Originally published 9/14/2019
Infurating. Illegal. And most ad agencies get away with it.
Megan Greenwell is the editor of Wired.com and runs the workplace advice column in the New York Times. Her email address is workfriend@nytimes.com
Let’s start with two letters this week.
No. 1:
I am an advertising creative who has been unemployed for over six months. I’m having difficulty finding a full-time role because I fear that, in my 50s, I’ve been thrown out with the trash in favor of “new blood.”
And No. 2:
People need to stop prefacing workplace conversations with older people with terms like “Hon,” “Dear,” or “Sweetie.” Ageism is real and despicable, and it is becoming more and more prevalent.
Megan’s take:
Ten columns into this gig, I have a solid archive of questions about age discrimination, and very few good answers. It is a huge issue, and it is absurdly difficult to combat
The problem, as I learned when I turned to an outside expert for guidance, is that age discrimination is uniquely difficult to prove — by design. A 2009 Supreme Court decision endorsed a higher standard for showing advanced age is the cause of disparate treatment in the workplace than the threshold for other types of discrimination.
“Hiring discrimination is the most difficult to prove because you rarely have any evidence,” Ms. Laurie McCann, a senior attorney for AARP Foundation says. “You don’t know who got hired instead of you, you don’t have the comparison of if they’re younger or less qualified.”
Ms. McCann’s advice:
- Keep up with trends in résumé-writing (for example, opening with a career objective is passé, she says)
- Emphasize your technological skills to the point of overkill
- Develop a social-media presence
- Leave graduation dates and other giveaways off your résumé so you’re not making it easy for employers to reject you.
- Some online hiring platforms won’t allow you to move through the system without including those dates — which AARP has asked the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to address — so avoid them whenever possible
- And everyone can take a lesson from New York: Bite back when someone makes prejudicial assumptions or treats you unfairly at work!
- Find some allies
- Form a support group
- Coach or mentor others in your industry
From me:
Fight age discrimination in your workplace actively but the onus is on you to prevent it
- Don't allow others to patronize you
- Invest in your education --formally and informally
- Keep up with the trends
- Whatever you do, never say "oh, this technology, it's so over my head" and similar phrases