Bernie Borges [00:00:00]:
Maureen Wiley Clough, welcome back to the Midlife Fulfill podcast, another maximum episode.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:00:08]:
I’m so pleased to be here. Thank you so much, Bernie.
Bernie Borges [00:00:11]:
Thank you, Maureen. Well, you were on episode 130 4. I don’t know when that was, but let’s just say that it was about 80 episodes ago, give or take. And just to refresh my yeah. To refresh my listener, so maybe my listener didn’t catch that episode, you are the host of the It Gets Late Early podcast. I love that name. And, Maureen, if I was to really kinda frame you up as who you are in the world is you are an activist, you are an, advocate really focused on, and here’s your tagline right from your website, breaking ageism in tech. But I think I have your permission to say that you’re not limited to tech.
Bernie Borges [00:00:55]:
You just kinda brand yourself around that because you you spent your career in tech. And I wanted to have a conversation with you about a recent insomnia experience that you shared. It’s not about insomnia, listener, so just sit tight here. It’s not about that. But the story began, Maureen, with one night when you woke up at 3 AM, and I’ll turn it over to you.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:01:23]:
Yeah. I mean, occasionally, I do struggle with insomnia, as I know many people do. So, yeah, I woke up in the middle of the night, and because I’m super cool, I decided to log on to LinkedIn on my phone, on my little supercomputer in my hand. And I I don’t know. I thought that that would maybe help lull me back to sleep because why wouldn’t that do so? But so I log in to LinkedIn, and I see this post from I believe it was Victoria Tomlinson who I originally saw, and she is an anti ageism advocate over in the UK. And the post was about this career guide that was published by Indeed, which is the largest job site in the world, so a massive player. And the picture that she pulled directly from the website, from the Indeed career guide, just, like, woke me all the way up because it was so incredibly offensive. I mean, wildly so.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:02:13]:
It had everybody’s career stages listed by decades. So it had, you know, a certain decade that was late career. They called late career, and that was 45 to 55. And then right after that, they had one that they labeled decline from 55 to 65. And as you could imagine, quite so many people were not so pleased to hear that they were labeled as in decline in those particular years. So I was floored. I had to go and read it myself, see it to believe it, and it was still on the Indeed website at that point. So I I took a look through it, and it was actually even worse than just those labels would indicate.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:02:49]:
I actually read through the entire thing, and it said things like, hey. When you’re in your late career stage, you should stop focusing on things like learning and start thinking about training a successor. And I was like, what? What? What is this dribble? And so I I woke up and I I penned this post, this impassioned post about how wrong this was, how deeply ageist the language within it was, how outdated the guide was, how it was kind of, like, reflective of how a lot of employers think of the workplace, and so it was some so somewhat of a they said the quiet part out loud and published it for all to see type of scenario. And I I hit post, except for I had scheduled it to release at around 8 AM Pacific. I’m on the Pacific time zone. And for some reason, LinkedIn messed up, and it posted it in the middle of the night. So my insomnia musings were posted at 3 AM, which ended up being really funny because when I woke up later and I pulled up LinkedIn, I had a gazillion notifications, and the post had gone viral along with those of the other people I’d mentioned, like Victoria Tomlinson and Lindsay Simpson of of 55 Redefined and several other people who were over in the UK. So I posted it, and my audience is typically, you know, in in the United States, and so I thought they wouldn’t see it.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:04:09]:
So it was it was interesting because it pushed it to a different audience that I don’t normally have in my network. So it had spread like wildfire, and by about 9:15 AM Pacific, I had received on my post itself a a comment from Indeed corporate from their social media account saying, we are so sorry. This was so wrong. We have pulled it off the website and, you know, basically our bad. Right? And so they publicly commented and they pulled it down. So it was it was a firestorm that was multiple people across the world, and they acted within really hours of seeing how wrong they were. But And
Bernie Borges [00:04:46]:
wasn’t wasn’t that post already up on their website for, like, a year?
