Age perception's effect on employee interactions with HR representatives

¶ … human resource services has changed from its traditional role of providing benefit administration and payroll services to one that has become more focused on treating employees as valued customers through the provision of active support. This transformation has been influenced in part by the ability of human resource departments to provide high quality services to their customers in a timely fashion in both face-to-face as well as online venues. In face-to-face exchanges between human resources employees and customers, there must be a level of comfort involved in order for there to efficient communication between the two parties. The hypothesis of this study was that employees visiting a university human resource office with questions concerning their benefits would be more likely to ask for another benefit representative when the initial agent was visibly younger and would be less likely to ask for another benefit representative when the initial agent was visibly older. To confirm or refute this hypothesis, an experiment was conducted using 20 visiting employees and their reactions to the two benefit representatives tabulated. Other factors such as estimated age and gender were also taken into account. The results of the experiment are followed by a discussion of the results. A summary of the research and salient findings are presented in the concluding chapter.

INTRODUCTION

As the process of benefits enrollment becomes more challenging, due to increasing numbers of choices available to the employee, employers are becoming increasingly concerned over communication and employee-engagement during the process. Traditionally, enrollment in a benefits plan involved registration-like steps and little in-depth interaction with human resources personnel. This has changed in recent years, though, as the goal of human resources has become more focused upon treating the employee as a customer and offering active support throughout the complex decision-making process ("Engage Employees," 2007, p.2). These are important considerations when attempting to formulate the most effective method of service delivery in an organizational setting because people depend on their human resources services to ensure they are provided with the benefits and perquisites to which they are rightfully entitled.

In order to successfully engage the employee in the benefit selection process and encourage the individual to feel comfortable asking questions, human resources personnel must understand the factors that could impact the relationship between personnel and employees. One such factor that may not be considered by many human resource services is the physical appearance of their representatives. The research to date suggests that facial characteristics may impact the judgment of others across a broad continuum of emotional reactions. In this regard, Little and Perrett (2007) investigated the relationship between facial cues and personality perception. Study participants were asked to rate composite facial images of individuals for agreeableness, conscientiousness, extraversion, neuroticism, openness to experience, attractiveness, masculinity, and age. Results indicated that for female faces, participants associated a younger looking face with high conscientiousness. For male faces, participants associated older looking faces with high extraversion, high openness to new experiences, and low degrees of neuroticism (p.120). This study was deemed highly relevant and especially noteworthy because of the steps taken by the researchers to ensure the validity and reliability of their approach and their interpolation of the study's findings.

Other research has also focused on the importance of facial characteristics in establishing credibility. For instance, Masip, Garrido, and Herrero (2003) investigated the relationship between facial babyishness and perceived impression of truthfulness and the influence of facial characteristics on credibility judgments. Prior research suggested that both facial babyishness and physical attractiveness played a role in others perceiving that individual as credible. The authors described babyishness as possessing qualities typically associated with the face of an infant, such as prominent forehead, large eyes, and thin eyebrows. Results from this study indicated that individuals possessing babyish facial qualities were judged to be more truthful than those who did not. While this study does not necessarily suggest that individuals will react in a more positive manner to those who appear younger, it does demonstrate that physical facial appearance impacts the views held by the observer.

This study investigated the impact of perceived age upon the interaction between the employee and the human resources personnel. Today's human resources professionals strive to treat employees as customers and actively engage them in the benefits selection process. Employees often have questions concerning the complex workings of benefits and may turn to human resources professionals for assistance. Ideally, employees should feel comfortable in interacting with such individuals so that questions can be quickly resolved. Prior research suggests that factors such as facial features and perceived age may play a role in the success of the interaction between two individuals. Furthermore, research also indicates that the importance placed upon the corporate value of operating in a highly ethical manner at all times varies with age, as older individuals tend to place higher importance upon this ethic (Thumin, Johnson, Kuehl, & Jiang, 1995, p.398).

Employees seek accurate information from knowledgeable individuals committed to performing their best at all times. The perceived age of the human resources service agent may be one factor that contributes to the quality of the interaction between this individual and the employee. Therefore, the hypothesis investigated in this experiment is that employees with questions regarding benefits will be more likely to ask for another service agent when the initial agent is younger and less likely to ask for another service agent when the initial agent is older. This research will be based upon a between-subject design; participants will be less likely to determine the proposed hypothesis because they will only be exposed to one condition and unaware of other conditions.

The dependent variables in this experiment will be the customer service given to employees and the rate at which they ask for a different agent for assistance. The independent variables will be the difference in age between two service agents. The manipulated variables will consist of two different agents with an age difference of ten years. Results from this experiment will provide insight into ways to improve communications between employees and service agents with regards to benefits questions.

METHODS

Participants

In this experiment the sample size consisted of 20 employees of Florida International University who are visiting the Human Resources office at the University Park campus. These employees are there because they have questions regarding their benefits. They are comprised of existing, past and prospective employees. Both of the benefit representatives that greeted the employees upon their arrival in the human resources offices were younger then most of the other benefit representatives in the office despite the age difference between the two participating benefit representatives (i.e., 20 and 30 years, respectively).

Materials

The materials used to conduct the experiment consisted of a clipboard containing copies of a worksheet to collect a running count of participants that was measured by the frequency which the participants asked for another agent other than the two used in the experiment to assist them with their benefits questions or services. Repeated customers were also taken into account when analyzing the data. All participants were addressed in an identical fashion to ensure that the greeting was not a confounding factor.

Discussion

The results of the experiment failed to demonstrate any significant or conclusive findings concerning the hypothesis that age would have an adverse effect on the perception of the credibility of the younger benefit representatives for a variety of reasons. Notwithstanding the themes identified in the literature review concerning the possible relationship between age, credibility and trustworthiness, just one (or 5%) of the 20 employees who sought assistance from the 20-year-old benefit representatives requested assistance from another benefit representative, and this was most likely attributable to the fact that the requested benefit representative possessed the requisite expertise in the benefit area being consulted (retirement). None of the Some of the potential reasons that the visiting employees were satisfied with the services provided by the visibly younger benefit representatives include the following:

1. Employees were less concerning about the age of the benefit representative than the quality and friendliness of the services provided.

2. Employees did not want to appear "pushy" or otherwise offend the participating benefit representatives by requesting another benefit representative.

3. There was an insufficiently distinct age gap between the two younger benefit representatives and the others available to assist employees with their questions or requests.

4. Employees did not want to single out a human resource employee for failing to perform his or her job adequately and thereby harm their livelihood and opportunities for future advancement.

In reality, though, the refutation of the study's hypothesis is good news for American society, at least in some small part. In a day and age characterized by an increasingly multicultural society and globalized marketplace, there would appear to be little room available for using spurious factors such as individuals' age, gender or race in formulating preconceptions about them. In fact, rejecting the assistance of a younger person in favor of an older one smacks of ageism, and the law of the land prohibits such conduct in the workplace today. Certainly, it is reasonable to conclude that older employees will likely possess a greater amount of experience and expertise in their given field than their younger counterparts, but this does not mean that younger people are not able to perform their jobs satisfactorily or even superbly. It does, mean, though, that there are significant and important gaps in the growing body of research concerning how people perceive others based on physical appearances that require further investigation before any valid conclusions can be drawn concerning these issues today.