WORKSHIFTER - Dispatches from the New Executive Frontier

Management consultancy Booz Allen Hamilton's UK operation issued a report in May entitled, "Reshaping the World of Work and Retirement." In it the firm argues that the so-called traditional approach to retirement is all wrong.

The report's author, Lord Andrew Turnbull, a Booz Allen senior adviser, said: "We need to alter fundamentally our assumptions about work and retirement and the transition between the two. A profitable decade of mixed working and retirement ought to be the dominant model of how to make the most of our flexible years, easing ourselves into a restricted income rather than plunging into it."

Richard Rawlinson, vice president at Booz Allen Hamilton and a specialist in strategy and leadership, added: "We have not yet fully grasped the size and significance of our aging population. The implications are vast, from the patterns of work and retirement to the way companies are run. Companies are starting to recognize the great opportunities from focusing goods, services and marketing to the opportunities created by long life expectancy - but few companies have actually adapted their business and made the changes they need to make."

You can get the full report here.