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Ask HN: Laid-off readers over 50, have you left the tech workforce?

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Re: Ask HN: Laid-off readers over 50, have you left the tech workforce?

#191

Post by Latteland »

lproven wrote: post #171
onion2k wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reason? I think it's because I was 41 when I started. The implication of your post is that the hiring managers responsible for 3500 jobs are *all" discriminating on age. That seems unlikely, if only because there are people in the UK tech sector older than that who can still find roles, so evidently not all managers discriminate.

Not all, but most. It is endemic in the Anglophone world. I also speak a little German, French, Norwegian and at a push Spanish and Swedish, and I applied to anywhere that was hiring English speakers there, too... with cover letter in the local language, naturally. Zero interest. So I think it's a Western problem. Q.v. https://techcrunch.com/2010/08/28/silicon-valley%E2%80%99s-d... https://newrepublic.com/article/117…

I think it's just an oversupply of people in it support and it really contrast with the shortage of software engineers. Now that you're teaching English as a foreign language you're in a skillset area with a shortage and that's why you're more in demand. Age might matter a little bit but I think you've just got the right skill set now in the area that's short of experts.

Re: Ask HN: Laid-off readers over 50, have you left the tech workforce?

#192

Post by Latteland »

benburleson wrote: post #91
ProAm wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if you sue and win you'll likely never work again due to it.

Serious question: If this is the expectation, is it not possible to sue for the actual damages, which is a lifetime of income?

Sue after you start working in your new job and are established.

Re: Ask HN: Laid-off readers over 50, have you left the tech workforce?

#193

Post by Latteland »

himom wrote: post #152
modbait wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe the "old == stagnant" meme is largely a myth. It sounds right somehow, so it sticks with us. Over the course of a long career, though, I've seen this kind of stagnation distributed pretty evenly across people of different ages. The difference is that when we someone who's young and stagnant, we just chalk them up as green, or a business type, etc. But not "stagnant". We can't see their future, so we can't s…

It’s a fallacy of younger, inexperienced, consumption-brainwashed people that “new == better.” Also, it could be that certain groups want more people like them for mating, dating, etc.

I'm another 50-plus programmer. It's not that new is better it's that you just need to know about new things. You need to know about C++ 11 and C++ 14 if you're a C++ programmer. You should learn before you interview. Right or wrong companies are looking for people that have a grasp of current Technologies. It's not about being better it's about knowing what's happening in today's world.

Re: Ask HN: Laid-off readers over 50, have you left the tech workforce?

#194

Post by Latteland »

modbait wrote: post #97
fecak wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just it. It's really rare to find a 25 year old with a stagnant set of skills. I don't know if stagnation is the best word, but I also think there are other elements. Complacency in some cases, or getting too comfortable. Most of the successful tech people I know that are 50+ never overstayed their welcome at companies where they stopped learning, or they were always being recruited by other firms and moved ar…

We must move in different circles. I've tried to sell whole teams of 20-somethings to give git a try, and they're just not having it. They know what they know, and that's it.

I must move in different circles too. Every programmer today uses git, only maybe people stuck at a big company like Microsoft for their whole career don't use git and even Microsoft uses them now. And make: it's what everyone uses. Sometimes cross operating system projects use cmake instead of make but it's not that different. All the new programmers I meet coming out of college use these tools.

Re: Ask HN: Laid-off readers over 50, have you left the tech workforce?

#195

Post by Latteland »

coss wrote: post #185
coss wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's weird at 30 I can't see myself making it another 20 years. I find programming draining and exhausting, but I still enjoy doing it :? I just don't think I'll just feel like I will have lost a lot of the fire when I'm that age.

edit: I feel like I will have lost a lot of the fire when I'm that age.

Have to find new things to do and learn about to keep interest in your life and in your job. Eventually if you never been a manager then that might be an interesting job change. And then working on a different technology and then taking a different role yet again. All these things can keep your interest level up. Imagine if you just sat in a job and a desk and a giant cubicle farm and Shuffle papers and never did anything interesting but prepared TPS reports. We are a lot more fortunate as programmers in that we have a lot of different career opportunities.

Re: Ask HN: Laid-off readers over 50, have you left the tech workforce?

#196

Post by Latteland »

kev009 wrote: post #22

Are there any plausible moves to earn mid 100s in some non-tech industry without going through re-schooling?

Everyone would be doing it if it was easy. Sales is probably the best option but you have to be able to do sales.

Re: Ask HN: Laid-off readers over 50, have you left the tech workforce?

#197

Post by sheepmullet »

jones1618 wrote: post #184
sheepmullet wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you think so? Do you think they would sooner cut off their nose to spite their face?

I've worked in tech for 30 years and never experienced a single company that does math the way you describe: "I.T. generates or saves us $X million per year therefore we'll share that with frontline developers." Ha, puhleez. In my experience, you'd consider yourself lucky to work for a company that sees I.T. as a strategic/operational advantage (and not merely a "cost center") and therefore pays its staff 10% better…

> therefore we'll share that with frontline developers." Ha, puhleez.

Like I said "if they had to".

You still have to make a compelling case.

Surely you have seen teams with 3 solution architects when they don't even really require 1?

Or teams with contractors who have been in the same team on contract 5+ years?

The problem is most senior devs don't even collect the information they need to make a compelling case.

Like if I asked you how much more productive are you than a new (3-6months) senior dev on your project? Would you be able to show me?

I'm ~14x more productive on my current project than a newly hired senior dev and can give you the jira queries to prove it.

Re: Ask HN: Laid-off readers over 50, have you left the tech workforce?

#198

Post by antonvs »

himom wrote: post #153
antonvs wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But an older stagnant person's skills tend to be much more out of date. Younger ones have the benefit that their skills are still likely to be relevant at a larger subset of the employer pool.

Your first sentence is a loaded, presumptive opinion that assumes age equals out-of-date without evidence. Younger ones can have all the latest Javascript library experience they want but they still don’t have enough obvious experience for engineering mastery that’s vital to being a highly-productive independent contributor or tech lead.

> Your first sentence is a loaded, presumptive opinion that assumes age equals out-of-date without evidence.

Read it again. It's referring to older stagnant people, not all older people. The longer someone has been stagnant, the more out of date their skills become.

Re: Ask HN: Laid-off readers over 50, have you left the tech workforce?

#199

Post by [deleted] »

dasil003 wrote: post #101
antonkm wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I think I was a bit unclear. The guy obviously knew what he was doing, and had setup projects in Node. For me to come in and tell him how require() works would be insulting. No missed opportunity, I pivoted the deal after turning down the first.

I don't think you were unclear, I think maybe GP only read the first two sentences.

[deleted]
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