RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK – Documents released as part of an age discrimination suit against IBM disclose that executives called older workers “dinobabies” who wanted to turn them into an “extinct species.”
Both The New York Times and Bloomberg reported details from a trove of documents ordered released by the judge in the case.
Bloomberg noted that executives – who weren’t identified – had a plan to “accelerate change by inviting the ‘dinobabies’ (new species) to leave” with the goal of turning them into “Extinct species.”
Added Bloomberg: “Company officials also complained about IBM’s ‘dated maternal workforce’ that ‘must change,’ and discussed frustration that IBM had a much lower share of millennials in its workforce than a competitor, but said its share would increase following layoffs, according to the filing.”
“These filings reveal that top IBM executives were explicitly plotting with one another to oust older workers from IBM’s workforce in order to make room for millennial employees,” Shannon Liss-Riordan, a lawyer for the plaintiff in the case, told The Times.
IBM, however, defended its pratices.
IBM, ex-employees intensify court fight over alleged age discrimination
Adam Pratt, an IBM spokesperson, told The Times: “IBM never engaged in systemic age discrimination,” he said. “Employees were separated because of shifts in business conditions and demand for certain skills, not because of their age.”
In an interview with WRAL TechWire, Liss-Riordan said she believed IBM systematically targeted older workers for layoff to build a younger workforce, flouting rules against age bias – and she was going to prove it.
“IBM seems to recognize it has a problem here,” she said at the time, pointing to the fact that the tech giant had carved out age discrimination claims from its severance agreement in recent years.
It did so, she says, “so that it would not have to provide the required disclosures of ages of its workers who were retained and who were laid off” in an effort to conceal its effort to shed its older employees.
‘IBM cannot escape discrimination laws,’ says attorney in age bias suit
In November, IBM moved for dismissal in a case filing in the District Court in the State of New York, 1:21-CV-06296. In the filing, dated Nov. 8, a consolidated memorandum, IBM argues that 25 cases ought to be dismissed due to the timing of their claims and the signing of confidentiality documents that stipulated terms of separation.
But the use of such agreements—and their legality—is one key factor in the case, according to Shannon Liss-Riordan, the lead plaintiffs’ lawyer for the class action lawsuit against IBM, who spoke with WRAL TechWire earlier this week.
IBM’s use of its confidentiality agreement is a practice with the goal of “trying to block employees in building arbitration,” Liss-Riordan told WRAL TechWire. “Simply by the fact that they’re in individual arbitration.”
Judge allows IBM age discrimination lawsuit to proceed but limits who can participate
