SYDNEY, NSW – October 9, 2025 – Aquent, a leading global work solutions company specialising in marketing, design, and technology, today announced the release of its comprehensive guide, The Age Advantage: A Guide to Age-Inclusive Hiring in Australia. The guide provides practical steps and strategies for organisations to combat age discrimination and tap into the highly skilled, underserved talent pool of workers aged 50 and over.
The Age Advantage: A Guide to Age-Inclusive Hiring in Australia is available for download here.
The launch of the guide in partnership with AgeInc comes amid a significant demographic shift in Australia, where one in three workers is currently aged 50 or older, and by 2040, 37% of the population will be aged 50 or older. Despite the clear need for experienced talent, ageism in recruitment remains a pervasive issue.
Research cited in the guide found that over 53% of Australians aged 50+ have experienced age discrimination when seeking new employment. Furthermore, 24% of Australian HR Managers believe workers aged 51 and older are too old to hire.
“The marketing, creative, and tech industries are well known for having a youth-centric culture, and in a world of talent shortages and longer working lives, overlooking experienced candidates based solely on their age simply doesn't make sense,” said Monique Richards, Managing Director of Aquent.
Challenging Outdated Myths
The guide directly confronts common myths and unconscious biases that prevent mature-aged people from entering or remaining in the workforce.
Key misconceptions debunked include:
- Myth: They're not tech-savvy | Reality: Older workers have a history of adapting to new technologies and are eager to learn, having successfully navigated workplace technology from typing pools to Generative AI.
- Myth: They're less productive | Reality: Research indicates older employees often exhibit lower absenteeism, higher reliability, and stronger engagement in an age-inclusive setting.
- Myth: They're resistant to change | Reality: People aged 50 and over have demonstrated a greater capacity to embrace change, having successfully navigated restructures, disruptions, and economic downturns.
A 10-Step Action Plan for Hiring Managers
The Age Advantage offers a practical 10-step action plan for hiring managers to integrate age inclusivity throughout the entire recruitment lifecycle.
The steps include:
- Making age part of the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) strategy.
- Training teams to overcome unconscious bias.
- Auditing Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) to mitigate algorithmic bias.
- Using skill-based hiring and avoiding language that codes for age (like “digital native” or “recent grad”) in job ads and descriptions.
- Anonymising resumes to remove details that can trigger unconscious bias.
- Diversifying the shortlist and interview panel to ensure fair evaluation.
Aquent's Commitment to be age-inclusive
Aquent has underscored its commitment to this issue by partnering with APSCo Australia and AgeInc. As the first marketing, design, and tech recruiter to commit to the Age Inclusive Recruiter program, Aquent's team now has access to specialised training and resources to help clients build diverse teams and overcome age-based hiring biases.
“The future of work is multigenerational, and hiring managers hold the power to make it a reality. This requires more than good intentions; it calls for deliberate action at every stage of the recruitment process,” Aquent states in the guide.
Organisations that adopt age-inclusive recruitment practices will gain a significant competitive advantage by attracting quality candidates from this underserved talent pool.
About Aquent
Aquent is the leading global work solutions company specialising in marketing, design and technology. We partner with businesses to deliver the talent, technology, and resources they need to excel.
From bespoke recruitment solutions and building scalable, on-demand teams, to creative strategy and project management, we’re making the future of work better for everyone.
Website: aquent.com.au
About AgeInc
AgeInc aims to combat age discrimination in the workplace through Australia’s first age-inclusive employer endorsement. The business works with employers from SMEs to enterprise-level, helping to raise awareness of age discrimination in the employment cycle and educating hiring managers to recognise and combat bias against workers aged 50 and above.
Website: ageinc.au