Observations In Life

As will probably become more evident as I post, I am a US citizen living in London. I thought it may be nice to post a few things under a ‘Culture Clash’ banner – things I encounter that I didn’t expect when I moved here, even though I’ve been a huge Anglophile for most of my life.

This one concerns employment law. There are a number of differences I’ve noticed between the USA and the UK in terms of employment law and practice. As a couple of examples: In the USA, we have mostly ‘at-will’ employment and it isn’t difficult to get fired or to quit on the spot. In the UK, which historically is more unionized, it is difficult to be ‘fired’ without disciplinary procedures, and employees have a notice period of 2 weeks or more, almost without exception. It’s also standard to get a month’s paid holiday for most jobs in the UK.

But here is one that has thrown me for a loop completely: apparently it’s not frowned upon to require a photograph to be submitted with one’s job application or resume. I don’t know if this is a Europe-wide thing, but from what I have been reading, I understand that it may be. As an American, I am somewhat amazed that this country, which seems to have a lot more protections in place for the workers, would allow this sort of thing to happen routinely. I can think of very, very few exceptions where a job application would require a photograph, and to me, this practice opens up a whole host of issues of discrimination based on racism, sexism, religionism, or any other negative ‘ism.’ I personally don’t submit to job applications that require my photo.

For all the talk about Britain being so multicultural and tolerant, I honestly cannot think of any other rationale for a hiring manager to require a photo, except to exclude based on appearance.