and Leisure chalk up 34 and 36 per cent respectively.
Meanwhile, AllOnMoney.com has several suggestions on what Indians can do after retirement. Among them:
Start equity trading. Tackling bulls and bears at 60 is fundamentally flawed. One would do well to remember the marginally adapted Max Scratchmann offering:
The bank is on the brink of death, the rupee is on the run,
The death march thinks that the Sensex is not a lot of fun,
A broker stands upon the ledge, he’s just about to jump,
And oil shares reach an all-time-low beyond the petrol pump.
TIRED OR RETIRED
Word associations with retirement in India (%)
- Tired 8
- Ill health 14
- Boredom 14
- Insecurity 16
- Loneliness 16
- Excitement 17
- Dependent on others 20
- Opportunity 23
- Leisure 34
- Enjoyment 36
- Freedom 39
Source: Aegon Retirement Readiness Surve
