There is job at SM Supermalls after 60.

As part of their corporate social responsibility, SM Supermalls give senior citizens the chance to land a decent job and lead a comfortable life.

Under the SM Cares for Senior Citizens Program, the elderly from 60 to 70 years old  are afforded the opportunity to work at SM either as greeters or ushers at the entrances, food courts and cinemas of the SM  malls.

Senior citizens who will be hired are assigned on four-hour shifts every Saturdays and Sundays starting 10 a.m. when the malls open.

SM Fairview Human Resource Manager Techie Gonzales said the program aims to help senior citizens by providing them casual and part-time work assignment.

This will also help promote productive use of their skills and abilities, enabling them to be of service to mall customers, as well as empowering them to be relevant members of the society.

She said it started last year with only a pair of senior citizens in five SM malls.

Since  it  has become successful because of the many applicants and inquiries that all malls, SM malls now employ ten senior citizens at any given time.

She said SM has partnered with the Office of the Senior Citizens Affairs to set the guidelines of the program as well as endorse the applicants for each batch.

“There is no minimum qualification. For as long as they are within the set age and are physically fit, they may apply,”  stressed Gonzales.

Ofelia Oliva, 61, and Rosario Espino, 63,  former barangay kagawad and a laundrywoman said they are very  much happy of their work at SM.

Oliva, of Novaliches, Quezon City, a housewife all her life, admitted she  has a reason to smile these days.

For the past five months, she has found a new direction, a new mission. One that for the first time in her life is making her wear an office uniform and lipstick.

Oliva said she is proud of her work at SM Fairview, where she is a greeter at one of its entrance halls, because she gets to meet a lot of people who are also glad to see her.

“When people see me at the entrance, some are surprised to see me but are happy because they don’t expect an old woman like me greeting them,” she said.

That is the reason why, according to Oliva, she feels compelled to wear a happy face to make other people’s day pleasant. In fact, she goes out of her way to wear lipstick so she can look nice for the customers since she is in the frontline.

But for the senior citizens who see her, they ask her how is able to get in SM. “They ask how I was taken in. They also want to be part of it. That makes me proud because I know I am doing something worthwhile,” she said.

For Espino, her job at SM Fairview as a mall greeter has given her a sense of importance.

“I have not held a formal job and I never imagined that I would get one when I am already in my 60s and in SM at that! I feel very honored to be given this chance.”