Does Age Matter?
I celebrated a birthday earlier this week and I think I made a big career mistake during the festivities.
I told my boss the year I was born.
His reaction was, “‘What?! You’re kidding, right? Wow, you’re young. I thought you were at least five years older than that!”
Looking back, maybe I should have been offended by the fact that he thought I was nearing 40 (nah, I have always looked older than my age), but the way he reacted got me thinking about a conversation I had with my pervious leader a few weeks before I transferred to my current job.
It went something like this:
Her: You have hit your earnings ceiling here. At least for now. You’re awfully young to be at your salary.
Me: I don’t understand.
Her: We usually require people in your pay grade to have at least 10 years of experience.
Me: I’ll have 10 years under my belt next June. Plus, I have a master’s degree.
Her: I have people on my staff who have been here for 20 years and don’t make what you do.
Me: The other people on your staff don’t have the responsibities for profitability that I do.
Her: You know what I mean. You’ve reached the end of your career path in this business unit. At least until the CMO retires.
As I’ve mentioned before, this woman has never been my biggest fan, but she didn’t actively dislike me until she knew what my salary was (I was a new direct report - my hiring manager left for another opportunity). I have a sneaking suspicion that my pay wasn’t much less than hers - and she had a fancy title and had just celebrated her 50th birthday.
My partner and I were discussing these two events last night, and he suggested that I start lying about my age. This is not an original idea - most women pretend to be younger than they really are - but in my case, Matt thinks it may work to my advantage if I tell people I am older than my actual age.
Maybe he has a point - I’ve never had a leader or boss that was fewer than 10 years older than me. Is there a certain age requirement for acceptance into the C-suite? The financial services industry seems to employ more than their fair share of middle aged white guys. Maybe it’s my gender combined with my age that’s an issue - but I’ve never been one to play the “girl” card - at least not outside of my blog.
Do you think that age matters in the workforce? I never did - until Matt got me thinking about it. Perhaps he’s on to something.
Stumble it!
May 8th, 2008 at 4:46 am
From an HR perspective, your boss can’t say boo! about how old you are. Also, if a company is basing your pay on your age, they’re opening themselves up for a HUGE risk. It’s illegal to discriminate based on age, and that’s exactly what your boss was doing (it’s not always about discriminating against someone because they’re older!).
Hopefully your new boss is a good one and doesn’t let how old you are influence how they manage you!
May 8th, 2008 at 9:21 am
Heidi - Ageism is certainly alive in the world today. I sit in similar circumstances, I am always the youngest person “in the room”. I even serve on a Board of Education and I was elected in January to be President by my fellow members… none of which are younger than double my age!
It sounds like you have done the things in your career to make age a non-factor - work hard, be prepared, and produce results.
I’ve found different people react differently when they learn my age. For some it seems to make them have more respect for me, for others it becomes more discriminating. Hopefully your boss can focus on the first. If you don’t feel like he is, or he is now making comments/jokes about your age, address it clearly with him and again remind him of all the great achievements and experience you have which made you justified to have your position in the first place.
I would highly recommend against lying about your age. Nobody really needs to know your age in the first place, and potentially getting caught in a lie later could be more damaging.
Most of all just have confidence you belong in the same room as the old fogees!
May 8th, 2008 at 9:58 am
I lied about my age, through omission or obfuscation, when I was younger and held a position of way more responsibility than a twenty year old should be entitled to or entrusted with. Unfortunately, even though ageism is illegal, like many other things that means boo in real life.
May 8th, 2008 at 1:49 pm
I’m happy to be in a profession (banking) where my performance primarily dictates my promotions/title/compensation. But I am still by far the youngest person in my office, and it certainly DOES make a difference.
Colleagues are constantly talking about songs, movies, events that happened around the time I was born, if not before. Worse, they then realize it and never fail to exclaim “I bet you don’t even know what I am talking about! You were not even BORN when that happened! Wow you are so young.” Most of the senior execs have kids are my age; my colleagues are generally a decade older (mid 30’s) with young children.
Certainly age can make clients and superiors skeptical of my abilities - especially in an industry where I’m giving financial advice and direction (and where the best clients are often the oldest).
However it’s an advantage too. I am young and single. I have connections my older colleagues don’t with the up-and-coming crowd. I can go to happy hours and networking events every night of the week and/or work late, whereas they all have kids and families to get home to. Plus some of the older clients actually LIKE having a young female banker - sexist or not, I’ll take that advantage.
May 8th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
Today I had a coworker take me for 17. One thing I like about working online is that my age isn’t readily apparent. I do mention it on my about page because it’s part of my story, but I don’t advertise it.
I sometimes worry that at the hospital people won’t take me seriously. At the library it doesn’t matter as much since I’m working with books, not babies. And as long as I get the job done online, young is actually good.
May 8th, 2008 at 7:00 pm
You ain’t seen ageism yet! Wait till you get to be around 50.
Once you’re over 45, it’s extremely hard to get hired. And at my age–I was born during the Cretaceous Period–I figure if I get laid off in the current round of budget cuts, I might as well start collecting Social Security. I can’t live on it. But you can be sure I’m never going to get another full-time job, certainly not one that pays better than what a greeter at the Walmart makes. Might as well take in the slack while starving!
That said, having had some negative experiences with an older woman I hired, I’m afraid I might very well tend to prefer someone who looks 17, thank you. Many of her problems were age-related.
Really…a point comes when we old buzzards need to get out of the way and make room for the next generation. Maybe your boss is becoming aware of that, and starting to get the heebie-jeebies? If you quoted that exchange accurately, it sure sounds like there’s a subtext running beneath it.
May 9th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
I run into the same problems that you. Mine’s even worse because I have almost 6 years of experience and yet I’m grouped with the kids right out of college with a or two year of experience because of my age. Its very frustrating becuase not only do people in my industry think you’re too young, but often I get mistaken for a lower position and written off.
Eventually as people get to know you age doesn’t really matter, but first impressions make it hard.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:37 am
Well they say that “first impressions” matter so I suppose if you look young that works against you; at least initially. Let me explain…
I started originating when I was about 20 years old. Often times, I dealt with odd looks, smirks and questions like: “How OLD are you?!” And I could understand it I suppose. I mean I was hosting a presentation for REALTOR®’s who had been in the business 10, 15, 20+ years.
We didn’t move past the initial age stigma until we got into the presentation and the words coming out of my mouth showed signs of intelligence.
So does age matter in the workforce? I don’t think so. What matters more is if you have something “worthwhile”/”valuable” to contribute. But you can’t help but deal with the initial stigma that says, “look at this young gal, what does she know?”