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:04:50]:
A year, Bernie. An entire over a year. And so, I think it was Sarah Taylor Phillips who found it originally in the in in the UK and posted about it, and then it just kinda spread throughout all the, the people who advocate against ageism and it was but it it just was it was flabbergasting that someone would have put this to print and that it would not have been flagged by anyone. And it really underscored to me, it’s like, tell me you don’t hire anyone on your editorial team over 40 without telling me you don’t hire anyone on your editorial team over 40 because it was uniformly and and universally panned. It was it was terrible. Yeah. It’s like the worst career advice ever written.
Bernie Borges [00:05:31]:
So here’s what’s here’s what’s super, super ironic. Before we jumped on this recording, knowing we were gonna discuss this, just out of curiosity, I Googled indeed ageism. Right? Indeed ageism. And the very first listing is a blog post. The title of the blog post is Ageism in the Workplace, Its Impact, and How to Prevent It. And it’s a pretty long, detailed blog post. What is age is what is ageism in the workplace? And then a bunch of paragraphs. Benefits of hiring older workers, increased loyalty experience, different perspective, ageism examples in the work.
Bernie Borges [00:06:09]:
I mean, the the blog post goes on and on and on. And, Maureen, this blog post is from Indeed. It’s on the Indeed website. How ironic is that?
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:06:20]:
It is. And in fact, I decided after the whole debacle that I would invite Indeed to come on to the next show that I was going to host, and I was going to actually cover exactly what happened with this whole saga. And there were people on the Indeed team, including the CMO, Jessica Jensen, who publicly expressed interest in joining me. And then I was sent to, you know, an external, basically, PR firm, you know, Indeed PR, whatever it was called. And from there, it was, you know, all these different people within Indeed trying to set me up with the right person to come on the show. But, eventually, what happened was even though we were in the process of scheduling someone, the external crisis comms team just said, you will not be having
Bernie Borges [00:07:00]:
the show with you. Yeah.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:07:02]:
So that’s not gonna happen. But, yeah, he did actually and tying it back to what you just said about the piece on their website, he said, I have this this particular statement I want you to read on the air to your listeners, and he also provided me with a bunch of links, including the link to the piece that you just mentioned. So he’s like, we have these other things for older workers, and we care about this, and we’re sorry, but, you know, the fact that they didn’t show up, I I imagine it was legal advice not to do so. Right? But Yeah. It leaves a lot of questions and a lot of things that are unanswered about their true commitment to actually supporting workers across all generations. Right?
Bernie Borges [00:07:40]:
Yeah. Yeah. So let’s segue to, kind of, the the the bigger picture here, because this is just an example. Of course, you are focused on this, Maureen. Your whole podcast is about it. Your your your very professional existence is all about this whole ageism conundrum that, many of us face. What are you seeing in the time that you’ve been advocating? You’ve been an activist. You’ve been podcasting.
Bernie Borges [00:08:04]:
What are you seeing? Are we making progress, or are we stuck in the mud or going backwards?
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:08:09]:
Well, it’s interesting. The EEOC actually just released a report last week called high-tech low inclusion, which is an excellent burn and very illustrative of exactly what’s within that report. And they did focus on age in the report. And even as our population grows markedly older, our representation in the tech workforce is slipping. So we went from 56% of the workforce in 2014 down to 52% in 2022. And so that that is concerning. And we’ve all What
Bernie Borges [00:08:38]:
what is that what is it what does that number represent?
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:08:41]:
That represents the representative group in the tech workforce of those over 40.
