discrimination from employers?

metaldrummer · 06-06-2014 3:24am #1

Here it is,

Have been on the job hunt for a good while now, it has been a long time since i ever had to this, i have always had my independence and paid my own way.

Recently have had a few interviews and a dropped of my C.V's.

One interviewer said to me i was over experienced,

another one said to me that the last irish person they had was not as good as the foreign lads so they hire more foreign lads to irish lads, and this guy was irish himself. I will not give company details.etc..

Next one said they don't hire people with tattoos, now my most visible one is just below the elbow.

Dropping a C.V to lidl for chance,
manager said they are only hiring lithuanians.

Last one was because i lived a good distance away that the position might not suit me, like i didn't know that already?? I applied.for the position already aware of this.

All other interviews went fine but very few replies to say i was unsuccessful.

So where do i stand here? Apart from this i do voluntary work for children around the area who are not as well off as other kids so i help out with projects and day trips to the beach and activity centres, all.to keep my mind in a work environment.

Was this wrong for them to say those things to me? Am i better off leaving my homeland to seek work elsewhere? Am i being pushed out of my own country to seek a better life? I don't understand how these issues are not being dealt with. I am on the verge of leaving my family and friends to go to another country to become a stranger in a strange land. I don't want it but it seems that i have little choice.

Irishguy16 · 06-06-2014 3:43am

I had the same problem when I used to live in Ireland. The likes of Aldi and Lidl don't hire Irish people at all, or very rarely. I agree with one thing, foreigners are better workers than the Irish. Irish people don't want to work hard and the foreigners have a great work ethic and will work for less money.

Back in 2011, I had the same problem as yourself. I got bullied out of my old job, so I needed a new job. Interview after interview with no luck whatsoever. It became frustrating after interview number 5. I would have worked absolutely anywhere in Ireland, Mcdonalds, Burgerking, cleaning the streets, so my only option was to emmigrate and I found a job easily enough in America within a week and a half.

To be honest, your only way forward is to emmigrate. There are no real opportunities back home anymore. Making that change is worth it, even if that means leaving your friends and family behind. You will respect your job so much more abroad, becasue of the difficulties back home.

Things would have been completely different if I grew up in my brothers generation. I guess i'll just have to accept these changes and continue to live abroad

metaldrummer · 06-06-2014 3:54am

Irishguy16 wrote: »

I had the same problem when I used to live in Ireland. The likes of Aldi and Lidl don't hire Irish people at all, or very rarely. I agree with one thing, foreigners are better workers than the Irish. Irish people don't want to work hard and the foreigners have a great work ethic and will work for less money.

Back in 2011, I had the same problem as yourself. I got bullied out of my old job, so I needed a new job. Interview after interview with no luck whatsoever. It became frustrating after interview number 5. I would have worked absolutely anywhere in Ireland, Mcdonalds, Burgerking, cleaning the streets, so my only option was to emmigrate and I found a job easily enough in America within a week and a half.

To be honest, your only way forward is to emmigrate. There are no real opportunities back home anymore. Making that change is worth it, even if that means leaving your friends and family behind. You will respect your job so much more abroad, becasue of the difficulties back home.

Things would have been completely different if I grew up in my brothers generation. I guess i'll just have to accept these changes and continue to live abroad

I understand some parts, but i am a very hard worker and find it terrible that some lazy irish people have a impact on my hard working reputation. Moving abroad to work scares me because i wouldn'y know where to start and what if i ran out of money before i got employment? I hate this i really do and i feel that good honest people deserve better.and to leave their homes is a shame because people are being pushed not going by choice but rather by desperation. Ill never know till i try though and you seem happy with it.

Chucken · 06-06-2014 4:03am

metaldrummer wrote: »

another one said to me that the last irish person they had was not as good as the foreign lads so they hire more foreign lads to irish lads, and this guy was irish himself. I will not give company details.etc..

Next one said they don't hire people with tattoos, now my most visible one is just below the elbow.

Dropping a C.V to lidl for chance,
manager said they are only hiring lithuanians.

I don't believe any of these quotes.

