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Ageism – 3 reasons why it can hurt your business
It may be the last (covertly) accepted form of talent discrimination but it brings huge opportunity costs.
by Val Unverricht
During my career so far, some of the highest calibre of professionals were in their late 50s and in their 60s and, in some cases, even in their 70s. They made for great candidates, because of their general reliability and their serious and straight-talking nature. When it came to client introductions, however, unfortunately their age was too often perceived as a red flag rather than as an advantage.
Whilst all other areas of diversity are welcomed and encouraged, diversity of age is still being shied away from. In some countries, my native Germany is a prime example, this is due to relatively concrete pension-age thresholds. Others, such as the United States, are more liberal and generally leave retirement up to the individual. Sectors make a difference, too. Candidates in their 60s are commonplace in Energy but less so in Software Engineering.
Rejecting a candidate purely and only because they are older is not just morally questionable – it also brings huge opportunity costs for your business. Here are 3 of the biggest ones.
Change resilience
If you consider the career span of a typical professional, you will find that it covers an astounding amount of global and societal change. Today, a 60-year old candidate will have experienced the end of the Cold War, the growth of the internet and digitalisation, and at least 2 financial crises – all in their working life. This means that they had to change their set routines and mindsets and go through the mental adaptation process of doing so many times over. It gave them a kind of learned and practiced resilience no millennial (admittedly) or Generation-Z employee can compete with.
2023, for example, was a tough year for most sectors and the next boom-and-bust cycle is only round the corner. Older professionals have lived through these crises many times over and can mentor young colleagues accordingly when times are tough. Do you really want to make do without this capability?
Best-practice knowledge
Older employees are often suspected of “being set in their ways” and slow to adapt to change. Above point about learned change resilience already shows why this is unfair. But why are “their ways” something that needs changing, anyway? Because of the length of their experience, these professionals will have tried and tested the good, bad and the ugly strategies, processes and campaigns along the way. In many cases, “their ways” are the cream of the crop of those and have yielded proven results. Are “their ways” perhaps a valuable addition into your business’ existing structures? Don’t you hire someone for what they can add to your team, rather than what they could be moulded into?
Network of contacts
Naturally, someone at 25+ years of experience has had more time to build a book of contacts than someone with 5-15 years of experience. Because of the amount of change older professionals have worked through, their contacts are often quite diverse in focus areas and capability. These networks can yield huge commercial and operational opportunity for your business, above and beyond the immediate role and function of a hire. It would be remiss not to utilise these.
The above points notwithstanding, of course there are risks involved when hiring older candidates. But risks of different natures also exist when hiring younger professionals. These are just as potent but are often irrationally minimised in a comparison. Longevity, for example. If you reject a 60-year old candidate because you “only get 5 years out of them”, would you accept a 5-year guarantee on a 35-year old hire? Of course you would.
Hiring an older candidate brings concrete advantages into your business – the 3 I mentioned here and many more beyond. Do you really choose to forfeit those in favour of someone with “more runway”?
6 Group’s Executive Search and Talent Strategy capabilities work with a clear focus on JEDI: Justice, Equity, Diversity, Inclusion. This means we do not discriminate on the basis of gender, ethnicity, sexuality, religion – or age.
If you are interested in capturing truly diverse talent, get in touch today.
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