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Do you think an old fashioned name could hurt your prospects?

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Community Manager
Community Manager

Do you think an old fashioned name could hurt your prospects?

There have been studies that show some cases of age discrimination with old fashioned names.  Have you experienced this?  What do you think?

AARPTeri
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Social Butterfly

I have not seen evidence of this theory.  My grandson rose to the CEO position of a large corporation in a matter of 12 years!  His name is Horatio!

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Super Contributor

Everything old is new again!  My friend's granddaughters are named Ruby and Leona - old names for 3 and 6 year olds.  Let's hope by the time they are job hunting, their names won't make any difference and it's only their skills that matter.

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Conversationalist

I would hope not.  A name, whether old-fashioned or new wave, should not be the defining item to get you a job. Today many names are conjoined or made up.  What difference should it make if the person has the right qualifications for the job.

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Honored Social Butterfly


@AARPTeri wrote:

There actually have been studies that show some cases of age discrimination with old fashoin names.  Have you experienced this?  What do you think?


Wonder if this name scrutiny of whatever type could be extended to other types of discrimination?

Race / ethnicity - I have one of those names.  Mostly the comments I get are something to the effect of "what an unusual name" but perhaps they are surprised by my race/ethnicity; I can't say.  To my recollection, I don't think it has ever affected me adversely but I was self-employed for most of my working career so I never thought about it.

 

Any word, name or otherwise, has the potential to produce an image into another's mind based on their experiences or upbringing.  Although I don't think I could actually say that any name would produce an image of an older persion in my mind.  Names run the gamut - seems to me, they go through cycles so what was old could be new again and vice versa.

 

What's the alternative - change your name?  Perhaps changing your name to "BOSS" would help in job seeking.  Woman Wink.

 

It's Always Something . . . . Roseanna Roseannadanna
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Contributor

As someone with the name "Mildred", and not in the youngest of years, I started filling out resume's with "Millie", sometimes bracketing Mildred following, sometimes signing with Mildred on the legal forms like tax papers or sign off on application, and the former business contacts.  

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