close
Search:

The Future of Work Is Grey

THE FUTURE OF WORK IS GREY: The Untapped Value of Age in the Workforce will be published on May 5, 2026, and it’s Dan Pontefract’s sixth and arguably most important book yet.

An age revolution is reshaping your workforce. Are you ready to lead it?

A massive demographic shift is reshaping the world, one that is permanently altering how we work. People are healthier, living longer, and redefining the concept of retirement.

The Future of Work Is Grey, by award-winning author Dan Pontefract, reveals the critical ways we must rethink work in an era of demographic, economic, and productivity upheaval.

For decades, leaders have clung to outdated models that assume younger workers will always outnumber older generations, that retirement at sixty-five is an unshakable norm, and that older employees have little left to offer.

This mindset has left us working and leading in a period of “age debt”—the workplace equivalent of the climate crisis.

It is the cumulative burden organizations face as our populations age, birth rates plummet, middle-aged workers become overwhelmed, internal skills gaps widen, multi-generational issues intensify, and various economic structures fail to keep pace.

In this robust exploration, Pontefract uncovers how we reached this tipping point of age debt and what organizations and leaders need to do next. He also reveals how leaders must seize the most significant opportunity of our time, the “experience dividend”—the value gained by integrating the skills, insights, and mentorship of employees across all age spectrums into a revised workforce strategy.

Central to this vision is his framework of Rivers, Rocks, and Rubies—three age archetypes that reflect the evolving strengths of workers at every stage of life.

An emergency siren to future-proof your organization’s success and security, The Future of Work Is Grey gives you the imperative actions leaders need to take NOW. By reframing age as a powerful asset, leaders can avert a growing crisis, redefining work and—equally important—what it means to work.

The future of work will most definitely be grey, yet it can also become a future of resilience, innovation, and hope.

May 5: 2026 – THE FUTURE OF WORK IS GREY: The Untapped Value of Age in the Workforce

Pre-Order the Book (click below)

Early Praise

  • “The Future of Work Is Grey shows leaders how to confidently navigate the upcoming demographic shift. Design work and teams for longer careers, keep wisdom flowing, and build a culture people are proud to be part of.”
    Chip Conley, founder of Modern Elder Academy; New York Times bestselling author of Learning to Love Midlife
  • “Dan Pontefract is an original, insightful and, above all, practical, thinker. The Future of Work Is Grey sheds powerful new light on one of the most pressing talent issues of our age. Experience it to think differently.”
    Stuart Crainer, cofounder Thinkers50
  • “Dan Pontefract masterfully shows how longer lives can lead to better work. He provides clear practices for age-diverse teams. When knowledge flows, continuity is strengthened and cultures evolve. A needed guide for leaders ready to ride the age wave.”
    Ken Dychtwald, Ph.D., bestselling author of 19 books, including Radical Curiosity and What Retirees Want
  • Dan Pontefract shines a light on one of the most overlooked blind spots in leadership today—age. In The Future of Work Is Grey, he argues persuasively that thriving organizations will be those that value the wisdom of experience as much as the energy of youth. This is not a book about retirement or nostalgia; it is a call for leaders to balance curiosity, flexibility, and humility across every stage of working life. A timely and necessary guide for anyone serious about leading with both head and heart.
    Dr Kirstin Ferguson AM Bestselling author of Head & Heart, Blindspotting, Women Kind; Thinkers 50 Ranking and Thinkers50 Distinguished Award for Leadership
  • “In a time marked by near-constant change and disruption, it is easy to hear only the voices calling for innovation. But Dan’s book calls us to turn down the chaos and tune into a more subtle disruption that most are not paying attention to: demographic shifts in the workforce. This is not a dry exercise in age-related data and workforce planning; rather, it is a timely call to harness the wisdom and intelligence inherent in every demographic now present in our workplaces.”
    Tony Bingham, President and CEO, Association for Talent Development
  • “A lucid, provocative exploration of the “grey zone” in the future of work. Dan Pontefract reveals how this new reality, the massive demographic age shift amid the disruption of AI blurring roles, skills, and value, is fundamentally rewriting the code of the global economy.”
    Hamilton MANN, AI Researcher and Bestselling Author of ARTIFICIAL INTEGRITY
  • The Future of Work Is Grey is a powerful call to recognize age as an asset. Dan Pontefract brilliantly shows how wisdom and experience can fuel innovation and resilience.”
    Faisal Hoque, Founder, Shadoka and NextChapter, and #1 WSJ bestselling author of REINVENT and TRANSCEND.

Download the Book Overview

Dan Pontefract

Why Did I Write The Book?

I wrote The Future of Work Is Grey because, in part, I ran headfirst into a wall of age bias.

Somewhere between turning fifty and getting quietly “refreshed” off a speaker roster, I realized something larger was happening.

Organizations were treating age like a liability instead of an asset, even as the world around them was growing older by the minute.

What started out as a personal sting turned into a global investigation. Across Canada, the U.S., Europe, and Asia, I discovered that the story was the same.

People are living longer, birth rates are plunging, and workplaces are utterly unprepared. They’re about as prepared as you might be when you go down your first roller coaster. It’s steep and stomach-turning.

Leaders keep talking about the “future of work,” but few are willing to face the reality of what that future actually looks like.

We’re running what I call an “Age Debt,” and the bill is coming due.

However, my new book isn’t about doom. What good is that?

It’s equally about another term, the “Experience Dividend,” a concept that arrives when leaders finally recognize the value of every era of work and life.

The Future of Work Is Grey is a wake-up call, a framework, and a bit of a love letter to wisdom itself.

Because the future of work is neither young nor old; it’s grey, and if we get it right, it’s going to become gold.

I hope you get the chance to read it.

You can pre-order at the following:

Indigo | Amazon | Porchlight | Barnes & Noble | Bookshop (my fav)

Note: Audiobook coming soon.

Media Appearances

sidebar hashtag menu home office pencil images camera headphones music video-camera bullhorn connection mic book books file-empty files-empty folder folder-open price-tag barcode qrcode cart coin-dollar coin-euro mobile user users user-plus user-minus key lock unlocked glass mug spoon-knife fire bin switch cloud-download cloud-upload bookmark star-empty star-half star-full play pause stop backward forward first last previous next eject volume-high volume-medium volume-low volume-mute amazon google whatsapp twitter dribbble behance behance-black github appleinc finder windows8 skype pinterest pinterest-o chrome firefox edge safari opera file-pdf file-word file-excel html-five asterisk search search-plus search-minus cog arrow-circle-o-down arrow-circle-o-up edit share-square-o check-square-o arrows question-circle arrow-left arrow-right arrow-up arrow-down mail-forward expand compress eye eye-slash comment twitter-square facebook-square camera-retro cogs comments thumbs-o-up thumbs-o-down sign-out linkedin-square external-link sign-in unlock feed bell-o arrow-circle-left arrow-circle-right arrow-circle-up arrow-circle-down globe filter arrows-alt link paperclip bars envelope linkedin rotate-left bell angle-left angle-right angle-up angle-down desktop mail-reply mail-reply-all chain-broken chevron-circle-left chevron-circle-right chevron-circle-up chevron-circle-down html5 unlock-alt youtube-square youtube-play dropbox stack-overflow apple windows trello female male arrow-circle-o-right arrow-circle-o-left wordpress file-image-o paper-plane paper-plane-o share-alt cc-visa cc-paypal cc-stripe bell-slash bell-slash-o facebook-official trademark registered wikipedia-w question-circle-o