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Ask HN: My 56-year-old father is a developer having a tough time finding a job

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221–230 of 232 posts

Re: Ask HN: My 56-year-old father is a developer having a tough time finding a job

#221

How is his English? Would he be prepared to work as a freelancer for a while? Can he code in C++??

He's hasn't a perfect English but enough to work, and yeah, he would be prepared. He coded in C++ several years ago, not sure he's up to date...

Re: Ask HN: My 56-year-old father is a developer having a tough time finding a job

#225
post #66

He's worked as an executive, but never moved onto something more senior like a project manager????

Yeap, he "downgraded" from executive to developer at one point, not a very smart decision but that's how things are...

Re: Ask HN: My 56-year-old father is a developer having a tough time finding a job

#226
I have to thank you all from the bottom of my heart for the overwhelming support, I never thought he would get all this help.

I'm an avid HN reader and a somewhat active member but never imagined this could go up to the frontpage, you all are awesome.

I told my father about all the opportunities and interesting comments here, and will continue helping him get a job. Thanks :)

Re: Ask HN: My 56-year-old father is a developer having a tough time finding a job

#227
post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its reality though. The age group of my current workplace probably averages early 30's, and we have a lot of people taking time off to have babies. I seem to be the only person that does any work a lot of the time.

I bet you pay more tax than them too for the benefit of doing all their work. But the world needs more babies! Um... no it doesn't.

The continual growth economic paradigm requires more babies.

Re: Ask HN: My 56-year-old father is a developer having a tough time finding a job

#228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They don't even have to give a reason Yes they do. There is a lot of legislation about employment and documentation of the processes. Lots of smaller companies don't bother but larger companies are obsessive about it because they wouldn't risk exposing themselves.

yeah, and those large companies won't write "too old" in the documentation. there are a million reasons not to hire someone, including you simply found someone else you liked better. the case is pretty much unwinnable, why would anyone go through the hassle?

Which is why people need to expose stuff like this from within their organisations. Like the op.

Re: Ask HN: My 56-year-old father is a developer having a tough time finding a job

#229

He should start a business, it's easier than ever: www.ProjectAmericanDream.com Seriously, it could change his life in a major way.

You don't seem to have a history of spamming on HN so serious question, is this spam or are you being sincere? If the former, given your experience on this site, I don't see how you can not know how wrong that is here.

Not spam at all. On many points. I'm on my iPad so I'll be brief (hate typing on this thing)

On advising he start a business. Launching a successful business is the greatest liberator. For OP's father a nice lifestyle business would provide him with security as he gets older. What happens when he is 60, 70, 75. None of these people talking about helping will hire him. That's an illusion. My statement could be wrong in this particular case but it isn't for the overwhelming majority of older engineers.

If your comment is about the link. No, it isn't spam at all. The registration period is now closed so I can no longer provide links to the content. I personally know somewhere in the range of 50 people doing this program through being a mentor for a local meetup group for members. There's an annual conference for the program. I believe the next one is in February. Sir Richard Branson will be the keynote speaker. So, no, not a scam or spam. The fact that people down-voted it or dismissed it as such is only a reflection of HN bias. I hope the OP did get a chance to consider it before this was voted down to the bottom and the registration period ended.

Re: Ask HN: My 56-year-old father is a developer having a tough time finding a job

#230
post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm currently living in Guadalajara and looking for a new gig. Drop me an email; we're hiring.

I'm currently living in Mexico City. I'm surprised to see these many startups in Gudalajara, and yours are not certainly the first ones that I read about. Is Guadalajara becoming the Silicon Valley/SF of Mexico? What are the reasons to establish your startups there?

GDL has a thriving technical community and getting bigger every day, the founder of the startup for which i work for has an special interest on making Guadalajara Mexico's technological hub and wants to create success stories to bring more inversion and companies to the city.

I think a big advantage of Guadalajara over Mexico City is that it's a big enough city without the downsides of a huge metropolis, and is very affordable for engineers to live on pretty good areas, i bike about 10 minutes to work every day and love it.

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