Irishguy16 · 06-06-2014 4:07am

metaldrummer wrote: »

I understand some parts, but i am a very hard worker and find it terrible that some lazy irish people have a impact on my hard working reputation. Moving abroad to work scares me because i wouldn'y know where to start and what if i ran out of money before i got employment? I hate this i really do and i feel that good honest people deserve better.and to leave their homes is a shame because people are being pushed not going by choice but rather by desperation. Ill never know till i try though and you seem happy with it.

I agree, some Irish people are excellent workers, including myself. My point being, I worked in Ireland for about 6 years, and it was the Pakistani's and Polish people that impressed me the most, always on their feet and never complaining about anything.

Emmigration really isn't that difficult. It scared me the first time, but after about a month or so, I had made a lot of new friends, found a decent place to live and was earning a reasonable salary and gained a lot of confidence.

I disagree with a lot of stuff that has happened/is happening back home. I wish that I could be close to my family and friends sometimes, but I know that I would not have the same opportunities and independence back home.

There should be a limit on how many Irish and foreign people should be working in the same job like a ratio of 4/1 or something, but that never happened/or will never happen. Eastern European managers would favourtise hiring their own people, and it is the same elsewhere. For example, my agency in China very rarely hire anyone outside of America. In Australia my brothers job only hire Irish people. It's happening everywhere, not just in Ireland.

Mrs OBumble · 06-06-2014 10:13am

Chucken wrote: »

I don't believe any of these quotes.

With my moderator hat on, I do have a degree of skepticism about threads like this started in the early hours of the morning.

But personally, I do believe these:

another one said to me that the last irish person they had was not as good as the foreign lads so they hire more foreign lads to irish lads, and this guy was irish himself. I will not give company details.etc..

Because I've had an Irish factory supervisor say exactly the same thing to me. I wasn't job hunting, he's a friend of Mr O'B was was chatting in the pub about how much easier his job is now they hire Polish lads who follow instructions better than the Irish ones.

Next one said they don't hire people with tattoos, now my most visible one is just below the elbow.

That's quite a common attitude where I come from, because there tatts are likely to mean you've been in prison. But even here, where it doesn't mean that, if I went looking for a job I would have them covered up!

I don't believe that any manager for a multi-national would be dumb enough to say "We only hire Lithuanians". A staff member might. And a staff member who was pretending to be a manager might. And if it really was a manager, then you can take them to the Equality Authority. But if you do want to apply to work there, I'd suggest going through the right channels instead of just talking to a random in a store: http://jobs.lidl.ie/cps/rde/career_lidl_ie/hs.xsl/jobsearch.htm?entrylevelid=34&employmentareaid=9
What I personally have observed is that stores seem to have employees of various nationalities - which makes me think they have a systematic non-discrimination policy

Mod suggestion: lets try to keep this to discussing verifiable facts, and personal experiences, and stay away from gross unsupportable generalizations.

metaldrummer · 06-06-2014 2:15pm

Chucken wrote: »

I don't believe any of these quotes.[/

I made them up for giggles, did I? Do you not notice this happening everywhere?

TimeToShine · 06-06-2014 3:49pm

The fact that your tattoo just below the elbow was visible indicates you were wearing a T-shirt to your interview rather than a shirt?

metaldrummer · 06-06-2014 5:26pm

TimeToShine wrote: »

The fact that your tattoo just below the elbow was visible indicates you were wearing a T-shirt to your interview rather than a shirt?

No i pointed them out, to be a honest person, didn't think honesty would deny me a job. Worse part, i was once a manager in retail and i never cared for tattoos etc.. Why? Because you can't judge a person for having a liking to body art, i even kept my company shop above water for 4 months before it had to close and we were the last to go, i shed sweat and tears keeping that place alive not only for me but for my co workers, now it seems nobidy will give me a chance at a job because other irish people gave a bad reputation and it us preventing me from work.

TimeToShine · 06-06-2014 5:34pm

People are very judgemental. I'm not saying it's fair and I appreciate where you're coming from but it's just how things are. Tattoos and piercings are not the commonplace in office environments.

