Who is considered an ‘older worker'? Extending our conceptualisation of ‘older’ from an organisational decision maker perspective

• Author: Christine Cross,Jean McCarthy,Jeanette N. Cleveland,Noreen Heraty
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/1748-8583.12041
• Published date: 01 November 2014
• Date: 01 November 2014

Who is considered an ‘older worker’? Extending

our conceptualisation of ‘older’ from an

organisational decision maker perspective

Jean McCarthy,Noreen Heraty and Christine Cross, University of Limerick

Jeanette N. Cleveland, Colorado State University

Human Resource Management Journal, Vol 24, no 4, 2014, pages 374–393

A refinement of the construct of age, specifically ‘older’, is recognised as a critical measurement concern

for experts in both ageing research and policy formation. In this context, we set out to both

chronologically define an ‘older worker’ and to identify on what basis the age of ‘older’ is determined.

In doing so, we draw on open-ended survey data (collected in 2011) from a sample of 407 organisational

decision makers across all industries in Ireland. Our focus was specifically on the perspective of

organisational decision makers because these individuals will be instrumental in facing the challenges

associated with workforce ageing. The results show that workers are considered as ‘older’ at a younger

age than might be expected and that decision makers conceptualise workers as ‘older’ using various

approaches in the organisational context. Our findings contribute to the literature in three ways: firstly,

by providing an important empirically derived understanding of the term ‘older worker’; secondly, by

empirically examining previously suggested ‘possible’ indicators of age; and thirdly, by demonstrating

that these indicators are conceptually and empirically distinct, advancing theory on the concept of age

in the workplace.

Contact: Jean McCarthy, Department of Personnel and Employment Relations, University of

Limerick, Limerick, Ireland. Email: jean.mccarthy@ul.ie

INTRODUCTION

Workforce ageing has been labelled the defining social issue of the 21st century

(Pitt-Catsouphes, 2007). As ‘older workers’ become a dominant demographic group

in the workplace, finding solutions to the economic and social pressures arising from

ageing populations through increasing the labour market participation of these ‘older workers’

is a persistent and pressing policy concern [Organisation for Economic Cooperation and

Development (OECD), 2005; Phillipson and Smith, 2005; Riach, 2009]. The study of ageing at

work with a particular focus on ‘older workers’ is thus at the forefront of the research agenda

internationally, and yet, there remains little consensus on the age or ages at which an ‘older

worker’ is defined (Charness et al., 2007; Finkelstein, 2011). Schalk et al. (2010) draw attention

to the need for a better conceptualisation of age in the workplace than currently exists because

the specific age at which an employee is identified as ‘older’ can have important, often

negative, outcomes for them (Snape and Redman, 2003; Visser et al., 2003; Wood et al., 2008).

Despite repeated calls for the refinement of the construct of age in the workplace (cf. Kooij

et al., 2008; Schalk et al., 2010; Finkelstein, 2011), the current lack of a priori consensus on the

term ‘older worker’ presents a problem not only for ageing and work researchers, but also for

policy makers and decision makers alike (Truxillo et al., 2012, March) because, as Gonyea (2009)

suggests, any attempt to determine the current and future number of older workers must start

with a definition of who ‘older workers’ are. More specifically, understanding older worker bias

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doi: 10.1111/1748-8583.12041

HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT JOURNAL, VOL 24 NO 4, 2014374

© 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Please cite this article in press as: McCarthy, J., Heraty, N., Cross, C. and Cleveland, J.N. (2014) ‘Who is considered an ‘older worker’? Extending

our conceptualisation of ‘older’ from an organisational decision maker perspective’. Human Resource Management Journal 24: 4, 374–393.

is made more difficult ‘if we do not know what we are talking about when we use the word

old’ (Finkelstein and Farrell, 2007: 10).

This article offers an empirical investigation of the construct of age in the workplace and

addresses repeated calls for greater empirical evidence at the level of the organisation on the

conceptualisation of age at work. We contribute to the literature in three particular ways.

Our first contribution in this article is to empirically explore at what age, and why, a worker

is considered ‘older’ by decision makers in organisations. We do this by offering empirical

evidence from 407 managers and supervisors on the age at which they consider a worker

to be ‘older’, as well as their rationale as to why they conceptualise a worker to be ‘older ’

at this age. We found no published empirical evidence of this nature in our search of the

extant literature to date; yet the centrality of this stakeholder group in understanding and

managing age diversity is increasingly recognised. We argue that any evidence that helps us

to better understand how this group conceptualises age in the workplace offers progress in

this field.

We identify a decision maker as any manager or supervisor who has direct responsibility for

making decisions relating to the hiring, training, development, promotion or dismissal (by way

or redundancy) of employees in their organisation. We believe that decision makers’ views of

who constitutes an older worker are critical because these managers and supervisors determine

entry/re-entry to employment, identification of talent for promotion, access to training and

development opportunities at work, and retention prospects for all workers. We know from

successive studies over many years that age bias remains a persistent problem in the workplace.

Hirsch et al. (2000) point to evidence of outright and pervasive age discrimination in the

workplace and successive meta-analyses of age discrimination research by Finkelstein et al.

(1995), Kite and Johnson ((1988) and of age stereotypes by Ng and Feldman (2008) consistently

indicate an overall negative bias against ‘older workers’. These negative stereotypes become

ingrained in organisational norms and incorporated into HR systems (Farr et al., 1998) unless

actively challenged. In point of fact, Hedge and Kehoe (2009) stress that there are probably

more policies and decisions that are implicitly age biased than those that are explicitly so, while

Adler and Hibler (2009) note that employer practices regarding hiring, lay-offs, workplace

environment and employee benefits structure all play an important role in determining an older

worker’s ability to work. McCann and Giles (2002: 167) further caution that where negative

perceptions of older people in general are extrapolated into the workplace context, those

generalisations can play a part in stereotypical expectations by management, which may serve

as a harbinger to ageist communication and discriminatory practices towards older workers.

Both Leisink and Knies (2011) and Hedge (2009) identify a central role for managers in this

respect because their role provides them with the potential to influence cultural values and

position their organisation as one that supports age-neutral policies and practices. Together, we

can see that the manner in which ‘older workers’ are considered by managers is likely to have

a significant impact on the treatment of this category of worker, a point that Schalk et al. (2010)

suggest is likely to be determined by certain underlying conceptualisations of ageing.

Kite and Wagner (2004) argued that age-based ratings cannot be easily categorised or

captured because it matters whom you ask and what you ask about. While a number of models

have offered important conceptual approaches to how workers can be categorised as ‘older’ (i.e.

Sterns and Doverspike, 1989; Cleveland and Shore, 1992; Pitt-Catsouphes et al., 2010), to date

these models have not been empirically examined in an organisational context. Our second

contribution, therefore, is to empirically examine the utility of Sterns and Doverspike’s

conceptualisation of age (Sterns and Doverspike, 1989) framework for understanding age in an

organisational context – to our knowledge, this has not been completed or certainly published

Jean McCarthy, Noreen Heraty, Christine Cross and Jeanette N. Cleveland

HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT JOURNAL, VOL 24 NO 4, 2014 375

© 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.