Dearest Readers,


Please read the following LinkedIn exchange and give me your thoughts and perspectives.  This has to do with job postings I recently published in connection with two full time positions in the Middle East on behalf of one of my firm's strategic business partners.  For further perspective on this subject, please refer to my earlier blog posts where I advertised two positions in Kuwait -- and for which I added a footnote to make it more US "PC."


As far as I'm concerned, there is no real right or wrong answer.  I'm simply interested in hearing your perspectives on this particular issue because these types of discussions and mindsets will become more commonplace as our global economy continues to evolve.  How do we bridge these differences, and how do we find common ground and gain better understanding of the rest of the world's cultural norms without imposing a "my way or the highway" mentality with our fellow global citizens?

I welcome your thoughts and commentary,
Carrie
Here's an excerpt of my blog posting that prompted the commentary below: 

"Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Full-Time Position in Kuwait #2: Director, Risk & Compliance

Mark G:  "Carrie - I just checked out the blogs pertaining to the two Director-level jobs in Kuwait and noticed that there were age requirements attached to each. You should be aware that this type of thing is probably a violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.

Mark G."

Carrie:  "Hi, Mark. You are correct; however, these jobs are non-US jobs through non-US employers; my intermediary is in Kuwait and not the US. 99% of the applicants are non-US nationals. The applicants don't contract with my firm at all; I'm simply the intermediary who passes on the CVs to my global alliance partners.

The age restriction is my client's mandate and so I have to say this up front.

While this is clearly illegal in the US, it's a widely accepted and legal practice in the Middle East. My firm's #1 market is the Middle East and right now the US is last. I have to tailor what my clients needs to the culture of each client or I cannot compete effectively in the global marketplace.

Having said that, I can see where you're coming from. The problem is that in the US we don't put our DOB on resumes like they do in other parts of the world. It's awkward to ask the age after someone has submitted one because then they ask me why I didn't disclose it up front.

It's a global world full of conundrums and pitfalls for the unwary, and in this case it's a Catch-22. I will add a caveat to the blog entries so that US people understand the context of where these jobs are


One other thing I wanted to mention to you is that, unlike in the US where there is an aging population, in most MENA countries over 50% [some are 75%] of the population is under the age of 25, so the dynamics are different. Unlike in the US where there are so many displaced, unemployed professionals over 40, it is the exact opposite in the Middle Eastern countries.

Another reason for the age emphasis, besides the fact that it's a widely accepted business practice, has to do with cultural reasons. In the Middle East, many children are either sent to school in the US or Europe and often they don't return to their own country, resulting in a brain drain. They don't return because there are no opportunities, something the region is trying to change by moving away from an oil-based economy to a global financial and tourism economy.

The other side to this coin is if there are no jobs or biz opportunities in the home country, the youth that stays in the country with no future business prospects -- those young people become targets for terrorist groups; similar to restless youths in our own country who turn to drugs, gangs, crime -- and more recently home-grown terrorism.

How do I know all this? Because I've worked in the MENA region for over 3-1/2 years. On my very first visit in 2007, I heard this message from the very lips of the head of the Dubai International Financial Centre, who was reiterating what Sheikh Mohammed Al-Makhtoum had expressed numerous times; I have an excellent WSJ Opinion article written by the UAE leader and published in 2007 which outlined these concerns for the future of the youth and the Middle East as a whole.

Finally, I can remember when I was young seeing age and gender restrictions pertaining to jobs in our own country -- as late as the 1970s.

Carrie "



Mark G:  I appreciated your emails explaining the rationale behind the age requirements in your position ads. Obviously, you feel strongly about the matter, and offered heartfelt justification for the practice. Normally, I wouldn’t bother replying since I have a lot of other things to do, but the more I thought about it, the more I became convinced that your points required a reply.

First, on general principles, Americans have fought a long, bitter struggle to eliminate these kinds of socially destructive practices. I’m assuming you’re too young to remember the “Whites Only” signs in restaurants throughout the South, even as late as the 1960s. I remember asking my Mother what those signs meant, and why Black people had to sit at the back of the bus. And the reasons I heard then made no more sense than they do now. Discriminating against people for reason of color, religion, sexual orientation, and, yes, age is morally wrong. Period. We’ve spent too many years and too many lives fighting against these notions to accept them now simply because it’s commercially expedient.

Second, as an economist I consider this practice to be weirdly self destructive. It works against the organization’s own economic interests, whether they realize it or not. Recruiting the best talent available for the price should be the objective of any hiring organization. To do less – to deny one’s own best interests in favor of a purely arbitrary discrimination policy -- wastes resources, and if practiced on a broad scale can make the difference between a successful, competitive firm and a financial failure.

Finally, I just don’t buy your arguments about Middle Eastern culture. I’ve spent more than twenty years working and living overseas – including long term stints in Armenia, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia – and I never had the slightest hint that my clients would have preferred someone else simply because of my age. I have an upcoming assignment in Algeria, and I anticipate that they will be very happy with the work product I will provide them, even though I am well above 45 years of age. And I simply don’t buy the argument that if we don’t hire young people, they’ll turn to terrorism to express their frustration. Please.

In many parts of the world, such as Korea, China and Japan (where I have also worked extensively), older persons are often selected because of their age, even if there are more suitably qualified younger persons available. These cultures value age – and the experience it conveys – over youth precisely because youth has a greater tendency to take the easy path in the short term while ignoring the long term implications of their actions.

In closing, I would just say this. Even if you’re right – that your clients are forcing you somehow to explicitly discriminate against a large class of qualified people (forget for a moment that it’s a direct violation of U.S. law) – what does it say about your firm if you simply go along and post the ad? Does your company value the short term monetary benefit that may come from such a placement over the principle that people should be treated fairly? Does your company not have the courage to say no to this practice, or the wisdom to counsel its client that this is a self-defeating? Integrity often carries a high price, there’s no question about it. But, this is an issue your firm has to struggle with on its own. Your rationalizations are sufficient if you can all look yourselves in the mirror and honestly tell yourselves that it’s perfectly all right. But if you can do that, then yours is not the kind of firm I’d want to work with on a job search, or any other business endeavor for that matter.

Best Regards,

Mark G