WRT Irish people, I work in a research environment and it's quite obvious the foreign people work harder than their Irish counterparts so no complaints from me there.

BeatlesFan1992 · 06-06-2014 5:37pm

metaldrummer wrote: »

No i pointed them out, to be a honest person, didn't think honesty would deny me a job. Worse part, i was once a manager in retail and i never cared for tattoos etc.. Why? Because you can't judge a person for having a liking to body art, i even kept my company shop above water for 4 months before it had to close and we were the last to go, i shed sweat and tears keeping that place alive not only for me but for my co workers, now it seems nobidy will give me a chance at a job because other irish people gave a bad reputation and it us preventing me from work.

For 3 years, nearly, I didn't even get responses from jobs. I am hard of hearing and I had one a-hole tell me that the job wouldn't suit because my hearing might affect my ability to work. This was for a retail shop, which I won't meantion and funnily enough I'm working in another retail shop over a year now, got made permanent and full time and increase in wages. Some people just don't like giving others a chance. The pervious retail shop is full of foreigners and I've heard people complain because not many can speak English. I'm sorry but that's backwards if you ask me. Mind you, I'm not saying ALL foreigners don't speak English and I've met some amazing people from all over the world and are hard working but it doesn't help that certain a mangers/HRs would rather employ these rather than their own.

I have also heard the whole "inexperience" crap and what annoyed me more was that I even offered to work day a week for free to gain experience and they still said no.

You just can't win with some people.

metaldrummer · 06-06-2014 7:00pm

BeatlesFan1992 wrote: »

For 3 years, nearly, I didn't even get responses from jobs. I am hard of hearing and I had one a-hole tell me that the job wouldn't suit because my hearing might affect my ability to work. This was for a retail shop, which I won't meantion and funnily enough I'm working in another retail shop over a year now, got made permanent and full time and increase in wages. Some people just don't like giving others a chance. The pervious retail shop is full of foreigners and I've heard people complain because not many can speak English. I'm sorry but that's backwards if you ask me. Mind you, I'm not saying ALL foreigners don't speak English and I've met some amazing people from all over the world and are hard working but it doesn't help that certain a mangers/HRs would rather employ these rather than their own.

I have also heard the whole "inexperience" crap and what annoyed me more was that I even offered to work day a week for free to gain experience and they still said no.

You just can't win with some people.

What is going to happen is that there is not going to be any irish people left in ireland, we are all going to leave and get work elsewere, the governnent will have a hard tine with that to considering there voting percentage will decline also with irish people leaving the country, a statistic once said that there was 1,000 irish people leaving ireland every week, and what is making it worse is the more iriah people leave the more they will let forwign people in, and there is alot coming in to claim the benefits, why don't they bring in a visa where if you can't get work then it is time to leave, austrailia has that enforced and their economy is great, it is a shame that ireland is becoming a country ti scam from and also a easy ticket to free money, and i know that people say most try to earn a better living but i bet those people who say that are nice and snug in their own jobs and if they lost it to a foreign person then their attitude would change. Like i seen already up above is a law where there is a ratio of 1 in 4 workers in a workplace could be foreign not 90% foreign and 10% irish, and i hate going to shops etc asking fir something and a foreign person has no clue what i am asking for, it annoys me so much because i know i would be great at that job but yet a person who can barely understand what you want has the job. The way i see it, i feel something will happen where the irish people will have enough of it and cause hell, but then again who can say. Just have to keep trying i supppse

Diziet · 06-06-2014 7:20pm

You should work on your interview technique and remember that you are there to sell yourself as a suitable employee, so you need to give examples of good work and a professional attitude.

Which does not include pointing out tattoos. Why on earth do that? If it doesn't matter it doesn't matter, and if it does, pointing it out is just going to result in rejection. If just below the elbow, then cover up.

davo10 · 06-06-2014 7:48pm

Some of the posts on this thread read like policy statements for the Irish wing of UKIP. When irish people emigrate, they are the "foreign worker" in that country.

