Written Testimony of Jacquelyn B. James, PhD Boston College

Meeting of June 14, 2017 - The ADEA @ 50 - More Relevant Than Ever

Acting Chair Lipnic, Commissioners Feldblum, Yang, and Burrows, Deputy General Counsel and Legal Counsel, thank you for the invitation to speak with you about the challenges facing older workers in today's context of longevity and extended working lives.

Introduction

Experts anticipate that in most countries with established market economies, the older worker population will continue to grow over the next several decades while the size of the younger workforce will shrink. The number of people 65 years and older who remain in the U.S. workforce is growing as the average age of retirement has risen in the last two decades (United States Department of Labor: Bureau of Labor Statistics [U.S. BLS], 2016). According to a 2014 AARP survey, a clear majority of workers over the age of 50 plan to work past the age of 65, including a sizable 18% who indicate that they never intend to retire (Skufca, 2014). An important factor in this trend may be the recent evidence that fewer and fewer people are "very confident" that they have enough money for a comfortable retirement-only 18% of respondents in a recent survey (Greenwald, Greenwald, & Associates, Copeland, & VanDerhei (2017).

This major demographic change has increased the relevance of a range of issues related to the aging of the workforce, such as a possible knowledge drain associated with the departure of today's older workers from the labor force and the need for new employment practices that address the needs and priorities of the contemporary multi-generational workforce. Scholars have begun to take a fresh look at fundamental assumptions about contemporary experiences of aging and have started to re-examine older workers' preferences with regard to work. Unfortunately, however, employers have been slow to innovate. While the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 prohibits employers from making specific types of discriminatory decisions, there is evidence that age bias and negative age stereotypes about older workers continue to affect older workers' employment experiences (Boerlijst, 1994; Borgatta 1991; Diekman & Hirnisey, 2007; Maurer, Barbeite, Weiss, & Lippotreu, 2008; McCann & Giles, 2002; Munk, 1999; Newmark, Burn & Button, 2017; Roscigno, 2007).

Stereotypes and Ageism

Stereotypes are "beliefs about the characteristics, attributes, and behaviors of members of certain groups" (Hilton & von Hippel 1996, p.240). These are often deemed as normal cognitive processes enabling people to categorize information and to reduce complex input (Taylor 1981, Fisk, Rogers, Charness, Czaja, & Sharit, 2009, Hamilton & Trolier, 1986). In his classic study on prejudice, Allport explains this view:

"The human mind must think with the aid of categories. Once formed, categories are the basis for normal prejudgment. We cannot possibly avoid this process. Orderly living depends on it." (1954: 20)

Age Bias at the Workplace

As noted, there are indications that age-based stereotypes follow people into the workplace. Ageism might affect employment experiences at virtually any stage of the employee-employer relationship. Several studies have found evidence of biases against older adults during recruitment and hiring (Lahey, 2008; Bal, Reiss, Rudolf, & Baltes, 2011; Diekman & Hirnisey, 2007; Finkelstein & Farrell, 2007). Biases can be explicit or implicit, real or imagined, but, as noted above, our impulse to create social categories is practically unavoidable. Thus, it is unlikely that we can eliminate them entirely, no matter how well-intentioned we might be.

Rather, it seems important at this juncture to develop strategies for preventing biases to enter into employment hiring, recruitment and HRM practices. The Center on Aging & Work at Boston College has recently worked with AARP to develop a benchmarking tool for managing the current multigenerational workforce. Tip sheets are provided on the basis of whether an organization appears to be strong or weak (or in the middle) of any given set of practices. The tool can be found at the following link: http://virgo.bc.edu/employerbenchmarking/

Featured practices include: Assessment, Recruitment, and Hiring, Options for Continued Work or Retirement, Flexible Work Options, and Managing Intergenerational Relationships. What follows are a few strategies for avoiding age bias in managing today's multigenerational workforce from these tip sheets (McNamara and AARP, November, 2016)

How to Lessen Age Discrimination

Assessment Strategies. Employers can and should develop assessment practices to help them avoid age discrimination. They should, for example:

• Look 6 to 10 years in the future for assessment purposes rather than the typical 1 to 5 years.
• Assess larger scale trends such as in the industry and region to identify risks; and make the aging workforce an explicit part of the organizational knowledge audit.
• Map age demographics in critical positions.
• Assess the usefulness of internal transfers.
• Take action even while continuing to gather data.

Recruitment Strategies. Changes to recruitment practices might be an important step in avoiding age bias when hiring. To do so, employers should:

• Assess the extent to which hiring workers of diverse ages can support organizational goals and build on their employee referral program.
• Consult various sources of myths and misconceptions about older workers (e.g., The National Council on Aging's Myths and Facts about Older Workers).
• Review recruitment strategies to make sure that they are targeting workers of all ages.
• Develop an age-friendly website that includes images of employees at all ages; feature any awards such as the Age Smart Employer Awards.

