No EXPIRY Date ... in recruiting and careers

"Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been."

~Mark Twain

I've been having conversations with what some would call "old people" lately about gaining employment.  There seems to be a growing concern that anyone 50 or over are not desirable new employees.  Gosh, since when did 50 become old?  Isn't the retirement age 65?  Am I missing something -- a memo that went out that missed my email inbox or a social media article?

If you turned 50 in 2014, that means you were born in 1964. It is well past the defined "Baby Boomer" era and long before Millenia became a popular defined age.  

To define the terms and categorization:  Baby Boomers (1943-1960), Gen X (1961-1981), Gen Y (1982-2004) now called Millenials. 

We're creating a new dysfunction in society, sadly.  From my view, I see Millenia's totally being taken advantage of.  Their Baby Boomer parents have done their darndest to pave the way for the tipping edge of the Millenias whereby it is customary to ignore anything that a parent has to say, and only information from perceived smart sources (social media, media, academia, friends).

Millenia  (Gen Y) 1982-2004

Unfortunately, Millenias didn't have post war parents who kicked behinds out the door, demanded to improve their lives by taking advantage of what hadn't been offered to them:  usually an education.  Many learned by life's knocks and setbacks, and there were cobblestones, gravel roads, hardly anything paved.  Nowadays, it seems that anything BUT an elder person has wisdom and experience to heed -- including anything viral, on social media, in the media or considered relevant by the age group.

It ain't so rosey folks.  When I was in my 20s, I was pretty dazzled when someone in their 50s took the time to mentor me, give me advice, follow their example, and learn from. The kids who have arrived in their 50s post Baby Boomers, were born in between 1960 and 1975 thereabouts ... a time of optimism, world power was determined by economics and soon to follow technology.  They were graduating when the 80s were coming into fashion.  Today, 80s fashions, music, innovations (aka computers) movies, are hip to watch, pay heed to by the Millenias.  Kind of ironic I'd say.  Pay attention to the music, movies, television or technologies that defined your parents generation, but ignore their advice today, in person.

Gen X (Post Boomers) 1961-1981 

There are a lot of Millenias that are no where nearly as tough as post Baby Boomers are.   These are the people who worked while going to university or college, saved up to buy a car themselves, and were brought up to believe that success was defined by 20 or 30 years with the same company, a healthy retirement pension, and a massive retirement party that included not just colleagues and clients, but family and friends. That was the culture then.  If you were going to work 50 hours a week, you'd be recognized for your extra dedication, hard work, be recognized, promoted, handed a raise, or even get paid overtime.  Not like today where that will barely keep you a job.  Today, you are being asked to bypass OT for banked hours, then hassled if you want to take time off.  Is it a wonder that stress is the leading killer, the culprit behind heart disease and cancer?


Post Baby Boomers, pre-Millenias, weren't programmed for layoffs.   It was ingrained in them that if you put in an honest day's work, you will reap the rewards.  Your co-workers were not colleagues, they were your work family.  Many of our best companies today, that are faltering, were built on this culture yet fallen completely out of touch.  They were built on a community, employee first culture.  Typically, formed by Post War Babies, they hired many Baby Boomers and Post-Boomer employees.  There was a culture of pride in who you work for, who you worked with, and what you did.  Taking anything for granted was never part of the psyche because it wasn't in the genetic code called upbringing.

Baby Boomers (Post War) 1943-1960

Kids, you're being taken advantage of and being misguided by some pretty savvy dishonest people, companies, organizations. Never doubt, they know the ins and outs of employment codes and confidently walk on the fine line.  You can take two weeks off for legitimately being really sick, go to the doctor and get a doctor's note and the boss will dock your pay, citing that you are only entitled to 1 day per month for illness.  Huh?  Yes, it happens.

Or, how about a boy who is 25, has worked for the same corporation for 6 years, even has to be told to go home when sick, is at work long before starting time because he's up at 4:30 to make the long trek into work via bus because he can't afford a car, never mind leave home.  Why?  Further disheartening, is that this corporation only pays him $12.25 an hour after 6 years.  He's had a whopping $0.25 .. yes, 25 cents TOTAL, raise over the course of 6 years!!  This same fellow was given a regional award for outstanding service, attitude and customers love him!  

How can that be possible?  Well, it is possible because the branch of the corporation has to reign in on costs and employees are overhead and a major cost that shareholders don't like and corporations have a challenge controlling spending, so they fix the area that seems to be the easiest, in their people resources.  They bank on the fact that employees of any age are hesitant to rock the boat and put their jobs at risk and remain quiet.

The cycle has begun.  We're not listening to anyone who can help the ones that need help.  We're letting the ones who shouldn't be allowed to be in a position of power get away with some of the mass dysfunction.

"All diseases run into one, old age."

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

How about even to this day the Rolling Stones are considered super stars, setting concert ticket sales benchmarks.  Why is that when they haven't released a brand new single in how many years?  It is a little strange if you ask me.  It isn't what post Baby Boomer were raised to believe in and doesn't coincide with economics lessons of the best universities.   Yet, it happens.

Shame on us for ignoring anything that doesn't directly impact us ... because it does impact us.  Maybe not today, or next year, but it will when there is no retirement or pension funds that were promised ... yes, from putting in many honest days' work, staying with a company until retirement, or making contributions... because the ones managing those funds are padding their own pockets and living the life we are naively thinking will be waiting for us at 65.  What about stock option plans that are encouraged?  Who really benefits from that?  Not the average worker realistically.

How about how we craftily recruit people in a way to reveal their age.  There are multitude of online application forms  with red stars that must be completed by prospective candidates in order to be processed that force a month and/or year.  Why? So, they can purposely, although never admittedly, avoid being hired because they're over 50.  Why? So someone in their 20s or 30s can be hired and paid less, within a corporate culture that has deteriorated severely from reward to fear.  

It's all our each and individual faults.  We allow it to happen. Once in a while a sexy newsworthy piece unfolds, gets it a whole bunch of attention and a company or government hangs its head in a moment of shame ... soon followed by the offender blasting out a response by a PR machine, to silence the outcry by its big mechanism ... just so that it can go back to finding ways to be more profitable, on the backs of the individuals who no longer have a voice, a culture, or expectation that they matter.

"True terror is to wake up one morning and discover your high school class is running the country."

~Kurt Vonnegut