Posted on 10/06/2011 9:13:58 PM PDT by IsraelBeach
Steve Jobs Illustrates Age Discrimination by HR Employment Recruiters In High Tech, Social Media Unwarranted
By Joel Leyden
Israel News Agency
Ra'anana, Israel --- October 7, 2011 .... If Steve Jobs answered an ad today for work on LinkedIn.com or Monster.com chances are he would never even get a response.
At the age of 56 he would be deemed a dinosaur who would be completely out of touch with modern technology and integrated marketing channels. That at 56, he would be lucky if he was using email. HR and executive recruiters in high tech, SEO, social media and digital marketing have instructions by most companies not to engage anyone over 45.
Steve Jobs, the man who founded Apple and turned it into the world's must successful high tech, computer company died of pancreatic cancer yesterday. Jobs, with an estimated net worth of $7 billion dollars, was responsible for creating the personal computer industry, teaching people how to use a mouse to click on objects and how to make hardware easy to use. Steve Jobs created the iPod portable music player, the iPhone (telephone, Internet communicator, music player) and the iPad tablet. Consumer products which changed how we use and consume content in the digital age.
In addition to technology, Jobs served as served as chief executive of Pixar Animation Studios and became a member of the board of directors of The Walt Disney Company.
But yet, if Steve Jobs had not been so lucky in creating some of the first computers out of a garage in Mountain View, California and was simply a hard working, marketing professional who worked for Microsoft or HP and was laid off due to a recession where would he have been in the last few years?
Regardless of how deep his knowledge of software, hardware and marketing may have been - he could have wound up selling shirts at Macy's or frozen food at Walmart. If Jobs had not acquired the personal contacts that he accumulated over the years and simply relied on a resume to secure a hi tech position in 2011, he could have been collecting unemployment.
Many assume that those over 40 or 45 are not in touch with modern technology yet Steve Jobs was one of those middle aged professionals leading modern technology. Many social media, digital PR and SEO employers assume that in order to secure fresh ideas one needs to tap into a market of 20 - 30 year-olds. That those who are over 50 are completely obsolete.
When has youth had a higher value over experience? That those high tech marketing professionals who have made the jump from conventional media to online sales and integrated marketing channels are to be ignored?
One highly respected tech professional recently interviewed for a chief operating officer position with a West Coast technology company. The headhunter was very positive and told him that he was "the leading candidate". The CEO congratulated this 50 years plus professional on his stellar technology background. Then he heard nothing for two weeks. He then called the headhunter, who then told him that the company was seeking "a person with more technical experience." This candidate writes for CNET!
Age discrimination is alive and well. In fact age discrimination is killing high tech.
There's a TV commercial being aired on ESPN right now that illustrates two hiring managers discussing the two job candidates sitting in the lobby. We only see the backs of these candidates' heads. One is dark brown and lustrous and the other brittle and gray. The HR recruiters debate should they go with the experienced candidate though "he won't have energy" or hire the fresh young guy? And then we see that the two candidates are the same person before and after a hair dye job.
More than two-thirds of tech professionals over 45 have said that ageism is a "significant problem" according to a study released a few years ago. That nearly one in three workers over 45 said they have either witnessed or experienced "age bias."
During the next ten years, mature workers will overwhelm the high tech industry by their sheer numbers. According to American Demographics, seven baby boomers will turn 50 every minute in the US from now until 2014.
Steve Jobs at 56 was still creating, producing and marketing new consumer products at the time of his death. Jobs was widely described as a visionary, as a pioneer and perhaps one of the key leaders ever in the field of business, innovation and product design. Many say that Jobs had "profoundly" changed the face of the modern world in having revolutionized at least six different industries and was the finest role model for all chief executives".
Jobs was working smarter, faster and more creative than those half his age. Steve Jobs does not just leave us with an iPhone or graphics that you want to lick, but with the life example that experience and hard work is still alive after 55.
Steve Jobs will be remembered for many things and many quotes but perhaps these words are the most fitting: “Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren’t used to an environment where excellence is expected.”
And excellence, like a fine wine, takes time to achieve.
Well, that's rather obvious, since it almost certainly wouldn't be the real Steve.
I visited an Apple Store for the first time ever yesterday afternoon, before I learned the news (which I learned from the screens there) (how about that for strange coincidences?!) and among the many blueshirted employees, some wearing jeans with torn knees, others dirty sneakers, evidently the dress code applied only to the top of the body, among them all I noticed two fellows who were clearly over 60, one of them possible over 70, and this is a brand new store, so presumably they were new hires. What was going on there? I didn’t find out, they were both busy, and I didn’t speak to them or to anyone there.
The tech sector is notorious for age discrimination, even 35-40 years old.
Oh, Steve would today receive plenty of responses to his resume on Monster.com. From hungry headhunters, none from actual hiring companies.
So here’s my idea for solving the H1B visa problem. Let’s start from scratch, and withdraw all of the H1B permits. Then, Congress to hi tech companies: We’ll start approving your requests for H1B visas. Unemployment rate among computer software and hardware engineers over 45 years old is now ___%. You’ll get your H1B permits when the rate equals (is down to) the general unemployment rate in the country.
This is, folks, how the political system can begin serving the interests of American citizens first.
No no. That IS the dress code at apple stores. All the sales people are supposed to look like hip people in their twenties. That look is more important than knowing about their products.
I should have said ‘uniform code’, because the T shirts were all identical, and the bottoms all up to the wearer. I’ve no problem with that.
Yes. They have a ranking system and it is denoted by the t-shirts all the way up to the fellas in black.
Quite weird and cult like. I have a friend who works at a store near me that whenever he talks about apple or its products or the people he works with it is like he becomes a different person. He gets very hurt if you make any critical remarks about apple.
Freaky stuff if you ask me, but you know free country and whatnot.
HaHa... Somewhere, maybe on youtube, I saw a expose video made by this guy who was a Apple Store clerk. He spilled all
the dirt about what a stinking pile that company is to work for.
Specially about the store culture. If you spill any “secret” to a customer.... off with your head!!
Interesting. One other note. There were quite a few of the salesmen there, more than you’d see at a Best Buy or similar stores. Some in groups of two or three were talking among themselves. And yet, as I wandered around the store, none of them approached me, which is unusual in retail situations, and which I personally don’t mind (not being approached), as I hate obnoxious, aggressive sales people.
We need H1B visa people for work in genetics, cellular chemistry, nuclear engineering, bio-physics, neurobotics, aircraft design etc. We have enough computer programmers in this country, we don’t need foreign imports for programming jobs.
Why employ a highly skilled and experienced 55 year old American when you can import an 25 year old Indian or Chinese and pay him less than half as much?
And these geniuses in Congress and the White House better come up with a plan of mandatory job placement when they raise the retirement age from 65 to 67/68 - who the hell is going to hire a 65 year old?
Maybe we do (need H1Bs.) Still, I wonder how many professionals in the industries you mention who are over 45 are unemployed, and due to their age unemployable!
What would happen is that the guys on the H1B’s would go back to their countries, and the jobs would go with them. It would be even cheaper than employing them here, and you’d lose related jobs as well.
I am not sure age discrimination is as endemic as people believe. The real problem is that skills are perishable; any technical person needs to have a second job always, which is to remain current. Imo, staying in the same industry helps a technical person, by allowing him/her to accumulate domain knowledge. Domain knowledge is harder to acquire than technical knowledge.
I worked for many years at Argonne labs, a premier research facility in the country. I observed more scientists over 45 than under 45 doing research activities. It is not a small lab, employs about 5000.
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