Bernie Borges [00:08:45]:
Over 40. Okay.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:08:47]:
Yeah. And and also they are hiring people at a staggering clip under 25, under age 25 relative to the rest of the all American industry. So it’s it’s a very clear preference for youth and a decline in the representative group of those over 40 in the tech industry. So for me, that was first, first of all, like excellent validation. I thought to myself, no one needs to gaslight themselves anymore. We know that this is happening. It is an issue. It’s been called out by the EEOC and it’s it’s beyond mere sentiment and survey data now.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:09:18]:
It’s actual like, numbers of employment. So I’m very grateful for that because it’s really gonna give us a chance to have a real conversation about it moving forward with facts and figures underpinning what we have all been feeling. So that happened, which was really great because we know there’s an issue, demonstrably so, from all this data. But I will say I’ve also noticed just an incredible uptick in the number of people talking about this openly and the number of times I see pieces about this all over, and people are just not willing to sit idly by and let this happen to them anymore. And I think that’s very emblematic in what happened in the Indeed saga. Right? I mean, this this massive entity, this one of the biggest companies in the career space, in the job search space
Bernie Borges [00:10:01]:
Mhmm.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:10:01]:
Was made to backpedal because of our collective voices saying we won’t stand for this kind of stereotypical horrible language to be used on this website. So, I mean, that I found to be incredibly heartening. Whether it amounts to lasting change within Indeed and and at other companies, it remains to be seen. But from my perspective, the very first step to any sort of change is creating awareness, and I think we are well on our way on doing that. So I’m extremely excited about the opportunity that’s ahead for us to change the game for people of all ages and the ability to shift focus to how do we support a multi generational workforce. Right? How do we get people collaborating and innovating better together? And there’s just so much opportunity there. So I’ll also say I did deliver a speech at disrupt HR, and disrupt HR is a think tank organization that puts people on stages across the world, actually, in various cities, and they allow them 5 minutes. It’s like a 5 minute mini TED talk with a Right.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:11:00]:
15 second auto advancing slide deck, which, by the way, I didn’t read about that until after I applied. And when I got notified that I was actually doing it and got this instructions, I was like, oh my gosh. What if I send a form to? But I did it. I I made it through, and it was actually a lot of fun. But, this also heartened me a lot. They produce every single week after they launch these videos. They send out the next week a top 5 all videos watched the week before. And the week that my video launched, I was number 5 of all the I mean, they have so many videos.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:11:33]:
My video about adding age to the DEIB equation got 5th place. So people were actually paying attention. So, again, it just underscores to me, I think that there is a lot of enthusiasm, interest, and, you know, just movement on this particular front of of talking about age at work.
Bernie Borges [00:11:50]:
Yeah. That’s great. So speaking of intergenerational workforce dynamics, there’s a lot of my report on that, Maureen. I think you know, but I’ve I’ve been working on this report for many months. By the time this publishes, that report should be available. And even if it’s not, you can sign up to get it on the website midlifefulfilled.com. We had a number of questions that really speak to this whole intergenerational workforce topic. And I’ll share, you know, one data point that I thought was fascinating.
Bernie Borges [00:12:20]:
And that is that, by and large, I think it was, like, 75% of the people over 40 feel that they work well, collaborate well with younger people in the workforce. Oh. So so those of us over 40 feel good about collaborating with younger people in the workforce. Unfortunately, it it’s not reciprocated. And, of course, you see that a whole lot more than I do. Right? Because I’m not as focused on it as you are. Yeah. But from our lens, from our perspective, we’re happy to collaborate.
Bernie Borges [00:12:49]:
We enjoy it. I mean, many of the questions actually drill down on the collaborating with younger people in the workplace and mentoring and that sort of thing. So
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:12:59]:
That’s fascinating.
Bernie Borges [00:13:00]:
Encouraging.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:13:01]:
That is that is fascinating that a lot of the older people are interested in in actually having those conversations and communicating with the younger people, but it’s not reciprocal. I I have some perspective on why that might be, but, yeah, that’s I can’t wait to dive into that report. That’s wonderful.
Bernie Borges [00:13:16]:
Okay. So, are you seeing, you know, disrupt HR, you used as an example. Are you seeing that the HR community is heightening their awareness around ageism and maybe taking some action? Or you mentioned the I think it was the EOC report. But, you know, your exposure and your own career was in tech. Mhmm. So how much exposure do you do you continue to have through that window of tech employers as it relates to ageism?
