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At an event held at Stanford University in 2007, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who was in his early 20s at the time, notoriously declared that “Young people are just smarter.” His remark has reverberated through workplaces in the tech industry and beyond ever since, as employers look for talent who can help their businesses navigate rapid change.
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But the idea that younger workers are more innovative, more talented and more valuable hurts the career opportunities available to older adults, particularly those who may produce their biggest achievements later in life. In his new book, Late Bloomers: The Power of Patience in a World Obsessed with Early Achievement, Rich Karlgaard, publisher of Forbes magazine, challenges the misperceptions about the cognitive abilities of adults at different ages. By blending scientific research with his journalistic knowledge about what makes businesses successful, Karlgaard, who is 64, makes a compelling argument for why older people can, in fact, be some of the smartest employees on the job.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
In many ways it seems that in order to be considered really successful today, you have to accomplish amazing things when you're still in your 20s. How does that standard affect older workers?
Karlgaard: Most of the early achievers used to come from music or movies or TV or other entertainment forms. I think it's more recently when the rise of all these people who have gone out and dropped out of college and created technology companies and become billionaires before they're 25 that has added a whole new dimension to this.
It has added this trickle-down effect where schools and educators and even parents are buying into this idea that if their kids aren't performing extremely well on standardized tests and grades, that if they aren't getting into elite colleges and universities, that life will be difficult for them. It ignores the facts. Even in technology, when you step back and look at it, there are a lot of middle-age successes in Silicon Valley, which is supposed to be all about youthful success.
There's a lot of ageism in Silicon Valley, where I live. This might be ground central for ageism in the economy. And so much talent is lost because of this.