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Hi Recruiters,
40% of hiring managers have a bias against Gen Z candidates, according to a recent survey of over 1,000 hiring managers.
Of that group, a whopping 46% said it's beneficial for the company to avoid hiring Gen Z candidates.
If you ask me, that's their loss.
So, a not small number of employers are evaluating candidates by years of existence instead of qualifications. That's ageism, folks. Plain and simple. And it really adds a layer of fuel to the company-asking-for-8-years experience-for-an-entry-level-job fire. Except now, those unrealistic job requirements look less influenced by psychosis and more by discrimination.
At first glance, you might think, "Well, maybe these hiring managers are looking for someone who's not completely green."
That does seem to be true, as 80% of the employers interviewed were concerned about Gen Z's lack of experience. Obviously, for mid or senior-career roles, someone fresh out of college is likely not going to be the most qualified.
Unfortunately record scratch that's not really all that's at play here. About 60% of those surveyed were concerned about an unprofessional attitude, and another 50% were concerned about reliability and work ethic.
This is a problem.
Ageism, not exclusively to Gen Z, relies on stereotypes. And from a recruiter's perspective, ageism and stereotypes are not ethically compatible with attracting and retaining talent.
Somehow, blatant ageism doesn't ring as many alarm bells as other forms of discrimination.
In a fantastic article, CFO recruiter Jenna Fischer got to the heart of it, pointing out that "unlike sexism, racism, antisemitism, homophobia — you name it — ageism is still widely accepted in today's business culture."
Jenna also makes note of how the bias against older workers is just as prevalent. This, too, is evidenced by the aforementioned study, in which 33% of hiring managers admitted bias against Baby Boomer candidates.
And if you know me, you know I could dedicate a whole series of posts to the issue of gender bias at work (but we'll save that for another time).
Do we really have to explain why all of this is not just wrong, but stupid?
Sigh.
As environments change, the ability to adapt is the difference between species that survive and reproduce and those that go extinct. If you want a business, department, or even a team where everyone in it looks and thinks just like you, I recommend reading the previous sentence again.
If you're still not convinced you should gauge younger candidates (the most ethnically and racially diverse generation and the most tech-savvy to enter the workforce) the same as you would those from other generations, you're already way behind the curve — the oldest Gen Zers are approaching 30.
The rest of us will enjoy being a little less cringe.
Howdy 🤠 Aaron Ibañez here taking over for Kunwar Ishan Sharma this week! The total solar eclipse may have come and gone, but we've got some other out-of-this-world events coming soon. 👀
Register here to attend Trent Cotton's webinar on April 23 where he'll discuss the challenges of using LinkedIn Recruiter and how he built a high-performance team at HatchWorks with the help of hireEZ's recruitment CRM.
Happy Recruiting!
— Recruiters
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