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:13:45]:
Well, for example, I’m going to the HR tech show in Las Vegas. It’s next week. I’m not sure when this will air, but HR tech is a community focused on companies that support tech within the HR realm, of course, and companies that support anyone in HR sort of organizations, so all sorts of SaaS solutions and what have you. And I am there as a media member, and I’ve had a ton of outreach to me asking, can we be interviewed by you? Can we talk about what we’re doing for age diversity? Can we talk about how we help remove bias in the job search process? So I think that that is a good indicator that they’re starting to wake up to the importance of this factor. I still think we’re in early days, though. I mean, I know that this survey at this point by w PwC is rather old at this point, but the last data collected on how many organizations are using age as part of DEIB initiatives, it was pretty grim. It was like only 8% of organizations care about age right now or focus on it right now. I do think that that needs to be revised.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:14:41]:
I imagine it’s better than that now, but we’ve really just we’re at the tip of the iceberg here. I mean, we have a lot of of ground to cover, but I do think that there is enhanced interest in it. So I’ll get back to you after I go to that that session next week and and tell you how it how it goes, those conversations are going, and how much, you know, merit, I would say, is is behind the statement that things are changing.
Bernie Borges [00:15:03]:
Well, actually, you don’t have to get back to me. I’ll I’ll just tune into your your media coverage. Right?
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:15:10]:
Sure you go. Podcast,
Bernie Borges [00:15:11]:
your videos. I’ll just be tuning in as as I often do. Yeah. Yeah. You know, a few episode episodes ago, I featured a gentleman by the name of Mark Daly, and he shared a story. He’s in his early sixties, and and I’m in my mid sixties. So, you know, I talk about age pride. I I never deny that.
Bernie Borges [00:15:29]:
I never hide that. So he’s in his early maybe mid sixties. I don’t know. And he shares a story about how he was going through a job interview process for a position that he was imminently qualified for, like, really totally qualified for. He had a ton of relevant experience. And then after they went dark on him, he followed up and eventually got the person that he was talking to. And she said to him that her boss, said that he was looking for someone with quote unquote more runway.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:16:00]:
Mhmm. Yep.
Bernie Borges [00:16:03]:
And he said to her, he said, you know, I could sue you for that. I I I won’t. Yeah. But you realize that that is lawsuit material. And I just wonder, anecdotally, how many people who are in that probably HR knows that, but I don’t think she was in HR. I think she was more of, like, in the, yeah, the hiring manager or or you know, like, it probably her hiring manager. We’ll leave it at that. But how many people are not even aware of that? And they’re not even aware of the words that are not only lawsuit material, Maureen, but also just offensive.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:16:40]:
Yep. Offensive. And, also, the data is is showing the opposite. Actually, older employees tend to have more tenure than younger employees. That’s what the data bears out. So it’s actually just wrong anyway. So, it’s it’s wild. So I think you’re right.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:16:53]:
The point is that a lot of people don’t even understand that these things are wrong. People don’t understand their rights at work. People don’t people don’t understand what the law is. Right? And so this sort of thing happens all the time. I hear my audience is constantly reaching out to me saying things just like what you just said. Right? And sometimes they will actually literally use the word younger or earlier in his or her career, and that’s why we went that with that person. Right? And and that, like you said, is lawsuit material. Age discrimination, despite the fact that it is so incredibly hard to prove in court, still remains to be markedly higher in the tech sector.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:17:26]:
Those suits come up more than a gender, race, etcetera, which is fascinating to me. So, it’s, I would say, rampant at this point, but there’s just there’s such a need for education. So, I think the education has to happen at all these organizations about why you need to remove age bias from the equation, but that’s that’s something that has to happen, like you mentioned, with this situation. It wasn’t necessarily the recruiter who uttered that extremely potentially litigation booming saying. Right? Like, it it could have been anyone on that team who would say that. It wouldn’t necessarily just come from you know, you could school what I’m trying to say is you could school the people who are the gatekeepers in the recruiting and talent acquisition team, but that doesn’t mean that the average hiring manager understands what you can and cannot say and why it’s wrong. So you have to actually have a 2 pronged effect. You have to talk to people on the the talent acquisition and recruiting side as well as all of the hiring managers.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:18:23]:
So this education needs to permeate through all the ranks of an organization, so it’s not just like a rubber stamp you go to to the HR team and you’re good. It’s just not how it works. But people just don’t they don’t even know that ageism is wrong. Like, that’s how deeply ageist our society is. 1 in 2 people are ageist according to the World Health Organization. 42% of hiring managers have copped having an age bias against either the young or the old, and that’s from a recent resume builder survey. And and so this is just a wide spread issue with a lot of potential ramifications for both companies and employers, and also, of course, candidates. So, yeah, lots of issues there.