Being good at your job is important, but the image your employer wants to project to its customers is also important. I don't employ anyone who has visible tattoos nor body piercings beyond one in each ear. Other employers may not rule you out because of the body art, but when it comes to a choice between someone who has them and someone who doesn't, both being equally qualified, they are probably more likely to go with the one who doesn't.

It also depends on the job, a heavy metal band might be inclined to hire you as a drummer than a guy who looks like he's a member of 1D.

Stheno · 06-06-2014 11:10pm

Diziet wrote: »

You should work on your interview technique and remember that you are there to sell yourself as a suitable employee, so you need to give examples of good work and a professional attitude.

Which does not include pointing out tattoos. Why on earth do that? If it doesn't matter it doesn't matter, and if it does, pointing it out is just going to result in rejection. If just below the elbow, then cover up.

I don't get pointing out the tattoos, they are a professional taboo in Ireland, even in retail the likes of Dunnes Stores hate them

davo10 wrote: »

Some of the posts on this thread read like policy statements for the Irish wing of UKIP. When irish people emigrate, they are the "foreign worker" in that country.

I think in areas that are low skilled, this is an attitude that prevails, that EU nationals are coming in and working harder with lower expectations and usurping Irish nationals. There is a tendancy to forget we are in the EU, and so work in an open labour market.

I work in IT and at this stage have forgotten more nationalities I've worked with than not, apart from the Spanish, as I can never understand them and have to work to listen to them

muboop1 · 09-06-2014 12:10am

Lidl near me opened in the last year or two. Has mostly irish people working in it. Seems to booming. Doubt they wont hire irish...

Franw246 · 12-06-2014 6:35pm

I think some employers are very judgemental when it comes to looks.. I work in retail and currently have 8 tattoos.. The company is multi national and has staff from all walks of lives.. Three of mine at least are on show at all times sometimes 5 depending on my foot wear and they were when I went for my interview.. Im also in the process of starting my sleeve and I dont plan on telling my boss as its not any of their business.. Im doing my job the way they want and am hitting my targets.. Other members of staff also have tattoos and none of the public have made any remarks or complaints against us over how we look..

Ray Palmer · 17-06-2014 12:53pm

Stheno wrote: »

I don't get pointing out the tattoos, they are a professional taboo in Ireland, even in retail the likes of Dunnes Stores hate them

Let's be fair here the jobs that are being mentioned aren't professional jobs. They are minimum wage low skilled jobs. I don't really care one way or the other on tattoos but lets be fair anything that is a fashion choice that is on display permanently is going to effect your opportunities in work.

That was a choice made when getting them done. If you aren't aware of that when getting one done then you are naïve at best.

I know a few people working professional jobs that have tattoos visible in short sleeves and it has no effect. I expect minimum wage public facing jobs to have their own standards.

Mrs OBumble · 17-06-2014 3:03pm

Franw246 wrote: »

I think some employers are very judgemental when it comes to looks..

Some customers are too.

If I see you with tatts, I will at some level assume that you've done time in prison.

I know that's not a fair assumption to make in this country - but I come from a place where it's generally enough true. Old habits die hard.

P_1 · 17-06-2014 10:07pm

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

Some customers are too.

If I see you with tatts, I will at some level assume that you've done time in prison.

I know that's not a fair assumption to make in this country - but I come from a place where it's generally enough true. Old habits die hard.

To be honest I find that hard to believe that in this day and age there are places where the blind assumption that 'someone has tattoos = that person has done time' exist. Particularly when the general art of it has come on so much over the past few years.

I'd wager that even somebody who hasn't the slightest clue about tattoos would be able to tell the difference between a prison tattoo and one done in a modern studio. I understand the difficulty of the art of elderly habit euthanasia but that really is an awfully black and white assumption to be making about people with tattoos.

Shelflife · 19-06-2014 9:50am

Ray Palmer wrote: »

Let's be fair here the jobs that are being mentioned aren't professional jobs. They are minimum wage low skilled jobs..

Wow, that's a really snotty statement, I work in retail and employ 12 people, 4 of whom are with me over 10 years. Its a bit rude to say that they are not professional hard working people who take pride in their jobs.

