Is 45 too old to get a job?

Udemy.com is an online "school" that specializes in such things, and the previous year I enrolled in a range of educational and training courses offered by the website. The majority of the classes I signed up for were simply based on my own personal interests (for instance, I found Jeremy Lipkowtiz's course on mindfulness to be really interesting). However, the majority of them focused on teaching productive skills that may be used in the business.

It turned out that I was acting in a manner that is appropriate for someone approaching middle age.

People who are in the second part of their careers can face significant challenges, including discrimination based on age and long-term unemployment. Changing one's line of work is not easy. It is far more challenging to get new employment after being terminated from your previous position. People over the age of 45 make up the vast majority of those who are jobless for an extended period of time, both in the United States and worldwide. Hiring managers freely say that they are hesitant to recruit candidates older than 40 or 45 for the reasons that their experience is unlikely to be applicable to the workplace, the candidate is unlikely to be eager or able to acquire new skills, and the candidate is unlikely to be a good "match."

However, what is the one item that has the potential to really make a difference? More learning and schooling opportunities.

These are the findings of a recent research conducted by Generation, a nonprofit organization that was established by a group of former McKinsey consultants and is supported financially, among other places, by the management consulting company. I've discussed Generation in previous writings. They have recently released the results of a worldwide study on midcareer employment, which was based on interviews with more than 5,000 employees and managers located in seven different countries.

What have they discovered?

In their research titled Meeting The World's Midcareer Moment, the analysts at Generation state that "older midcareer workers...make up the majority of the long-term jobless in many nations." [Citation needed] For instance, more than forty-five percent of those who have been jobless for a long time are people over the age of 45. And according to their research, if you become unemployed beyond the age of 45, there is a roughly two out of three risk that you would remain jobless for more than a year. They write that people in the middle of their careers are having a more difficult time finding work. People over the age of 45 are facing increasing competition in today's labor market, which is already rather competitive. They have been out of work for a much longer period of time than the national average, and their advanced years are, without a doubt, one of the most significant obstacles on their path to employment.

They indicate that "rampant ageism" on the part of recruiting supervisors is responsible for a significant portion of this problem. Even though these managers acknowledge that employees hired beyond the age of 45 often turn out to be on par with or even better than those hired when they were younger, they still don't want to recruit them. According to the findings of Generation's analysts, hiring managers have a substantial perceived bias towards job prospects who are 445 years old or older because they consider members of this age cohort have inferior abilities and little flexibility.

The findings of the survey are astonishing. It is three times more likely for hiring managers to assess job candidates between the ages of 35 and 44 as "application ready," more "seasoned," and a better "match" than applicants over the age of 45. On average, they give job searchers over the age of 45 a poorer rating on all three criteria, including experience, compared to those between the ages of 18 and 34. This is the case despite the fact that almost nine managers out of ten employees under the age of 45 claimed their post-45 colleagues were just as excellent as or better than younger workers in the same occupations.

What are their greatest concerns about recruiting somebody older than 45? Managers have expressed their concern that older employees hired would be hesitant to experiment with new technology and will be unable to pick up new abilities. (They also seem to be concerned that we will have difficulty collaborating with members of previous generations; yet, it would appear that they are unconcerned about the capacity of other generations to collaborate with us, which should tell you something.)

The majority of those in charge of recruiting are similarly under the age of 45, and they are unwilling to employ candidates older than themselves.

However, I have some wonderful news for you. The situation is turned completely around for older employees who have actively participated in further education and training that is relevant to their careers.

Three quarters of those in charge of employment have said that they are more willing to recruit someone beyond the age of 45 if they have the appropriate degree, training, or qualifications. Seventy-four percent of those over the age of 45 who'd successfully moved jobs indicated that training helped them achieve the new job they wanted.

The researchers argue that the majority of people who transfer careers in the middle of their careers credit training with allowing them to transition to a new professional path. And when they surveyed over 45 applicants about their perspectives, they discovered that "those who are thrilled by training are jobless for shorter time, obtain more job offers, and are more pleased by the job offers they receive." [Citation needed]

Training was cited by hiring managers as a factor that increased their likelihood to recruit candidates beyond the age of 45 by a factor of three, compared to factors such as government subsidies.

What kind of training are we discussing here? Of course, that is determined by the work. And, certainly, the sector certifications you get in school are likely to impress bosses the most. These activities need a commitment of both time and money.

However, they are not the only things that are beneficial. Those individuals who had successfully changed occupations beyond the age of 45 reported to Generation that education and training had been a significant factor in their success. This included in-person, on-the-job training as well as "informal learning" and online courses, with or without certification.

Even if they believe that we are too old to acquire new talents beyond the age of 45, the simple act of gaining new abilities may have an impact all on its own.

There is a negative aspect to this. People who are less likely to be interested in retraining are more likely to come from neighborhoods that have traditionally been disadvantaged, more likely to have poor incomes, and more likely to have attended the fewest years of school after receiving their high school diploma or earlier. People who move jobs beyond the age of 45 and have better wages enroll in a median of 2.5 different training programs each. Those with lower earnings, on average, have access to 0.9 programs.

We may spend as much time as we want railing against "ageism." It serves no use for us. It's easy to forget that employers, like everyone else, are pressed for time and are simply trying to find solutions to issues, but it's important to keep that in mind. Their concerns about employing someone older than 45 will be alleviated if you provide them with "training" of any kind, even training that is both affordable and informal. Because of the internet, learning new skills is also far less difficult and more affordable than at any other time in history. Many online educational platforms, such as Udemy and Lynda.com, provide attractive sign-up discounts. (For example, if you sign up for Udemy for the first time, each course will only cost you $12.) Additionally, YouTube offers its courses at no cost.

Bottom line? Obtaining a new job beyond the age of 45, much alone switching fields, may be a genuine challenge in and of itself. Going online to acquire new abilities that are pertinent to our lives is one of the most helpful things that we can do for ourselves. The unfortunate reality is that those individuals who are in most need of assistance are also the least likely to accept it, which presents a difficulty for society as a whole. Not only do we not like to see people's lives go to waste, but it is to everyone's advantage if there are fewer people without jobs and more people with jobs.