Bernie Borges [00:19:02]:
So what do you think has to change, Maureen? How how is this situation going to improve over time?
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:19:09]:
So I think having reports like the EEOC’s recent report is really, really helpful to actually anchoring the conversation in data. Right? That I I’m so delighted to see how bad it is because now we can move from there. It’s not just merely, I feel like I’m being discriminated against and, oh, you do too. I mean, because those those surveys have been around for a long time, and they have all pointed to age discrimination and ageism being an issue. Now we have data proving the relative proportional, employment being off. Right? So, we know that. But, I think, it’s gonna take a lot just societally. I mean, we have to have the conversation about aging even with ourselves internally because we all have so much internalized ageism from growing up in this society.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:19:52]:
And so, I I continue to see heartening things like this being discussed more openly, even when it comes to media. You look at there’s a movie that’s, I believe, coming out today with Demi Moore and it’s called The Substance, and it’s a horror movie actually, and it’s about aging. It’s a horror movie about aging. Brea, can you believe this?
Bernie Borges [00:20:12]:
So Really?
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:20:13]:
Yes. And the premise is that Demi Moore is a 50 plus year old instructor, some sort of athletic, you know, instructor, maybe Jane Fonda esque. Right? And she’s told, basically, we wanna replace you with someone younger. So she instead goes and injects herself with something called the substance, which is supposed to make you a younger, healthier, sexier, better version of yourself. And apparently
Bernie Borges [00:20:37]:
sound all that bad, by the way. Right. Exactly.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:20:39]:
Well, that’s what probably everyone want. Right? Because we all we all drink from the fountain of youth. It’s what we want, especially
Bernie Borges [00:20:45]:
in women.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:20:45]:
And so she injects herself with this thing, and then all hell breaks loose. And, apparently, it’s full of gore. It’s gratuitous. Like, I was told you maybe don’t wanna see it, but, obviously, what that is is a narrative, you know, attacking the beauty industry and the silly standards
Bernie Borges [00:21:01]:
that
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:21:01]:
we have, especially for women when it comes to aging. So I think I will see it, but I’ll probably cover my eyes half the time. I’m not a horror movie type person, but, I mean, that is putting it directly in society, talking openly about these issues, and that’s how it’s gonna change because we all have these beliefs. Like, I think more than half of us are ages because we’ve been told getting older is the worst thing. We’ve been told it’s a bad thing. Right? And so I think we have to continue to to talk about it openly, to continue to see people who are out there crushing it into their later years. And we also I mean, the the demographic of the workforce is going to change just because we are all graying at the same time. Right? Like, we’re all growing older, and it’s just going to, I think, sort of, I hope, naturally start to change a little bit because if people want to fill the jobs that they need to have filled, they’re going to have to employ older workers.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:21:52]:
So I hope that that reality will also kind of, you know, smooth things over, But this is not an overnight thing at all, and yet I am extremely hopeful based on what I’ve seen and just I’ve been doing this for a little bit over a year at this point, and I feel like I’ve seen so much change. And, you know, granted, Bernie, you and I are obviously, you know, confirmation bias. We’re looking for this information everywhere, but it really seems to be picking up. It really truly does. So, yeah, lots of things have to change, but it really does have to start internally with each of us ourselves.
Bernie Borges [00:22:24]:
Yeah. So I agree. Yes, and, Maureen. The and is, I think, leadership in organizations. And when I say organizations, I mean of all sizes, whether you’re a small local business, you know, that employs 10 people, or you’re a large enterprise that employs north of a 100000 people. Leadership needs to be aware of this, and leadership needs to just like the DEI movement, and I know DEI is getting a lot of criticism and in some cases, maybe in many cases, being scaled back or even in some cases, completely eliminated. But it’s part of that. I mean, ageism is part of discrimination.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:23:03]:
It is.
