By Joe Redshaw

I’m running into “ageism”, recently I worked with an internal person to try and get my resume presented for a position that appeared to be a good fit for my skill set.  The internal person told me to forget it, they were essentially not going to look at anyone over 30 for the position.  How do I find jobs/companies that will look at what I can bring to the table not my age?

There are still companies out there that that do this.  But remember it may be that they want a junior level candidate as well.  I find many with lots of experience applying for entry level roles.  They think it is their age that holds them back but it is their experience level and often salary as well. Some companies want people they can take out of college and “mold”.  People who have been working for the past 10-20 years are not perceived as “moldable”.

There is not much  you can do about age.  You may want to research a company before you submit for a job to see what their employee population looks like.  Look at the company on LinkedIn and try to look at as many as the employees as possible.  What does the workforce look like?  If it is all younger people, you may have a harder time.  But I don’t think there is any way you can tell in the end.  I believe it is more of a manager preference than a company preference.  You were lucky to know from an internal person rather than waste your time.  Not many get this information.  And finally, would you really want to work for a Manager like this anyhow? » Read more: Q & A: Ageism & Career Transition