Has anyone considered not putting work dates on your resume? With 20 years of successful ad agency experience I feel like this screams I’m of a certain age and immediately overlooked due to agencies tending to hire people in their 20s. Want an opportunity to show I’m still 100% relevant in the industry.

I’m 64 and still busy freelancing. And getting job offers, so there’s hope for old farts like me, and you young whipper snappers. I’ve taken off graduation dates, natch. (The don’t need to see I graduated from Dinosaur U way back when). I keep the last 25 years of experience, with the years. I honestly haven’t experienced the ageism thing. Or maybe I’m too dumb to notice.

Took graduation dates off mine, but not work dates. Would beg the question by recruiters anyway, so may only help you get an inquiry to find out. But if there’s a perception they want someone younger, they’ll go that way anyway.

I’ve pretty much aged out at this point. And the emphasis on DEI hasn’t helped either (no judgment on the intention behind it, just - ironically - excluded me from being considered for many positions because I don’t fit “the client’s DEI hire brief” … literally been told that several times by recruiters now.

No graduation dates and only years, not months for work history. Only include the last 15 years as individual jobs. You can capture key highlights from earlier in a "relevant experience" section at the end of your resume.

I used to lead with I won my first Clio as an intern, but that was over 30 years ago. I peaked at VP CD CW and got laid off. My last agency job was ACD before losing that one 10 years ago. As you can see from my position, I made a shift. It was hard and I did take a pay cut to break in. UX is a saturated market now. Back then, I was looking for places of growth and found a place that gave a 50 yr old a chance to still be creative. Where is that place of growth now? AI? I don’t know.

Independent 1 - Recruiters who are giving you the DEI excuse probably aren’t very good at their jobs if they fall back on lazy excuses and no real helpful advice. EVERYONE in this industry is struggling. I always knew advertising was a business for the young even when I was younger. My former CD told me to plan for this time and I’m glad I listened to her. The fact that this bowl exists says ageism has always been an issue.

Oh, I feel this.
I too have considered it, but it fights against everything I believe in my core, which is that with those years comes a shit ton of experience on how to nail briefs, be an effective leader and sell the fuck out of great work.
I think it’s hard to not see I’m not 20, lol. But I also know that if I am starting to get passed over for opps, those agencies likely aren’t for me. But I get it. Getting work is important and if that means we have to advertise ourselves in ways that are more marketable, than I guess that’s also doing our job??

Sigh.

I’ve had two jobs since 2000ish (moved right into a company I’d been at part time while an undergrad, stayed about 20 yrs) so I’m in a similar position and go back and forth on best way to handle. I could focus only on my time at the agency (mid-2021) but also feel some of my experience prior to that is pertinent for showing my value, for certain roles at least.

I’ve hopped around loads in the past 20 years so I just show my last 5 years’ worth of jobs. 90% of recruiters stop at those anyway

I do the last few roles then just list them under prior experience.

I list the first few jobs and titles but only describe with bullet points the most recent job

I leave off graduation dates but the rest would be weird if they didn’t have dates attached. Some people don’t detail (or include) their early roles.

There’s also another scoop of thought to own that and show your relevance in the work itself.