Discrimination In The Work Place

Today, discrimination within the work place takes place in different forms. One example of discrimination that I have witnessed within the place of work is age discrimination. Age discrimination has a detrimental effect on the businesses within the working environment. Not only can it damage the working relationship but it also causes the business to incur legal liability. Age discrimination can be as a result of Companies refusing to hire older employee, or when the older employees are treated differently than the younger employees. According to Esposito 2011, age discrimination within the workplace is very wrong and the Congress has enacted the age discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) which was recently amended in 1991. The law was to protect other employees from other various forms of discrimination which include sex, race and religion discrimination. Many states have also enacted other laws which prohibit this form of discrimination; as a result, the employees today have the right to sue any company that illegally discriminates them and so result in large monetary judgments against the company. The law suits create a negative public image of the company as well as exposing the company to a financial peril.

Age discrimination creates an intimidated environment; it interferes with the work performance, the morale and the employment for workers who are older in the organization. Because of this, the managers have started to take measures of avoiding or eliminating age discrimination by understanding and identifying the potential problems within the organization for the success. Effective strategies that involve training, appraisal of each organization’s culture and retirement policies are renewed to provide a supportive work environment for the adult employees. Effective training of employees within an organization can help in raising the employee awareness of their discriminatory practices, managers should therefore make sure that, all employees participate in effective training in every organizations (Mayfair & Media, 2012).Conversely; the focus of training to those employees should go beyond the mere information so as to embrace the real changes on each individuals’ behavior.

An organization that practice peer reinforcement tends to be successful since this helps in encouraging the employees in speaking up their minds whenever they witness any kind of harassment within the organization. Most Organizations have lost their works because of age discrimination among the workers in the working place, however, other employees tend not to be the target of the discrimination, but they might be the next targeted group who do not want to work for a discriminatory organization. When employees leave the company for another company, it is evidently true that the productivity level will go down therefore making the company to lose the potentials of the employees against competitors.

Age discrimination can impact the company by damaging the productivity level. The knowledge of age discrimination by the employees can create an environment which is negative along with company management that has a poor perception causing a reduction in the number of workers therefore increasing the productivity of the discriminatory organization. Workers on the other hand might become concerned as they might lose their jobs because of age or other different forms of discrimination (Mayfair & Media, 2012). Lastly, age discrimination can make the company to lose the extensive work experience and the employees knowledge, take a case where the company fires an older employees so as to recruit younger employees, the company may end up losing also the years of experience of that old employee which could have been be used in helping the business so as to gain its competitive advantage. In summary, age discrimination is wrong and companies should eliminate age discrimination so as to be successful as well as able to gain the competitive advantage.

References

Esposito, S. (2011).Age Discrimination in the Workplace. Retrieved December 2, 2012 from http://www.humanresourcesiq.com/talentmanagement/articles/age-discrimination-in-the-workplace-2-mistakes-you/

Mayfair, A. & Media, D (2012). Improving lives .The Consequences of Age Discrimination at Work. Retrieved December 2, 2012 from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/consequences-age-discrimination-work-15806.html