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Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

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Re: Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

#11

Post by mkaziz »

coldcode wrote: post #10

I'm almost 57 and still write real code that people use and employers make money from. The trick is to continuously learn new stuff. My whole career has always been spent at the leading edge of whatever was most important at the time. Sure, people sometimes don't want to interview you because they assume you are old and pointless, but that's usually when they don't even read your resume, blog, linked in or whatever y…

How do you usually determine what's important at a given time? I feel like I usually find out when it's too late to be at the cutting edge.

Re: Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

#12

Post by stinos »

MartinCron wrote: post #9

I'm late thirties, and I'm writing code every day and fully intend to keep doing so until someone pries my ergonomic keyboard from my cold dead hands. Something to keep in mind is that this industry is aging and maturing alongside us. You can't use historical precedent for understanding unprecedented events. My personal hope is that the software developer monoculture (young dudes with ancestors in Europe or some part…

until someone pries my ergonomic keyboard from my cold dead hands

+1 for this nice phrase :P and, out of interest: what keyboard might that be?

Re: Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

#13

Post by boothead »

I'm 37 in May. I have been:

A marquee erector

A chemical toilette attendant

A barman

A bouncer (prefer the term doorman)

A commando

A telecoms engineer

A programmer of various different languages

Now I'm the CTO of a start up and we don't have any older people (apart from the founders by a few months). About the only thing I can think of to say is to keep learning forever, as many different things as you can think of. With a background in development and that kind of mentality you'll always be useful to someone! :-)

Re: Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

#14

Post by tsm »

aridiculous wrote: post #8
jhspaybar wrote: post #6

I honestly don't understand this, I'm sure there is ageism, but when I'm reading resumes and interviewing I love the more experienced developers! The few times I've seen a solid 10 years experience résumé followed up by a solid phone screen it has been a feeding frenzy. So much so that my company usually can't even move fast enough to get an offer in the ring :( On the other hand, it's really obvious when someone has…

>>10 years of experience staying invisible and just hanging on. Can you elaborate on this?

Repeating the content/work of one year of experience ten times, rather than having ten years of diverse and beneficial experience.

Re: Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

#15

Post by atmosx »

coldcode wrote: post #10

I'm almost 57 and still write real code that people use and employers make money from. The trick is to continuously learn new stuff. My whole career has always been spent at the leading edge of whatever was most important at the time. Sure, people sometimes don't want to interview you because they assume you are old and pointless, but that's usually when they don't even read your resume, blog, linked in or whatever y…

I like when the nickname fits the character. Congratulations (both for the nick and the long career in THE ever-changing field).

Re: Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

#16

Post by jefffoster »

aridiculous wrote: post #8
jhspaybar wrote: post #6

I honestly don't understand this, I'm sure there is ageism, but when I'm reading resumes and interviewing I love the more experienced developers! The few times I've seen a solid 10 years experience résumé followed up by a solid phone screen it has been a feeding frenzy. So much so that my company usually can't even move fast enough to get an offer in the ring :( On the other hand, it's really obvious when someone has…

>>10 years of experience staying invisible and just hanging on. Can you elaborate on this?

There's 10 years of experience, and there's 10 years of having the same experience time and time again.

Re: Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

#17

Post by jasonkester »

There are three popular paths you can take as you get older: You can become obsolete and eventually find yourself laid off and unemployable. Or you can move into management. Or you can keep learning new technology, becoming better, more employable, and able to demand higher bill rates year after year.

To a large extent, you get to choose which of these paths you prefer to go down.

I seem to have personally gone down path four: Start your own business. Consulting, unlike employeeing, tends to map bill rate exponentially to experience. And selling software products... well, when was the last time you decided not to buy a SaaS product because the company's founder seemed too old? That's what I thought.

Re: Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

#18

Post by MartinCron »

stinos wrote: post #12
MartinCron wrote: post #9

I'm late thirties, and I'm writing code every day and fully intend to keep doing so until someone pries my ergonomic keyboard from my cold dead hands. Something to keep in mind is that this industry is aging and maturing alongside us. You can't use historical precedent for understanding unprecedented events. My personal hope is that the software developer monoculture (young dudes with ancestors in Europe or some part…

until someone pries my ergonomic keyboard from my cold dead hands +1 for this nice phrase :P and, out of interest: what keyboard might that be?

I was using a a 15 year old original Microsoft Natural Keyboard until recently, but PS/2 ports are getting more and more rare and PS/2 to USB adapters haven't worked reliably for me.

I just bought a Microsoft Natural Keyboard 4000 which is nearly as good, even though the keys feel more "mushy" than I would like.

Re: Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

#19

Post by MartinCron »

mkaziz wrote: post #11
coldcode wrote: post #10

I'm almost 57 and still write real code that people use and employers make money from. The trick is to continuously learn new stuff. My whole career has always been spent at the leading edge of whatever was most important at the time. Sure, people sometimes don't want to interview you because they assume you are old and pointless, but that's usually when they don't even read your resume, blog, linked in or whatever y…

How do you usually determine what's important at a given time? I feel like I usually find out when it's too late to be at the cutting edge.

I personally like to be aware of the cutting edge, but not bother investing time and effort until after the real lunatic fringe has proven or disproven its worth.

It's OK to be late to a party, as long as you're fashionably late.

Re: Ask HN: What happens to older developers?

#20

Post by ceautery »

My story is, I think, atypical. I have no college experience, have been in IT for 19 years, and am now 42.

I was hired to my current gig 11 years ago to fill an emergency need for someone with perl and B2B experience, where I showed myself to be competent and approachable, and received a token promotion and consistent merit raises.

I have made all my IT hires in a similar way. In 1995 CompuServe had an immediate need for anyone who could tell a mouse from a keyboard, and due to my experience troubleshooting modem connections to play better dial-up Doom, I was put right into tech support in the ailing company. Before they imploded, I was hired at an ecommerce VAN to troubleshoot comm problems and write comm scripts for some of their software packages when they were very short on good comm help.

At each of the companies I've worked for over the last 19 years, I've dodged layoffs, demonstrated competence and agility, been given a single token promotion, and have been paid below the market average for my position due to not having a college degree.

Pluses: Haven't been fired, laid off, aged out, or put out to pasture. I have had consistent employment, taking only two contracting gigs over the years, both while still employed full time. Plus no one gripes that I wear jeans in a business casual environment, or that I look like a hippy with my 21" hair.

Minuses: Fewer promotions, lower average pay.

If I did the math of some of my peers who negotiated more pay from employers, but were then laid off during low profit years, I would either break even or end up in the black by comparison.

By showing competence, a sense of urgency, and willingness to keep an enterprise system healthy for the long game, I've done pretty well, plus no pesky student loans to pay off.

...but on the other hand, I haven't written that killer app, founded my own tech firm, or otherwise found my way to riches. As 50 gets nearer, and as I cost my company more, any of that may change. I fully expect within the next re-org or two to be handed a severance package, and then see if my secret project-x is a gold mine waiting to happen, or if I've been kidding myself all these years.

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