New Profession Emerges: Longevity Planning Consultants
The growing trend of increased lifespans is giving rise to a new profession: longevity planning consultants. These professionals are not doctors at longevity clinics, but rather multidisciplinary advisors who help individuals maximize their extended lives. This field addresses financial, social, familial, and legal aspects, including retirement planning, elder care, wills, guardianship, end-of-life directives, and housing.
Dr. Yochanan Shavit of the Stanford Longevity Institute suggests that many individuals in their 50s and 60s can expect to live into their 90s and beyond. He emphasizes the importance of not just maintaining good health, but also vitality, purpose, and societal contribution during these later years, warning against a "final exam atmosphere" due to a lack of societal models for active aging.
Dr. Ira Sofer, a former business consultant, has launched a company offering longevity consulting services. Building on her doctoral research on the economic and social aspects of aging, she co-founded a course for longevity consultants with Moshe Laron, who specializes in retirement and financial planning at BDO Academy. The course, now in its third cycle, attracts professionals from nursing, finance, pharmacy, and human resources, including gerontologists.
Sofer and Laron are developing a certification and a longevity readiness index to measure clients' preparedness. This index, which they found lacking in global research, assesses knowledge, perception, and action across six domains. It aims to help individuals and organizations gauge and improve readiness for longer lives, with plans for age-adjusted scoring and applications for municipalities seeking to create age-friendly urban environments.
The emergence of longevity consultants is part of a broader ecosystem of new professions related to extended lifespans, including specialists in community integration for seniors, age-friendly urban planning, home adaptation, and specialized financial advice for longevity.
