Ken Dychtwald, PhD

Psychologist, gerontologist, and authority on the lifestyle and workforce implications of the "age wave."

Travels From:  California

SPEECH TOPICS

The Longevity Revolution

The Age Wave: New Opportunities in a Maturing Marketplace

Age Power: 5 Crises an Aging America Could Cause & How to Avoid Them

Demography is De$tiny: Optimizing Age Diversity in the Workplace

ABOUT Ken Dychtwald, PhD

Over the past 25 years, Ken Dychtwald, Ph.D., has emerged as the nation's foremost visionary and original thinker regarding the lifestyle, marketing and workforce implications of the "age wave." He is a psychologist, gerontologist and author of ten books on aging-related issues, including Bodymind, Millennium: Glimpses Into the 21st Century, Healthy Aging, his best-seller Age Wave and his latest, Age Power: How the 21st Century will be Ruled by the New Old. He is currently working on two new books, Demography is De$tiny and Re-Visioning Retirement.

Dychtwald's interest in aging initially grew out of his pioneering work from 1973 to 1979 as Cofounder and Co-Director of the Sage Project, a non-profit social service organization funded by the National Institutes of Health and devoted to teaching the elderly how to improve the quality of their lives by taking charge of their mental and physical health. In the late 1970s, as his work branched out into other aspects of gerontology, he was struck by how many of the social, economic, and physical problems of aging were preventable. He repeatedly saw how a lifetime of disregard for personal health usually led to chronic disease. Aging, he came to realize, was not something that begins on one's 65th birthday. Rather, all of the choices we make regarding how we care for ourselves, how we manage our lives, and even how we think about our futures ultimately shape who we become, both personally and culturally, in our later years.

By the early 1980s, Dychtwald had become a member of various scientific and social service advisory panels, a frequent lecturer at academic and business conferences, and a consultant with numerous universities, hospitals and corporations. In 1982, while serving as an adviser to the federal Office of Technology Assessment, the think tank connected with the U.S. Congress, he felt a jolt when he realized that the next population of elders would not be his grandparents' or parents' generation; they would be the baby boom generation, which is his generation. Just as our social institutions were unprepared for the initial baby boom, Dychtwald feared that our gerontophobia might blind us to the true impact of 78 million boomers barreling toward an entirely new version of maturity. He realized that we were about to confront a demographic shift of enormous magnitude: increasing longevity, declining fertility, and the aging of the baby boom were triggering an enormous "age wave." This wave had the potential to create vibrant new stages of life and an unending stream of new business opportunities, and an equally compelling potential for social, economic and political crisis.

In the years since, Dr. Dychtwald has addressed nearly two million people worldwide in his speeches to corporate, association and government groups, and appears frequently on national television and radio programs. His strikingly accurate predictions have been featured in many prestigious publications including: The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, The Financial Times, Fortune, Time, Newsweek, Business Week, Inc., U.S. News and World Report and Advertising Age. In 1986, Dychtwald was the founding President and CEO of Age Wave LLC, a firm created to guide Fortune 500 companies and government groups in product/service development for boomers and mature adults. In recent years, he has served as a fellow of the World Economic Forum and is the recipient of the distinguished American Society on Aging Award for outstanding national leadership in the field of aging.

In May 2001, Ken Dychtwald became a Senior Advisor to North Castle Partners, a private equity firm focused on investment opportunities in the "healthy living and aging" sectors. In addition, Dychtwald has been actively involved in pioneering research efforts exploring the implications of key demographic trends. He recently completed the groundbreaking Re-Visioning Retirement Project, a landmark survey and segmentation of today's and tomorrow's retirees. Dr. Dychtwald has also announced his collaboration with the Concours Group, the global IT and HR consultancy, to lead the Demography is De$tiny Project, a visionary research and development venture exploring the profound effect that demographic shifts will have on all aspects of workforce and management dynamics.

TESTIMONIALS

"Ken Dychtwald is a show stopper. He is one of the few speakers that can educate, entertain and have you laughing and crying all at the same time." — Johnson & Johnson Company

"You absolutely thrilled our audience of 2000 people. I especially appreciated the customizing you did to meet the specific needs of our audience." — WorldatWork

"Congratulations! Your presentation at our Annual Convention generated the highest speaker rating in the twenty-four year history of this event." — Securities Industry Association

"I've been in this Chapter for fifteen years and I have never seen a presentation as good, as well organized, as thought-provoking, as interesting and as fascinating as what Dr. Dychtwald presents." — FHP Healthcare