Top Ten list For Reducing, Eliminating Age Discrimination in the workplace

DENVER (March 4,1998) -- According to educator and consultant Sheldon Steinhauser, age discrimination has cost American businesses millions of dollars and, as the baby boomer generation ages, such costs are likely to increase exponentially.

“Until business leaders wake up to the fact that age discrimination is a critical issue demanding immediate action, the courts are going to continue to impose enormous fines and award severe punitive damages,” said Steinhauser, associate professor of sociology at The Metropolitan State College of Denver and president of Sheldon Steinhauser & Associates, a diversity consulting firm specializing in age discrimination issues.

Steinhauser points to a myriad of recent examples: Westinghouse Electric and Northrop Grumman have agreed to pay $14 million to settle lawsuits filed by fired workers at two plants; First Union Corporation, one of the nation’s largest banks, agreed to pay $58.5 million to 239 former employees to settle an age discrimination suit.

In order to reduce or eliminate costly age discrimination litigation, Steinhauser has developed a list of the Top Ten Actions businesses can take:

1. Recognize age bias and discrimination as the pervasive, escalating issue it is.
2. Do an audit to assess your organization’s “culture.” Find out how employees feel about older workers and how those feelings manifest themselves in the workplace. Messages often emanate from the CEO and are picked up by managers and supervisors.
3. Re-think attitudes about older adults in your workplace.
4. Initiate a dialogue between managers of different departments regarding age discrimination. Discuss the issue at appropriate professional organization meetings to find out how other businesses are dealing with it.
5. Review and, if necessary, revise policies, training programs, recruiting methods, job designs and evaluations to eliminate discriminatory language and/or implications.
6. Expand preventative training on age bias.
7. Spend less time documenting defenses against potential age discrimination law suits and more time preventing or minimizing them.
8. Tap into agencies and networks that involve the older adult population.
9. Develop community relations programs to support services for older adults in the community as part of your company or organization’s agenda for being a good corporate citizen.
10. Build morale and higher productivity by demonstrating to older workers that they are valued and appreciated.

According to Steinhauser, companies, corporations and organizations must develop innovative and sensitive programs to address the issue of age bias and discrimination in the workplace. Those that are successful in implementing such programs will reduce, or perhaps even eliminate, the seemingly inevitable wave of costly litigation to be brought on by the boomer generation as it ages.