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Is 40 the New 60?

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Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#81

Post by jimlikeslimes »

bacro wrote: post #54
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #47

Earlier 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?

I think this needs to explicitly be handled by a role in the team. A common team might comprise of a project manager, architect, 1 to 4 more senior devs, some representation from a test team, and a number of juniors, interns etc.

One of the senior devs needs to handle onboarding new people and communicating the ideas of the architects and seniors over and over again to juniors. This is tiresome and boring to some. You need patience and empathy. It can be fun though as you get to meet lots of people and help them when they need it most. Most importantly you give the other seniors the time to work, without them getting involved in yeah just "make clean build" that away type issues.

I actually like the role and if the team doesn't have too much churn, you're just another senior dev.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#82

Post by [deleted] »

bacro wrote: post #54
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #47

Earlier 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?

[deleted]

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#83

Post by marcus_holmes »

dgb23 wrote: post #67
SkipperCat wrote: post #33

40 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…

> The only way that age becomes a detriment is if you do not grow. There has been research about this as well under the term https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroplasticity . Might be interesting to look at. My understanding is that you are exactly right. It seems to be common that we tend to stop learning and pushing ourselves, get comfortable or maybe even afraid. To each his own, but I think it is more fun and fruit…

I call it the "grumpy old fart" syndrome. I've (M50+) felt it - the urge to stop learning and complain at everything that changes.

It is a struggle to continue learning at this age. But it is worth it. Being a grumpy old fart sucks all the joy out of life.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#84

Post by dr-detroit »

switch007 wrote: post #59
SkipperCat wrote: post #33

40 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?

Show me a 5 year old kid who is starting out as a professional and sure I'll believe a 25 year old can have a 40 year olds experience

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#85

Post by drclau »

bacro wrote: post #54
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #47

Earlier 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?

Write a knowledge base, or Wiki, or FAQ, or whatever. A place where they can re-read the same thing 10000 times. Maybe add some examples too, in cases where it makes sense (i.e. code).

Even better, make them write it, and you just review it. It'll help them learn faster.

If you have a junior who already understand problem X, ask them to explain it to someone else too. It'll help solidify the knowledge, and at the same time offload you too.

Take my comment as wisdom that came with age and experience, if you will :). I don't think the above would have been my first thought 10 or 15 years back.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#87

Post by marcus_holmes »

bacro wrote: post #54
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #47

Earlier 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?

Work out what you're doing to make people prefer to lie to you and tell you they've understood when they clearly haven't?

If you're having the same communication problem with multiple people, then I'm afraid that's you not them.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#88

Post by twox2 »

brandall10 wrote: post #79
SkipperCat wrote: post #33

40 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’m 45 and have never gotten more attention from recruiters, despite the fact I entered the job market during the height of the dot com era. My graduation date is clearly marked on all resumes in circulation, as is my experience showing my first internship all the way back in ‘96. It’s not only the number of ops that hit my plate, but the sheer aggressiveness of the recruiters. Very often am I contacted repeatedly, s…

Are the recruiters targeting YOU specifically or are they just taking the spray-and-pray approach reaching out to everyone who fits certain keywords?

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#89

Post by freewilly1040 »

MontyCarloHall wrote: post #16

I 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…

It’s baffling to me that managers are given coding screens. As an IC I really don’t want to deal with a manager’s half thought out PR’s slapped together in between meetings.

Perhaps some shops give a light meeting load. But “manager code” has a stigma for a reason.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#90

Post by austincheney »

My professional experience has taught me two opposite things on this subject.

1) Toys. If you want to be employable you have to learn to play with all the trendy toys. You need to demonstrate the ability to build a tech stack with these toys and solve some problem. Beyond that old people skills are largely irrelevant. By old people skills I mean the ability to communicate with precision in writing and a mastery of skills (not toys). Nobody cares if you can solve business problems using code. Toys are the new inverted binary tree.

2) When things go bad and layoffs come around the only things that matter are old people skills and critical needs positions. Prior performance won’t save you and neither will titles or seniority. If you are solid with the cool kid toys but never really mastered your craft you aren’t worth retaining under a shrinking budget because they know they can easily replace you when the economy/business recovers.

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