Ageism is illegal, but it still exists in the process of reviewing resumes. As a 50-year-old who has worked in the same position for 20 years, how can I avoid giving away my age on my resume?
Sadly, age discrimination happens to so many job seekers out there. You can be discriminated against for being “too old” or “too young” in their minds. Age-proofing your resume or CV is something that’s meant to help fight age discrimination. The same goes for those who are concerned about being judged overqualified. And no, it’s not unethical or dishonest. That is if you aren’t really lying!
For example, if you have worked for a place for 12 years. You’re concerned that you’ll be considered overqualified because you have way more experience than others. So you adjust the employment dates to just show seven years of employment. Are you lying? Well, as long as you actually did work there during that time, no, you aren’t lying. So with a resume or CV, there’s flexibility built into work through overqualified and age discrimination. And if your college or university degree goes back to a long time ago, and you’re worried that if you included the graduation year, you’d be considered “too old,” you can leave the year of graduation off your resume or CV to age proof it. Are you being unethical or dishonest? The answer is no! IF you really do have the degree from that school, you don’t have to list dates unless you want to.