With Age, comes experience

Check out this link   www.cbsnews.com/sections/60minutes/main3415.shtml  or if that doesn’t work google 60 minutes for Sunday August 19.

I am posting this link because I think that it is a segment that everyone needs to watch, particularly those in my age group because its mostly about the difficulty a group of 40-50 year old workers have had finding a job after being downsized, laid off, let go whatever you want to call it. Now these weren’t people who quit or were fired but people like me who have great skills, were loyal to their companies and a solid work ethic.  These are people, like me, who through no fault of their own find themselves with the new label of “unemployed”.  These are people like me who get on the internet on a daily basis to search for jobs, go through the somewhat demeaning required classes on how to interview, etc., tests to find out what your vocation should be…ok at 53 I don’t think I’m going to go back to school to be whatever they show I should’ve been to be employable…

The people in the unemployment office are not the same ones I encountered 10 years ago. Today’s unemployment waiting room looks like a who’s who of Business line up.  The people I have encountered in my “mandatory” trips to the office are former executives, former managers, and last week the lady I was chatting with was a teacher who had relocated to Oklahoma with her husband and was trying to find a teaching job.  Did I mention that all of these folks were my age or older? 

I was talking to one of the representatives at the office and she told me that a lot of the older workers that were coming in were not recently unemployed but were early retirees in some cases that simply can’t make ends meet in today’s economy. But that’s a whole other blog subject!

I have kept a positive attitude and I have done all the right things.  I have great interview skills because I was the interviewer for so many years. I know what companies are looking for in regard to answers to the questions they pose.  I am not randomly applying for jobs for which I have not experience, or credentials.  I am targeting companies and positions that are a close match for my experience and my skill set.  Do I think that age has something to do with it?  Absolutely!  But what are you going to do about it?  Discrimination may be illegal, but it exists.  Just because a potential employer can’t legally ask your age or health status doesn’t mean they don’t have questions on their applications that pretty much tell that story.  High School Graduate?  What year?  For example.

I remember when I was first entering the work force, some 30 years ago and the number of times I heard “well you don’t have any experience”.   Of course I don’t!  Because no one will hire me so I can get that experience.  30 years later what I hear is “you have too much experience for this position, you are over qualified.”  30 years ago I heard, “you need a college degree to really get ahead”.  Today, I hear “you have too much education for this position”.   A polite way I suppose of saying “YOU ARE OLD”.  We don’t want to hire older workers. WE consider them a liability health wise.  WE think that we would have to pay them more money.  WE think that they won’t be around long enough to mess with.

Maybe 30 years ago, when companies had some loyalty to their employees and employees some loyalty to their companies.  How many people do you know that have been able to sustain a job for 30 years and retire with a gold watch nowadays?

What companies don’t get is that an older, experienced worker is probably worth paying more for. The old adage you get what you pay for makes a lot of sense.  You can pay less for less knowledge or you can pay more for more knowledge.  Personally, I’d rather pay more to keep a seasoned, experienced employee who most likely will stay around.

And I know it’s not just the older folks that are struggling in the job market today.  The younger generation has struggles of their own when it comes to jobs. I was reading an article the other day about how the average college student comes out of college with a lot of debt, expecting to go to work right away because they have done the “right thing”. They have gotten the college education that everyone tells them they must have.  How overwhelming that must feel to them to graduate, have a lot of debt and not able to find a job in the field they have worked to achieve their education in.   My son Andy got his degree in Hotel Restaurant Management and had no problem finding a job because that industry continues to grow and seemingly no matter how bad the economy gets people still eat out.  My son, Chris on the other hand, got a degree in Journalism/Broadcasting and had no luck finding a job, ending up going to work as a phlebotomist.  That’s a pretty big difference in skill sets.  (He now works at Apple…if anyone needs an apple product message me and I’ll give you his direct number because his sales are tracked).  

 Joe worked for many many years in a manufacturing plant. Expected to retire there and then was replaced by a robot.  He has been invaluable in keeping my spirits up. He went through the denial, the frustration of trying to find a job when you are over 50, doing all the right things, passing all the tests, and never getting a call back.  He reached the point where he had to say “any job is better than no job…I have to eat”.  He didn’t become a security guard because that was his lifelong dream.  He became a security guard because that was one field where age seems to be irrelevant. 

I was griping about my job one time to my dad, about 6 months ago.  And he said something to the effect  that it didn’t matter whether I liked it, hated it or felt indifferent I better hang on to it cause in his words “no one’s going to hire you-you’re too old.”   A relative of mine told me that when he tried to find a job during a slow time with his business that he couldn’t get anyone to even talk to him because he was over 50. “   And Joe told me countless stories of the men he worked with that were over 50 and how after the robots replaced them had to go to work at jobs that 16 year olds could get because no one would hire them…they were too old.   To all these stories and comments I would think “not me”.  I have tons of experience, a spotless job history, I have always been promoted, considered valuable, etc etc etc.   I was very much in the “that might happen to them, but not to me.”

Well, it’s happened to me.  It’s disheartening and discouraging and plain old not fair.   I have shed many tears of sadness and frustration and impatience in the last 9 weeks. I have had days where I wanted to just stay in bed and not even think about working again.  Losing a job is like any other loss you experience.  There is a period of grief that comes.  There is a period of denial and then you learn to accept it and move on.

The 60 minutes segment was an eye opener and it made me feel a whole lot better to know that I am not alone.  The participants, all older, were participating in a new kind of unemployment office program. One aimed at addressing their self esteem.   These people don’t need job training or more schooling.  What they do need is to have their value, their worth recognized and confirmed.

When I read that the NY City shooter   killed his boss who had laid him off a year earlier and read the neighbors comments about how they didn’t know he had lost his job because he still left every morning in his business suit etc. it really didn’t surprise me.  What he did was horrific.  Another article said he had been unable to find work for over a year.  I can imagine the anger building as he was rejected over and over again.  I suppose in his state of mind, he felt it was his former boss’ fault his life was in ruins.  What a tragedy that someone would reach that stage of desperation.  

I know I will work again.  I know it’s going to take a lot more perseverance and patience than I originally thought. I know that I am going to have to grit my teeth and make it through interviews where the interviewer wasn’t even born when first started working.  I know that in order to keep my unemployment benefits I am going to have to attend a lot more “seminars” that frankly I could teach.

Sometimes things happen for a reason.  Since the decision maker in my case left the company a few weeks later, I can’t help but think I was robbed.  Had I been given an opportunity to make a case for myself being kept I think I would be a lot less aggravated at how it all came about.  In the end, the decision was up to one person and that person was young.  

In the words of Mary Kay Ash of Mary Kay Cosmetics "A company is only as good as the people it keeps."

I have a lot more years of service in me.  I’m not ready for the rocking chair. Some company is missing the mark if they judge me by my age and not by what I have to offer.  I may be over the hill, but I’m still able to climb the corporate ladder.  Might take a knee brace and some Tylenol but I can do it.