n exaggerated stress on regard for workplace seniority is one of the most serious challenges in our academic culture today. While the country and the society struggle to cope with the demands of development, modernity and diversity, too often one comes across people deriving consolation from the idea that: at least we have a culture of respect rooted in eastern values. It is often mentioned as a prized asset.

This prized asset often leads to a sense of false pride. In fact the popular idea that one should respect one’s elders and treat those younger to them with affection is quite problematic as a value prescription. Should not respect instead be an inclusive, non-discriminating attitude? Should not people respect all their seniors and junior, men and women, alike? Come to think of it, why should this regard not extend to animals as well? Similarly, isn’t affection something everybody can benefit from, irrespective of their age or he level of their cultural achievement? The way it is often pronounced, makes the cultural commandment sound like making respect a right for seniors only.

So what is seniority, the thing that confers this right on some people to the exclusion of others? The context of these pronouncements/ reminders seems to suggest that it is closely associated with grey hair, facial wrinkles, higher cholesterol levels and a perception of maturity, besides reading glasses and bifocals. But do advancing years correlate strongly with maturity of judgment and greater expertise in relevant disciplines? It seems that while emotional intelligence tends to positively correlate with experience, the same cannot be said of other strengths relevant to academic work.

Not too infrequently, some of the not-the-oldest members of a work-place team have already had significant epiphanies and undergone life-changing experiences thereby developing unique strengths that make them as valuable in their roles, if not more, as their senior-most colleagues.

What does seniority entitle one to? There would be no problem at all if the privilege were to be limited to preferential seating on a bus or a separate queue at a public office. However, the seniority is often considered/ implied to be synonymous with competence and higher value attributed to opinions or a substitute for it. This results in practices, expectations and demands for time-scale promotions and age-restricted preferential treatment, more often the norm in the public sector.

An obsession with seniority can literally cause people expected to know better to forget about pressing concerns like global warming and fret instead about whether the seats at a conference are placed in the correct order of seniority, whether the most senior person was given the additional charge as soon as temporary occurred or offered due protocol: served the food first etc. It’s amazing sometimes to see how an attribute expected to bring wisdom fails to make the same people see the pettiness of it all.

A disclaimer is warranted here. This is not meant to deny conventional associated with aging, which indeed is a regard for human experience. It is just that competent younger individual should not be discriminated against and denied what their achievements entitle them to. Some of the best known leaders in modern history were recognised relatively early. Theodore Roosevelt became US at 42; John F Kennedy at 43; Bill Clinton at 46; and Barrack Obama at 47. Sebastian Kurz became the Austrian chancellor aged 31, Waldemar Pawlak, Polish prime minister aged 32, Sanna Marin and Finish prime minister aged 35.

Competence is a magical trait. It embodies charisma, experience, wisdom and patience typically expected from seniority. In traditionally religious cultures no individual is considered better or higher than another based on race, colour or age. These establishes piety as the sole parameter of superiority.

The writer, an electrical engineer, holds a doctorate from Ghent University, Belgium and LMU Munich, Germany. She is an associate professor of electrical engineering and head of Intermediate College at Lahore College for Women University. She can be contacted at: aqsa_shabbir@outlook.com.