Last week I heard a 60-something-year-old talk about getting some files out of his ‘machine’. I imagined some kind of futuristic filing cabinet but it turns out he was talking about his computer.

It got me thinking: how do older people keep up with the information and communication technology (ICT) skills needed for the modern world? ICT skills are useful in their own right, but increasingly they are becoming interlinked with other foundational skills such as numeracy and literacy.

This week, Andreas Schleicher, Deputy Director for Education and Skills for the OECD, was hosted by the Ministry of Education and Treasury. He spoke about the importance of continuing to invest in people’s skills, even after formal education. The OECD’s Skills Strategy, Better Skills, Better Jobs, Better Lives, promotes “investing effectively in skills throughout the lifecycle; from early childhood, through compulsory education, and throughout a working life.”

Investing in skills ‘throughout a working life’, particularly towards the end of one’s working life, is often overlooked in New Zealand. We have an ageing population: the proportion of the labour force aged 55 and over was one in six in 2007, and is predicted to rise to one in four by 2020.

And even though retirement looms for a large chunk of the labour force, it doesn’t necessarily mean the end of working life. According to the Equal Employment Opportunities Trust, most New Zealanders expect to work 15 hours per week even after officially ‘retiring’.

This means older people will need to continue investing in their skills. There is evidence that they are already lagging behind. The 2006 Adult Literacy and Lifeskills Survey found that those aged 55–65 have lower levels of numeracy and literacy than younger people.

So how do older people keep up their skills? Reading more books may not be the answer. The Ministry of Education reported in 2010 that “computer use is strongly associated with higher literacy and numeracy”. Part of this can be explained by higher computer use among higher-skilled occupations, but there was also evidence that computer use also improves literacy and numeracy.

Cranking up the machine (aka the computer) may be the way to invest in the skills necessary in today’s working world.