Friday 15 November 2013

Age DOESN'T matter

Almost every job seeker over the age of forty recently has been telling me that their age is a barrier to them gaining employment - and when I heard this again today, I really wanted to lose my patience to throttle the person!

Age is only a barrier to gaining work if you let it be a barrier.  No, let me correct that, if you think age is a barrier to you gaining employment then your ATTITUDE is your barrier, not your age.  Yes, there are employers out there who only want young ones; but equally, there are also employers out there who don't want anything to do with them!

What really matters is that you know that you are employable, and know what benefit you would be to an employer and to let employers know this. 

To avoid being discriminated against, sure, don't put non-necessary personal details like your age, marital status etc in your resume

Seriously, age isn't a factor for most employers anywhere near as much as 'can you do the job, and do it well?', so please... please, please, please, don't let me hear one more job seeker hide behind their age as the reason they aren't finding work quickly - there are so much more truer answers that you've probably overlooked.

*Deep breath* Sorry, rant over