Just because someone has a qualification doesn't make them any more professional in their work than someone on minimum wage and they probably don't have an elitist attitude either.

I have tattoos myself but dont like visible tattoos and hate them on a persons face and neck, so i wouldnt hire someone like that.

I believe the quotes and also find it to be true but find it hard to believe that a HR person would make such a statement.

As was said earlier, work on your interview technique it could be something simple thats not working for you.

Mrs OBumble · 19-06-2014 10:04am

Shelflife wrote: »

Just because someone has a qualification doesn't make them any more professional in their work than someone on minimum wage and they probably don't have an elitist attitude either.

It's not the qualification that makes someone a professional. It's membership of, or registration with, an external organisation that maintains the standards of the profession.

As an employer of retail staff, you set the procedures that your staff must follow. If you ask them to do things which are stupid-but-legal (eg to up-sell with each and every purchase), then there's no retail standards setting body that they can appeal to, or show you guidance from, saying that they should not do that.

If a hospital sets a standard that all doctors working there will do <whatever>, but the doctors don't agree, then they can say they won't do it due to professional standards (assuming that their organisation has set a standard for that issue).

Personally I work in a professional / technical job (as opposed to manual or customer service). I treat it as professional (ie paid) work not an amateur hobby. But I'm not a professional, because I don't belong to the official body (because for my job there isn't just one).

padma · 19-06-2014 10:28am

To the OP, I know it's hard at the moment with so many people going for the one or two jobs out there, but don't let your let downs drive you from Ireland. If you do leave the country looking for work you then become the foreigner taking others jobs etc etc..

I have come across that attitude about nationality x and y are better than nationality g and e in the workplace. From my own experience I've found nationality x and y are the same as g and e. There are good and bad workers everywhere.

In my own job my boss has an attitude that a Pakistani guy is "the best worker I've ever had" we all find him ignorant, rude, racist towards Poliish and one hell of a lazy fcuk who sits on his ass all day long, but you know what if he rings the guy in the middle of the night for a shift he will get out of bed and do it, just like I would.

Some managers just haven't a full grasp on the business their in. Example is hiring people with very poor English and unpleasant manners to do a customer service job etc...

[Deleted User] · 19-06-2014 10:46am

The only things you've mentioned that count as discrimination are the nationality comments OP.

As for the tattoo comment, surely you were aware when you first got the tattoo that it's something that affects your appearance. That it's something that can affect your ability to get a job, and generally can affect how people judge you. It might not seem fair to you, but it's not discrimination.

Shelflife · 19-06-2014 1:13pm

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

It's not the qualification that makes someone a professional. It's membership of, or registration with, an external organisation that maintains the standards of the profession.

As an employer of retail staff, you set the procedures that your staff must follow. If you ask them to do things which are stupid-but-legal (eg to up-sell with each and every purchase), then there's no retail standards setting body that they can appeal to, or show you guidance from, saying that they should not do that.

If a hospital sets a standard that all doctors working there will do <whatever>, but the doctors don't agree, then they can say they won't do it due to professional standards (assuming that their organisation has set a standard for that issue).

Personally I work in a professional / technical job (as opposed to manual or customer service). I treat it as professional (ie paid) work not an amateur hobby. But I'm not a professional, because I don't belong to the official body (because for my job there isn't just one).

Cheers, i understand the point that the poster was making, its more the tone of it that rankled me.Felt it was a looking down your nose tone.

Ray Palmer · 23-06-2014 11:57am

Shelflife wrote: »

Wow, that's a really snotty statement, I work in retail and employ 12 people, 4 of whom are with me over 10 years. Its a bit rude to say that they are not professional hard working people who take pride in their jobs.

.

Not really the person was saying they are a professional taboo. The point being that the roles being spoken about are minimum wage and low skill jobs.
What ever you like to think about your work it doesn't require much training to be able to do. Some people are better at it but ultimately it takes very little training.
I get why you think it is snotty to point it out but you have to accept the reality that retail jobs generally are low skilled worker. If you think it a high skill job then you can pay your staff more.

discrimination from employers?

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