Bernie Borges [00:23:03]:
And so I think it just needs to be more cognizant at the leadership level and have to lead by example. And, you know, one of the other topics that I mentioned briefly earlier that we cover in in my report, Thriving in Midlife, is about mentoring. And, a lot of people like to mentor, but not a lot of people are doing it. Now, specifically, the question was asked about mentoring in the workplace. So it is limiting because I know I mentor someone, but it’s not in the workplace. It’s just someone an individual that I mentor outside the workplace. Yeah. So the question was definitely in the workplace.
Bernie Borges [00:23:38]:
But, again, a lot of interest in doing it, but not a lot of mentoring taking place. Yeah. And it seems to me that if there was more mentoring taking place, that there would be a lot more intergenerational activity because And I heard someone say recently, like, reverse mentoring is the wrong way to even frame it up. Yeah.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:23:57]:
I said that.
Bernie Borges [00:23:57]:
It should just be You said that. There you go. Of course. You said that. It should come from you. There you go. So credit where credit’s due, Maureen. Yeah.
Bernie Borges [00:24:05]:
So go ahead. Elaborate on that.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:24:07]:
Yeah. So, I mean, everybody knows just instinctively what the concept of reverse mentorship is, and that is, of course, that the young teach the old because we think of ours, we think of mentorships as something that’s age based, but, really, it’s all about experience and skills. And I learn all the time from a younger social media, content creator. He helps me so much. He’s brilliant. He’s 27. And, you know, I wanna just call that mentorship because it shouldn’t have age attached to it whatsoever, but that’s the way we’ve all been we’ve been trained to think. Right? It’s like the knowledge comes down from the elders and the wisdom comes down.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:24:41]:
And, really, it’s not it’s not like that. You can you can have incredible experience at a young age and teach anyone of any age. Right? So but that’s that’s how people look at it. And, I think it needs to shift a little bit. I think there’s a little bit of a hierarchical sense that that people maybe don’t feel comfortable with either when you add that sort of component of the the different levels and and you ascribe meaning to someone who’s older just by virtue of the fact they’ve been around longer. Right? So I think it does need to shift, but I understand why that concept exists. Right? But we’ll move on from it. But you mentioned something in the last question or the last discussion point that I think is worth calling out about leadership being really attuned to this.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:25:19]:
And I hate to say this, Bernie, but I think they very much are right now. I think they know what’s happening. They are calling older workers. These return to office I call them return to office layoffs because I think that’s what they are. These mandates, they know that it’s going to impact older, more experienced workers predominantly and that they’re gonna be the ones that leave, and it’s a way to get them to flee for the exits and not have to pay them severance, not have to pay for unemployment. It sounds better PR wise. You know, they left versus we fired a bunch of people. And, you know, I I’ve been hearing from countless people at this point about age related layoffs.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:25:54]:
Now was it age discrimination or was it cost cutting? You know, remains to be seen. You have to dig deeper. And a lot of people don’t know their rights. They don’t know the signs of age discrimination. Sometimes people being, you know, disproportionately let go over 40 is merely cost cutting. Right? It has to include other elements of ageism, like ageist remarks or lack of promotion for people in a certain age range. Like, there has to be something else, but people don’t know that either. Right? So I’ve had people reach out to me and say, I think I was a part of an age discrimination related layoff, and I’m like, actually, based on what you’re telling me, I don’t think you were.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:26:29]:
So there needs to be a whole lot more education, and I I hope that, you know, for example, the case that’s proceeding against Elon Musk’s X Corporation for the layoffs that are allegedly for those over 50, I hope that there’s merit to that case because it’s kind of interesting. I think if there isn’t, it it does a disservice to us working on this. Right? Because if there’s no merit there, it’s gonna sound like people who are, you know, just upset about something that happened to them and it’s going to be at the detriment of the larger movement because ageism exists. It’s just it’s not always taking place in these layoffs. But, again, the fact remains these layoffs and this is the thing that nobody in the media is talking about yet. These layoffs are predominantly impacting older workers, and there’s a massive brain drain of those potential you know, some of them potential mentors. Right? Not all because it’s not age related, but the the ability to pull experienced workers into into the workplace and help with the intergenerational collaboration, it’s all walking out the door right now, and no one is talking about it. So leadership does know.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:27:32]:
I think they deliberately do this.
