"Ann Hummond knew the office software like the back of her hand. Based in Yorkshire, England, she could untangle any spreadsheet snafu in her sleep. Over the past 23 years, she had worked her way up from a data entry clerk to her finance company's administrative director, quietly becoming the person everyone relied on when things went sideways. She was, in short, indispensable."
"Hummond, who speaks about her experience for the U.K.'s Age Without Limits campaign to raise awareness of ageism in England, says she didn't break down in the meeting. "I didn't want to give him the pleasure of seeing how much he had hurt me," she says. Instead, she coolly finished her work day, gathered her belongings, "and then went home and fell to pieces.""
Ann Hummond mastered office software and rose from data entry clerk to administrative director over 23 years, becoming indispensable. A boss publicly told her "You're too old to do this job" during a quarterly team meeting. She suppressed her immediate reaction at work, then went home and fell apart, taking two weeks off. Quitting at 64 was not an option because of financial responsibilities and family obligations, so she remains employed. She speaks for the U.K.'s Age Without Limits campaign to raise awareness of ageism. Age discrimination remains socially tolerated and embedded in hiring, and U.S. law (Age Discrimination in Employment Act, 1967) has not eliminated complaints; EEOC received over 15,000 age-discrimination charges between 1997 and 2024.
Read at Fast Company
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