Companies who care about an inclusive company culture will make it easy for you to see they are ... [+]
So you’re looking for a new job. Whether you are just beginning your career or have a few decades under your belt, ensuring a company culture is age-inclusive is critical to great workplace culture.
But how can you really know?
As an external job candidate, you will not have access to internal policies, processes and demographics. Nor will you be familiar with the workplace culture. But there are still plenty of ways to get the inside scoop.
Companies who care about an inclusive company culture will make it easy for you because it will be part of their external branding.
Here are seven ways to dig deeper to know for sure.
1) The first place to start is the company’s website. It’s a treasure trove of information and critical in your search. A few clicks should make one thing very obvious–whether or not the company is age inclusive.
Company imaging often shows other dimensions of diversity, but everyone is under age 30. That’s sloppy work on behalf of the company’s brand-building because it shows they are grabbing stock imagery and ticking all the boxes they think are important for visible diversity: race and gender.
It also means that nobody is thinking about age. Chances are, the internal work culture is also oblivious to the relevance of age inclusion. That’s not a good sign.
2) Visit the career page and look for diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) information. Do they reference age equity as part of their scope? When age is incorporated into DEI strategy, company leaders understand how age-related assumptions, biases, myths and stereotypes interfere with creating a truly diverse, equitable and inclusive workplace.
3) Look at the languaging of a job description. Words conveying preference—for example, recent graduate, young and energetic, are words the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) suggests may indicate systemic age discrimination. Those words might imply that older applicants are not desired, but they may also suggest that younger employees will be required to work longer hours with minimum time off.
4) Visit LinkedIn to look up the company profile. From there, you can view the employees who are also on LinkedIn. Set the filter to current employer and scroll through the faces. What kind of diversity do you see? Is age diversity present?
If you see age diversity, that’s a good sign. But if other elements of diversity are missing, that’s a problem. Lack of inclusion for any group could indicate a workplace that is hostile to different opinions, ideas, backgrounds, experiences and ways of working.
5) Look for first- and second-level connections to current or former employees. Reach out to them and ask to learn more about the company culture. Let them know you are interested in applying and want to hear the pros and cons of working there. Ask if they would be willing to speak to you for 10 minutes or answer a few questions via messaging. No one knows the culture better than an employee, so this step is one you don’t want to miss.
6) Another way to get direct employee feedback is through job boards. Indeed and Glassdoor are two examples of boards that include company reviews. Reviews can be posted by current or former employees and often by people who were interviewed but may not have received an offer. That is another excellent way to get a feel for corporate culture.
If you see a comment in the reviews that concern you, i.e., about the need for more diversity and inclusion or that older people are not welcome, use that information to ask for more information from a LinkedIn connection. Set the search filters for the last year to keep it recent. Most companies watch company reviews on external sites, and if they have smart leadership, they investigate and make corrections as needed.
7) Finally, do a general web search with the name of the company and the word discrimination. For legal action, you will want to set the filter for the last three years with a custom search since litigation is a lengthy process. Dismissed cases typically suggest a settlement, and those terms usually are not disclosed.
The Age Discrimination in Employment Act protects people 40 and over from age discrimination. This protection is managed through the EEOC, where age discrimination complaints are filed. Even an EEOC complaint can take several years to go through the system if they choose to take it on.
If you have a lawyer friend, ask them to do a quick search via Lexus-Nexus, a legal site that tracks all employee-related lawsuits. With a few clicks, they will see if any age-related lawsuits have been filed—or any other discrimination cases. Inclusion is inclusion is inclusion. If even one dimension of diversity is excluded, that’s not a good sign.
With this research complete, you will learn a lot about the company and its work culture. Better yet, you’ll have many insights you can draw from should you decide to interview for a job.