Bernie Borges [00:27:35]:
Yeah. I guess the point that I was trying to make, and maybe I didn’t make it very well, is that leadership needs to take some action. And you’ve shared the example of some of the action that is that you’re seeing that is not the kind of action that you would like to see. Not what we want.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:27:50]:
Yeah. Not what we want.
Bernie Borges [00:27:51]:
Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Maureen, closing thought here. Look into your crystal ball, and I’m gonna suggest you look 3 years out. And if you wanna change the timeline, time horizon, feel free. I’m just gonna go with 3 years, but you can change it if you want. What do you see? On this whole topic, what do you see in that crystal ball?
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:28:12]:
I would say I see a ton more awareness. I see a lot more emphasis internally at organizations openly discussing this. I see a lot more mentorship. I actually did a walk yesterday with a women in tech regatta group in Seattle, and it was a walk and talk event. And it was a group of probably 15 women of all ages, and we just we had it out. We talked openly about age, and you could see the light bulb moments for so many people. And the younger people in the group were hearing these incredible stories from the older people in the group who were talking about what it was like coming back to work after having a baby or how to deal with multigenerational teams and, you know, the preference for Slack versus, you know, using email. Some people have organizations that literally do not have email, and it’s like if you are in your forties and beyond, you’ve probably done a lot of work in email over the course of your career.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:29:04]:
So that’s that’s gonna be a hurdle, and how do we help people and bridge that gap. Right? We had all these I mean, some of them moved me to tears. These these conversations about people just kind of recognizing ageism hitting them too late and and kind of being taken on their on their, heels a little bit by it. So this sort of conversation can be incredibly powerful, and I think we have the opportunity to really shape the future by sharing across generations what’s going on for us and what can we expect in the future. So I see a lot more of that. I imagine there will be a lot more companies that will bring people in to do this sort of consulting and workshop work around this topic because it’s something that actually impacts all of us. And you you can’t I mean, it’s just a fact of life. Like, the goal is to get older.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:29:52]:
So I think in the next few years, we’re going to see a lot more, a lot more emphasis on. I really do. I think it’s not gonna be solved. I wish I had a silver bullet. I think we all need to recognize that there are going to be hurdles that we have to face as we get older. We have to prepare for them as best we can. We have to try not to be victimized by the situation because that’s just it helps no one. Right? So Mhmm.
Bernie Borges [00:30:15]:
We’re
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:30:15]:
also coming to a point where it’s very clear that corporate employment is not the safety net that we all thought it would be and that careers will be changing, and there’s probably gonna be more of a jump to a gig economy as well. So I think there’s a lot that we have to just sort of contend with and get grounded in reality. But overall, I think I I’m just left with a very hopeful feeling about it because I think we’re all just gonna be much better set up to face whatever the future might be because we’re having these conversations. So I see I see hopefulness.
Bernie Borges [00:30:45]:
You’re optimistic. Well, you are a voice, Maureen, and you are being heard. People are following you. In the time that I followed you, I’ve noticed that you have more and more people following you, and you’re having more influence. So congratulations on that. I’m I’m happy to see that. I know that you’re very passionate about this. I mean, it stems from your own story, which we covered back on episode 134.
Bernie Borges [00:31:09]:
So if you’re interested in hearing that, go back and listen to episode 134. And so, I love what you’re doing. It Gets It Gets Late Early. That is your website. That is your podcast. I wanna direct people there to just connect with you. And, Maureen, just thank you so much for joining me on this Maximum episode. And, we’ll keep we’ll keep the conversation going.
Maureen Wiley Clough [00:31:32]:
We sure were will. Thank you so much for fighting the good fight out there, Bernie. I’m so inspired by you.
