Late 30's here with an experience in half dozen countries in EU... being interviewed by directors and architects with maybe few years of total experience in one, rarely two countries is just awkward. Perhaps the problem is companies naively give away top roles to those cunning with best selling skills? To those sticking around the longest? I really don't care - call me programmer but pay me well and treat me even better.
Is 40 the New 60?
51–60 of 381 posts
Re: Is 40 the New 60?
#52I wonder how much ageism is due to the fact that basic coding skills can really atrophy in senior developers who quit writing code years ago and are full-time architects/managers. I’ve interviewed more than a handful of highly accomplished people with decades of experience as developers and then engineering managers who couldn’t answer extremely basic coding questions (I’m not talking about Leetcode-esque BS, I mean…
Charity Majors wrote a couple of blog posts on the subject that I’ve tried to bring in to my workplace with varying levels of success. But still I’ve had colleagues express surprise that as an engineering manager I still wanted to get my hands dirty with the code of the systems I own.
https://charity.wtf/2017/05/11/the-engineer-manager-pendulum...
https://charity.wtf/2019/01/04/engineering-management-the-pe...
Re: Is 40 the New 60?
#53I am 47. Contemplating to close my office and go to work full-time as a design->frontend person for big corporation.
Ageism is real, but I see it as a use-case experience.
If a company cannot utilize my professional experience as ex owner of business, PM or design specialist in general, it means that they prioritize "cultural fit" criteria over real performance evaluation.
This is not a problem for me. I don't have expectations every business to be "mature enough" to know the value of effective professional work over "power of the young mind".
The idea that after "40" you are having "cognitive difficulties" or you are "out of fashion" comes from companies who exploit trough "overtime" or extreme performance prerequisite.
Working in this kind of environments is a suicide. Burnout is real and avoiding it is the only effective countermeasure.
Re: Is 40 the New 60?
#5440 is not the new 60. Not even close. At 40, I've done some of the best work I've ever done and my pay has been better than ever. I'm 52 now and the trend has only gotten better. Why? Its because at 40, I had a much deeper understanding of the tech, I understood of the whole business process and I had the maturity to deal with people in a productive way. You won't find all of those in a 25 year old developer. The onl…
>>> I've learned to be less of a jerk to people and how to communicate. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh.............. But that bit is so hard ! :-)
Indeed, I keep being a jerk to junior developers that constantly comes to me with the same questions after I explained to them 10000 times and they say "Yeaah, I got it now". It is so hard to avoid being a jerk. What should I do?
Re: Is 40 the New 60?
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
>>> I've learned to be less of a jerk to people and how to communicate. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh.............. But that bit is so hard ! :-)
Indeed, I keep being a jerk to junior developers that constantly comes to me with the same questions after I explained to them 10000 times and they say "Yeaah, I got it now". It is so hard to avoid being a jerk. What should I do?
Get a stress ball. Practise screaming inside your head. Works for me.
Re: Is 40 the New 60?
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
>>> I've learned to be less of a jerk to people and how to communicate. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh.............. But that bit is so hard ! :-)
Indeed, I keep being a jerk to junior developers that constantly comes to me with the same questions after I explained to them 10000 times and they say "Yeaah, I got it now". It is so hard to avoid being a jerk. What should I do?
Two options:
* Ask why they keep coming? Maybe you aren't understanding their question, they want to build the relationship, or it's a really risky operation and they don't want to undertake it alone. This might be worth digging into.
* Write the answer down to the questions (wiki, internal doc, whatever). When they ask, point them to what you've written down. Will still take some time and interrupt you, but hopefully they will learn they can just go to the doc.Re: Is 40 the New 60?
#57The greatest software engineer I ever hired was 60 and I kept him from retirement for 5 years before finally having to let him go when his wife became ill and needed his help more. The guy never under-delivered in 20 years. No drama, no exaggeration, no personality quirks, just experience and solid delivery.
Re: Is 40 the New 60?
#58I don't doubt this, and I'm truly sympathetic to the author's experience. However it doesn't match my experiences. At this age I find I'm getting better and better job offers. Too senior has never been a problem, these offers have been at principal or senior staff levels. I don't think I've been managing my career particularly well (15 years in and 5 jobs), and I've avoided management as best I can, but it doesn't se…
Why is one job a problem, as long as that job keeps you up-to-date with the current state of the art?
Re: Is 40 the New 60?
#5940 is not the new 60. Not even close. At 40, I've done some of the best work I've ever done and my pay has been better than ever. I'm 52 now and the trend has only gotten better. Why? Its because at 40, I had a much deeper understanding of the tech, I understood of the whole business process and I had the maturity to deal with people in a productive way. You won't find all of those in a 25 year old developer. The onl…
> You won't find all of those in a 25 year old developer.
Am I being uncharitable to question if that’s ageism?
Re: Is 40 the New 60?
#60This is a very American centrist point of view. In Europe everywhere I worked there were a bunch of 40+ year olds writing code, it's just yet another profession. No big deal.
I've found even a good amount of people at that age that were career switching(to development) and haven't had big issues entering the job market.
But of course, you have to be flexible. Move elsewhere, or where the jobs are. Your white hair doesn't matter as much as your attitude. If you feel entitled for good job positions just for the fact you wrote a library, I don't believe this can be positive. It isn't about your age. How long have you been looking for a job? Which city? Are you easy going?
I've moved to another country and city for a better job market and I'm willing to do over and over again. Can't make big commitments to where I live, me and my wife move, find new jobs and learn new languages and culture, that's just life. We can't buy a property and never feel at home really, but it isn't a hard life, to be honest.
Of course, we don't ever expect to make these american salaries, but we do have jobs. In America, it makes me think that a lot of management and business typey people who make decisions about hiring are very individualist folks that believe that one great person that works like a slave is better than a few average well-lived people, which is completely wrong.