Friday, January 26, 2007

Personal Appearance Discrimination


If you think personal appearance doesn't play that big of a role in your career, think again.* An excerpt from Fortify Your Oasis:

There was an interesting study in the late 90s which examined these unconscious discriminatory processes. When shown candidates who were apparently indistinguishable in terms of qualifications, experience and track record, 94% of hirers chose the candidate with no facial hair and 96% of them chose the less heavy candidate - even if that candidate was overweight him- or herself. We're back to the tall
CEO issue here; for some reason we still select people for important roles who 'look' healthy.

Read
the rest here.
[An option, of course, is to go into management consulting. We're expected to look eccentric.]

2 comments:

Rowan Manahan said...

The very reason I chose this route Michael! (Also, I'm told, I have a great face for radio.)

Michael Wade said...

Rowan, that is a major but usually unmentioned benefit of the consulting biz!