Age Bias Against Older Job Applicants: I Experienced It When I "Mystery Shopped" Some Large Employers

At some employers and staffing agencies, the job application process is front-loaded for age bias.

My mystery shopping  experiences at several staffing companies and large employers will illustrate what I mean.

1. At 2 companies, young job applicants were led to a bank of computers where they applied for jobs online while older applicants like me were handed clipboards with paper applications. When I asked one of the 20-somethings why she led young applicants to a computer bank but handed me a paper application she actually said "Well, my parents aren't computer literate so I figured you might rather have a paper application."

2. At one employer, the 20-something worker who was handling my application started speaking to me s-l-o-w-l-y and loudly when she saw me use reading glasses. To her, if I needed reading glasses I was also deaf.

3. Two major employers, one a staffing company, the other a transportation company, literally tried to talk me out of applying for jobs at their companies. They said things like "Uh, Mr. Higginbotham, you do realize  the job you're trying to apply for involves hard physical work, right?"

At some companies, the recruitment/application process is front-loaded for age bias because the 20-somethings on the front lines of that process stereotype older workers. Twentysomethings believe older workers are technophobes and Luddites. Twentysomethings think older workers can't hear because we wear reading glasses. Twentysomethings think older workers can't do physically demanding work.

Twentysomethings naturally want to stock their companies with other twentysomethings with whom they'd like to be "social".

The reason there are so many twentysomethings on the front end of the hiring process is that this initial screening role is seen as an "entry level" position that is wasted on more experienced HR people. Maybe employers need to re-think this. After all, what could be more important than getting the best people - regardless of age - into the next round of recruitment?

A twentysomething employer told me he wanted to hire "people with tight buns" who looked like "college soccer players."

If you don't have some older workers on the front end of your recruitment/application process your company may be one of the companies that discriminated against me when I went out to "mystery shop" staffing firms and other employers.

Employers need to diversify by age for the same reason they need to diversify by race and religion and gender.

Is your company's recruitment/application process front-loaded for age bias?

Have you ever hired a mystery shopper to report on your application/recruitment process?
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Would you like to serve on a "older workers task force" or would you like to recommend somebody? Call me at (304) 550-6710 or email me at JosephHigginbotham@gmail.com to learn more.

Attention Employers And Staffing Companies: Sometimes The Talent You Seek Comes In A Package You Don't Expect

A Parkersburg, WV -based staffing company with an office in Charleston recently scored a public relations coup by getting one of those you-can't-buy-this-kind-of-publicity stories written by Eric Eyre (http://wvgazette.com/News/201009241072).

The thrust of the story was that staffing agencies actually have jobs they can't fill - even in this jobless recovery.

According to marketing executive, Christian Kager, companies are "having a hard time finding qualified individuals willing to work."

I wonder if Kager has considered another reason why open jobs may be going unfilled: so-called staffing coordinators who don't know how to staff and recruiters who don't know how to recruit and front-line HR people who don't realize - or don't care - that sometimes the talent they need is literally looking them in the eye but comes in a package they didn't expect or aren't willing to advance to the next level of the employment process.

As some of my close friends and clients know, I have earned some ridiculous fees finding and recruiting talent and here's what I have observed: qualified people apply for the job but can't get past the HR gatekeeper because he or she is too black, too fat, too old or too gay or too (insert your prejudice here). I have collected 5-figure headhunting fees for "finding" candidates that my clients actually had a chance to hire but had rejected. I know a prestigious law firm that instructed its HR Director not to hire anybody who is "fat, black or ugly."

Take older workers , for example. Workers in their 50s remind front-line staffing coordinators and entry-level HR people of their parents. These twenty-something gatekeepers - let's say it like it is - use their jobs to stock their company with the kind of people they want to socialize with so when the talent they need comes to them in a package that looks like their parents, well, the hiring manager never knows about these older applicants because the twenty-something gatekeeper finds some way to disqualify them.

What's the solution? Simple: get some older workers in the gatekeeping positions. And while you're at it, get some black people and some gay people and some physically challenged people into gatekeeping positions.

If all your staffing coordinators and first-level interviewers are young and white you're going to have a hard time "finding" talent that isn't young and white.

And while you're at it, hire some staffing coordinators and some first-screeners who know how to evaluate candidates who have executive backgrounds, scientific backgrounds and technical backgrounds.

For more on this subject see my "There's No Whining In Recruiting" which first appeared in Business Lexington and later in this blog. Click here to read "There's No Whining In Recruiting". :: http://higginbothamatlarge.blogspot.com/2009/10/theres-no-whining-in-recruiting.html