HRD Pavlo Tkachenko was interested in the recruiter vacancy, but he clarified that he might not even apply because he does not qualify for the company based on age.
HRD Pavlo Tkachenko was interested in the recruiter vacancy, but he clarified that he might not even apply because he does not qualify for the company based on age.
He posted a screenshot of a conversation with a company representative. According to him, the company is looking for specialists under the age of 27.
«I’m 48 years old in a week. This is simply a fact, not a flaw or an achievement (everyone will be there if the card fits well). And the recruiter’s only question to me is about age. Not about skills or opportunities to create benefits for the company, but age. Seriously? This post is not about ageism. Yes, I understand that setting requirements for age (and a wide range of other issues) is at least illegal, I’m already silent about uselessness. But I also understand that I will not send an experienced adult (35+) candidate to a young (20 years old on average) team in the logistics department. He will not be comfortable there both from the point of view of internal departmental dynamics and from the point of view of the subculture that has developed there, and simple algorithmic tasks will simply be uninteresting to such a specialist. Instead, if the other criteria are met, I will offer a job in a department where emotional maturity and life experience will be a valuable addition to the culture of diversity (including age) that I have already created there,» writes Tkachenko.
He emphasizes: this post is about recruiting. «Recruitment ‘according to a script’, as opposed to recruiting customized to the company’s objectives. Of course, if your company is in the TOP-10 of the market, offers ‘better than market’ conditions, and has a good employer brand, my thoughts here will be useful to you only as notes of an anthropologist. Most of us work in other fields and other companies, where we have to go through all the circles of personnel hell to provide the same personnel with which the company will then achieve its goals,» he noted.
Pavlo’s post has garnered over 200 comments. Most experts are outraged, but there are also those who have had similar experiences.
HRBP Dmytro Smotrin writes: «I have a similar situation, I’m 42, and my experience is not very important to recruiters, as I was told today that it would simply not be comfortable for young people to work with me…».
«Yes, we have, and we still have. When people ask me my age, it immediately makes me wary. I’m a UX designer and I’m 35, but because of that, I can’t find a job,» shares Olena Bezruk, UX/UI designer.
Hanna Borova also faced similar discriminatory demands. «A similar situation… I plan to describe several situations on the topic of how I was „interviewed“. It’s just ridiculous… I want to sue some of them because they took up a lot of my time… Well, everyone has learned that if they don’t directly refuse based on age, then the excuse is „overqualified“. I think that if the manager is really interested in experts with experience, then he should supervise the mess of HRs. Because, as a rule, young HRs drag their own kind into good positions, and then the organization has a bunch of Instagram-worthy young people with poor English, and there’s essentially no one to work with. Because expertise and multifunctionality are experience that is gained over years. Therefore, everything depends on the manager…», she concludes.
«Aegis from local baboons is my favorite. At 43, the owner of the BASA factory and the ISTO architectural bureau called me „old“ in a circle. In general, the recruitment process in Ukraine is currently completely unprofessional and dehumanized. This will affect the quality and ROI of the business,» notes Alexander Valiukh, Head of Marketing & Brand Communication.
Meanwhile, IT employers insist that they do not discriminate against specialists.
Olena Oleksienko, Chief of People Team at EVO, notes that the company adheres to an anti-discrimination policy that categorically prohibits any manifestations of ageism. «For us, a candidate is, first of all, knowledge, experience and qualifications, and not the year of birth in the resume. Although the average age of our team is 34, we are open to hiring specialists over 50. Professionalism has no age limits, and we value experience and qualifications. For example, one of our colleagues, who is over 60, has significant experience in IT analytics. He joined us after several months of searching and immediately demonstrated high quality of work and stability. Senior specialists often bring depth, strategic vision and the ability to work for the long term to the team,» she noted.
Yulia Ostroukh, HR Director at Sigma Software, says that when hiring specialists, she adheres to the principle that professionalism, knowledge and skills are the main thing, and not age, gender, social status, or other individual characteristics. «Our company has specialists of different age groups: from students studying in the first year of university to specialists who have been with the company for over 20 years. This diversity gives us a competitive advantage in creating unique products and services, makes it possible to combine experience and entrepreneurial innovative thinking, and make more balanced and well-founded decisions that take into account diverse experience and approaches. At the same time, it is important to consider that the company’s decision to hire a specialist also depends on the candidate in any age group: the willingness to constantly learn and master new skills, take a proactive position in work, the ability to establish communication and work in a team is the key to a successful and successful job search and receiving an offer of cooperation,» she explained to dev.ua.
Ciklum said that they do not keep official statistics on the age of candidates, since the key criteria for the company always remain exclusively professional skills and relevant experience.
«At the same time, we can note what we see in practice: in certain areas, in particular in Embedded development, the strongest specialists often have 15+ years of experience in programming and are in the age range of 40-50. We have recent successful cases of hiring such specialists. In the IT industry, age does not matter — we focus on expertise, analytical thinking and the ability to work in a team,» Ciklum reported.
