Abstract: Lost Potential from Business Applications of Affirmative Action/Equal Employment Opportunity

Carolyn S. Browne

The adverse impacts from business and public policy practices when applying affirmative action/equal employment opportunity become critical for geologists as professional opportunities are lost potential for an industry.

Some affirmative action/equal employment opportunity policy applications involve "managers" asking potential applicants their age, basing hiring decisions on that information. Some young geologists may view a 55 year old male or female geologist as potentially incapable of doing the work which often results in two or three-fold adverse consequences to those older geologists. One consequence is the loss of scientific knowledge to society because of inappropriate management of personnel. Rare is the geologist that has been trained in management or personnel issues.

The same rationale applies to employment offices where, as part of affirmative action/equal employment opportunity, employment specialists who have no idea of what a geologist is or does or is capable of doing makes decisions whether or not that professional can even apply for a position. An example of similar management is when affirmative action/equal employment opportunity policies are implemented by nationwide research companies associated with many universities and public agencies wherein the employment office refuses to even consider geologists. The lost potential is exclusion of a class of people (geologists) from aspects of waste disposal and management, project management and environment assessments, GIS projects, pollution prevention and correction, even pipelines maintenance.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90957©1995 AAPG Mid-Continent Section Meeting, Tulsa, Oklahoma