Interviewing Strategies. The interviewing process can also be modified to avoid age bias. Studies show that interviewers tend to favor job candidates who remind them of themselves (ref). Thus, employers can:

• Develop an age-diverse interview panel for prospective employees. Diverse interview panels are less vulnerable to unconscious often unintentional age bias (see, for example, James, McKechnie & Swanberg, 2013).
• Know the guidelines (the do's and don'ts of interviewing strategies) to avoid lawsuits of all types including age bias.
• Provide a standard process for hiring managers or teams as to appropriate questions to ask as well as information they should or should not gather to avoid age bias.

Options for Continued Work or Retirement. Providing options for continued work in later life can decrease unexpected turnover costs and loss of institutional knowledge by providing flexible ways for employees to stay in the workforce, maintain a sense of purpose, and build their financial security. Employers therefore might:

• Provide employees with information and resources about continued work, e.g., flexible work options, phased retirement, reduced responsibilities, part-time options; and creating a program to reengage retired employees who want some level of continued involvement with the organization.
• Provide career counseling or coaching to workers of all ages, both financial and nonfinancial retirement coaching to promote an orderly and successful transition for employees and the business.
• Make knowledge management a priority in career counseling.
• Use individualized development plans to help workers who want to retire make a smooth transition into that next stage of life.

Strategies for Retaining Employees of All Ages. As noted above, today's older worker may want to continue working past conventional retirement ages for both personal and financial reasons. Yet, twin myths that older workers are pining for retirement and that younger workers are more likely to stay with the organization persist. Workers of all ages, however, may value certain conditions of employment that makes continued work more realistic. Thus, employers can develop strategies for retaining employees of all ages. Create desirable working conditions by:

Avoiding Intergenerational Conflict. Bringing together the similarities among different generations in a workforce, while acknowledging their differences, can have benefits for a multigenerational workforce.

• Confront the myths and realities of generational conflict and encourage a diverse workforce.
• Expand policies designed for younger workers to affect a larger age range.
• Provide cross-generational networking opportunities.
• Provide leadership training to all generations of employees.
• Minimize communication difficulties that could lead to misunderstandings, by, for example, communication over email.
• Pair employees of different generations in mentoring relationships.
• Train managers and supervisors in understanding differences among generations as well as building on characteristics that benefit all generations such as credibility and trustworthiness.
• Build intergenerational teams.

In sum, employer efforts to change practices instead of efforts to eliminate cognitive bias alone are time-honored strategies for confronting "isms" of all types.

References

Allport, G.W. (1954). The nature of prejudice. Cambridge, Mass: Addison-Wesley.

Bal, A. C., Reiss, E.B., Rudolf, C.W. & Baltes, B.B.. (2011). Examining positive and negative perceptions of older workers: A meta-analysis. Journal of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences, 66(6), 687-698. DOI: 10.1093/geronb/gbro56

Boerlijst, J.G. (1994). The neglect of growth and development of employees over 40 in organizations: A managerial and training problem. In J. Snel & R. Cremer (Eds.), Work and aging (pp.251-271). London: Taylor & Francis Ltd.

Borgatta, E.F. (1991). Age discrimination issues. Research on Aging, 13, 476-484.

Diekman, A. B. & Hirnisey, L. (2007). The effect of context on the silver ceiling: A role congruity perspective on prejudiced responses. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. 33, 1353-1366. DOI: 10.1177/0146167207303019

Finkelstein, L. M., & Farrell, S.K. (2007). An expanded view of age bias in the workplace. In K.S. Shultz & G. A. Adams (Eds.), Aging and work in the 21st century. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Fisk, A.D., Rogers, W.A., Charness, N., Czaja, S. & Sharit, J. (2009). Designing for older adults: Principles and creative factors. New York, NY: Taylor & Francis.

Greenwald, L., Greenwald & Associates; Copeland, C., & VanDerhei, J. (2017). The 2017 retirement confidence survey-Many workers lack retirement confidence and feel stressed about retirement preparations. (EBRI Issue Brief, No. 431). Washington DC: Employee Benefit Research Institute.

Hamilton, D.L., & Trolier, T. (1986). Stereotypes and stereotyping. In J. Dovidio & S. Gaertner (Eds.), Prejudice, discrimination, and racism (pp.127-163). New York: Academic Press. Canadian Journal on Aging, 24(4), 353-366.

Hilton, J. L., & von Hippel, W. (1996). Stereotypes. In J.T. Spence, J. M. Darley, & D. J. Foss (Eds.), Annual Review of Psychology (Vol.47, pp.237-271). Palo Alto, CA: Annual Reviews.

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McNamara, T., & AARP (2016).

Maurer, T.J., Barbeite. F. G., Weiss, E.M., & Lippotreu, M. (2008). New measures of stereotypical beliefs about older workers' ability and desire for development: Exploration among employees age 40 and over. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 23, 395-418.

McCann, R. & Giles, H. (2002). Ageism in the workplace: A communication perspective. In T.D. Nelson (Ed.), Ageism: Stereotyping and prejudice against older persons (163-199). Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.

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