Suffering discrimination when you work for an employer is one thing. Suffering it when you are still looking for jobs could cause you to miss out on the offer of employment altogether.
Most employers have a picture in their heads of their ideal candidate. There is nothing wrong with that per se, but it can inhibit their ability to give everyone a fair chance. So strong can the pictures in our heads be that staying impartial can be challenging, yet that is what the law requires. People should be judged on their ability to do the job, rather than their personal characteristics such as the color of their skin, their age or gender.
Age is one area where recruitment discrimination is rife
A lot of companies want to present a young image or those in charge of hiring want to recruit employees of a similar age and outlook to themselves. Think of tech companies that offer bean bags and table tennis tables as company perks. These perks would typically appeal more to someone who is fresh out of college and looking to make new friends in a city than someone who has a family to return home to each night.
Another thing employers might do is use terms when recruiting such as “digital native” or “recently graduated’ which can discourage those who did not grow up with their phone in their hand and hand wrote their college essays from applying.
Sometimes it is hard to pin down exactly what it is about a job posting that puts you off applying. Sometimes you might apply anyway but feel your application did not get a fair chance. If you think age discrimination occurred, you may want help to look at the individual elements, such as the job posting or interview process and build a case to show that age discrimination did indeed occur.