Dilbert and Ageism
The cartoon strip ‘Dilbert’ never fails to amuse me. Scott Adams has just started a series about the PHB employing a more senior member of staff, and continues to patronise him not understanding that he is bringing a great deal of experience into the team. Today’s strip was typical, “Mature Employee – I was a chip designer in my old job. PHB – Really? Chocolate or Poker?â€. This isn’t far from the truth in organisations today from what I’ve read on the ‘net lately. On the BBC News website a week or two back, there was a piece about the impending doom or crisis for the UK IT job market. It seems that we don’t have enough skilled people out there to fill the vacant positions. But reading many comments on the message boards that accompanied news article, it appears that ageism is prevalent throughout the UK IT industry.