Youthful image can mean everything in career moves
By Courtnay Edelhart
Indianapolis Star
When an Indianapolis food manufacturer laid off Howard Waelde after 17 years, the 54-year-old executive sent out reams of resumes. No one so much as bothered to send a rejection letter.
Frustrated, Waelde sought help from CICOA, a nonprofit employment agency serving those 50 and older. The agency suggested he remove graduation dates from his resume and list only his last two positions, omitting more than a decade of work experience.
Within weeks, Waelde had five or six job interviews. He now works as a financial analyst for the Indianapolis Housing Agency, but still doesn't earn as much as he did before.
Don't tell him age doesn't matter.
"There were three of us in my area who all got laid off at once, and out of all of us, the only one who found a job right away was the one who dyed his hair," Waelde says.
Fair or not, being or at least looking young seems to give employees a career edge, and more and more workers are altering their appearance to take advantage of that.
Dr. Carole Kanchier, author of "Dare to Change Your Job and Your Life" (Jist Works, $16.95) is an image consultant who coaches people looking to improve their job prospects.
"We live in a youth-oriented culture," she says. "People don't necessarily consciously discriminate, but subconsciously they choose people based on looks.
"There's a perception if you're older that you're not on the cutting edge of changes in your industry, so you want to project an image that communicates youth, energy and confidence."
Kanchier often advises people to color gray hair and update their hairstyle and wardrobe to reflect current fashion trends.
She sympathizes with those who argue that such superficial things have nothing to do with whether someone is qualified to do a job, but says reality is reality. You can either deal with it and get the job or promotion you want, or ignore it and complain about career stagnation.
In 1992, 2.2 percent of age-discrimination complaints filed with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission were deemed worthy of legal action. By 2000, that figure rose to 8.2 percent.
And in a recent survey by the Just For Men hair color company, nearly 65 percent of more than 100 career advisers surveyed said male clients had lost out on job opportunities because they looked too old.
Nearly 70 percent said appearance affects salary.
Admittedly a company hawking hair dyes has an agenda, but the results are still startling.
"It's a shame," says Tom Cochrun, a 55-year-old former television news anchorman who is now president of Indianapolis-based 19th Star Productions. "But I know why it's happening."
Across industries, companies are targeting young consumers, and feel they need young employees or at least people with a youthful attitude to reach them.
Cochrun noted that a documentary he's working on was recently re-edited at the request of a cable television station it was set to air on. The station wanted faster cuts and different music and voice-overs to appeal to a younger audience.
It's not just the media coveting this demographic.
Tru Pettigrew makes a living researching hot trends among teens and 20- to 30-somethings for retailers hoping for a piece of their considerable buying power.
Pettigrew, 30, founded the Boston research firm Y-Access, which sends researchers to nightclubs and malls across the country to take note of music and fashion trends and query young people about what's hip.
Consumers ages 12 to 24 spent $161 billion last year, and influenced another $240 billion in spending by their parents and other loved ones, he says.
But do you really need a young employee to appeal to young consumers and keep track of cutting-edge trends?
Bill Slatin doesn't think so.
Slatin, 67, is a retired district manager for the Ford Motor Co. and a volunteer counselor with the Service Corps of Retired Executives.
"A lot of the aspiring entrepreneurs who come to us for advice are surprised that us older fellows are still with it," he says. "But we read all the trade publications just like anybody else.
"That's got nothing to do with being young. It's just staying on top of technology and changes in your industry, and you can fail or excel at that no matter how old you are."
