Engineering inquiries for restless retirees.

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Engineering inquiries for restless retirees

Henry Mutnick, 70, is just not the retiring type. And he has tried.

Mutnick, who lives in Durham, retired from Carolina Power & Light Co. last August after nearly a decade there and a 48-year career in engineering. His retirement lasted a month.

"My problem was, I am not the kind of person to just stay at home," he says. His sentiments apparently are shared by other Durham retirees. "I found that people approached me and said, 'I have had about all I can take staying at home playing golf.'"

So in September, Mutnick launched Working Options, a placement company for older, professional retirees. He is accepting resumes from people who know engineering, computers and other technical skills, and he hopes to find them work.

"It's a tremendous idea. I wish I had thought of it," says Steven Jesseph, vice president of FoxMorris Associates, a national outplacement company with an office in Charlotte. He says U.S. companies miss these workers' expertise. "We often find ourselves reinventing the wheel."

Mutnick, with an investor, has spent $15,000 so far on letters to retirees, trips to companies around the state and accounting and legal...