By Nadia Zaifulizan
This month, reports surfaced on the lawsuit against IBM for its hiring and firing, in particular the allegations of age discrimination practices. Yes, at the time of writing it has only been the first day of the month.
This is just one among the many series of lawsuits against IBM, which previously includes individual civil suits filed in 3 different states and one class-action suit filed in Manhattan. One in particular was by a 61 year old Jonathan Langley, an employee who has been in service for 24 years. Langley alleged that he was laid off due to his old age, despite his high performance record at IBM. At the time that he was released from service, he was 59.
Ironically, IBM is older than Langley. The company stands today at 108 years old. Its rise, fall, and rise again in the course of technological history fueled its concern on being left behind by the times. Consequently, the company has fired up to 100,000 employees in the past few years, many of those are allegedly from the older age groups, while it continues hiring 50,000 new employees per year and spends half a billion on training new hires.
In a report filed recently, a former IBM HR vice president states that the company has been laying off employees as a move to appear as a “cool and trendy organization”, similar to the companies behind Google and Amazon.
Unsurprisingly, Google was also involved in a legal battle of its own, for its alleged “systematic pattern or practice of discrimination” in hiring. In 2013 the typical computer programmer in the US are over 40 years old, while the median age of Google employees are 29. Job applicants claimed that they were not hired despite being qualified due to their older age. In one case, the candidate was asked to state her graduation date, to enable interviewers to have an idea of how old she is during the interview.
The company recently agreed on paying $11 million to end the class-action lawsuit filed by 227 people in relation to the age discrimination allegation.
Reports of alleged age discrimination in the technology industry are not rare. IBM, Google, and Intel are only some among the many technological entities with a history of age discrimination complaints. Compared to non-technology professionals, technology professionals move up the career ladder at a faster rate but with age, promotion rates decrease continuously for technology workers.
However, what does this imply for the working world? Talents in technology are abundant, and their work and contributions have helped technological companies flourish and grow. Increasing technological application and growing demands in the area of Artificial Intelligence, automation, and Internet of Things, simultaneously fueled an exponential growth for the industry. The top 5 entities in technology (Apple, Alphabet, Amazon, Facebook and Microsoft) are reported to be worth more than USD $3 trillion when combined. In fact, some even claimed that these tech entities combined are worth more than the entire economy of the United Kingdom. Reports indicate that this year, global spending on information technology are expected to hit USD $4 trillion, with the most rapid growth rates predicted for data-centre creation, enterprise software, and IT services. USD $125 billion is expected to be spent globally on cybersecurity alone.
In terms of job availability, there is a constant struggle between acquiring young tech talents and maintaining the expertly experienced older ones. As well as deciding the end (if they may), of a technological employment for some.
Younger talents provide a fresh outlook and newer innovative approach, while the skills, experience, and expertise of the older tech workforce are substantially undeniable in ensuring technological projects succeed.
Research by Visier Insights show that technology workers are increasingly likely to be technology performers at the age of 40 onwards. However, the research also indicate that the technology industry hires a bigger proportion of younger candidates than older ones.
If jobs are less scarce to you when you’re a younger technological talent, would it be less available to you once you’ve served your part after a few years and become the more experienced senior employee? In terms of job security implications, is it better to plan and prepare for a technological career assuming it to not last more than a decade (give or take a few years) while exploring diversification pathways, or to consistently be ready to embark on repeated attempts of securing a long technological employment?
The answers remain uncertain, but unless technological companies are willing to reassess their hiring process and turn some questionable, probable systematic ageism practices around, human capital seeking to flourish in the technology world will face a continuously uncertain future.