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Is 40 the New 60?

neverworkintheory.org

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Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#371

Post by chasd00 »

joelbluminator wrote: post #363
chasd00 wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't stand the jaded senior engineer archetype. They're absolutely toxic to the junior and mid-level engineers who look up to them. Years ago i was at a coffee shop and overheard a conversation between a college student and what had to have been an assigned mentor. This guy was going on and on about the very worst of his experiences in his career yet, in a weird way, bragging about them at the same. This poor kid…

As long as you're not gonna be ageist that's fine to hate a certain type of engineer. Remember you will get old one day too and you'll be surprised how fast time flies.

I understand what you mean but I’m 45 and have been around the block a few times. I’m not sure if this analogy works completely but teaching someone how to climb a mountain safely is good.

Beating into the head of an aspiring climber the details of every injury/death disillusioning them of even an attempt is full stop unacceptable.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#372

Post by joelbluminator »

chasd00 wrote: post #371
joelbluminator wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as you're not gonna be ageist that's fine to hate a certain type of engineer. Remember you will get old one day too and you'll be surprised how fast time flies.

I understand what you mean but I’m 45 and have been around the block a few times. I’m not sure if this analogy works completely but teaching someone how to climb a mountain safely is good. Beating into the head of an aspiring climber the details of every injury/death disillusioning them of even an attempt is full stop unacceptable.

I get you buddy seems like you had a bad experience with some old dude. But you're no spring chicken yourself, you will get to that age eventually. Let's just all be humane to each other and judge each other according to merit as much as possible. I'm 37 and wanna keep working 15 years from now...

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#373

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

jandrewrogers wrote: post #361
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does "getting up there in age" mean? It has been my experience that the mid-thirties are kind of a "golden window" for senior-level talent. Some people think of it as "older," but not that many. We're old enough to have had the sharp edges worn away, but not yet old enough to make the management uncomfortable. Once we start getting into the 40s (or, heaven forbid, the 50s), attitudes start changing -drastically.…

Chris, I am approximately a decade younger than you, so in my 40s staring at 50. I started off my career at a pretty severe disadvantage, so it took off late. My golden age is now. You are correct that my unique expertise affords me some significant advantages. For certain fascinating classes of computer science problem, I’m the person everyone calls. My true CV is far weirder than the public ones. But ironically, th…

> if you are doing cool shit age doesn’t matter.

That's always been my viewpoint.

I'm used to dealing with folks across pretty much all ages. I have an "eclectic" social circle that includes (but not limited to) kids still in high school, bikers, ex-cons, scientists, bankers, retirees, and CEOs.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#374

Post by bacro »

marcus_holmes wrote: post #306
bacro wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, it is not only me that has these problems. But I agree that I am not the best teacher in the world. However, I do believe that they are not trying very much and keep calling me or stopping the team with meetings for small problems. I get it when you are new to the company, but for god's sakes when you have 2 years+ and you still keep asking trivial questions, there is some other problem here.

We keep telling people "there are no stupid questions - please ask before assuming anything" then get annoyed when they do exactly that ;) Though I do get the frustration. I had similar with one of my juniors, and it took me ages to work out that his learning style didn't match with my teaching style. I ended up having to go right back to basics and walk him through everything painstakingly slowly.

I know :D But, I am only get annoyed when the questions are recurring. I think there should be more effort from the developer to learn by himself if he does not get it from us explaining 100 times, then.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#375

Post by thiago_fm »

atemerev wrote: post #141
thiago_fm wrote: post #60

This 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 doe…

"it's just yet another profession. No big deal". Exactly, in Europe software engineering is just another profession, with pretty average compensation. Which is not exactly motivating.

Compensation is great. You can afford to have a good standard of living.

I get paid much more than soft devs get in many cities in the US, of course, much less than SV and similar tech hubs, but I believe that those extreme salaries are mostly because of bubbly economics rather than something perenial. It won't last.

If you can leave behind all that inequality and problems has, and only think of yourself, those tech hubs look like a good alternative, but personally I find it quite sad myself. I'd rather live in a place where my pumbler has good living conditions, the bus driver and so on.

Also that has good public transport and more collective thinking. Driving a car in those big american streets would make me very depressed.

It's a matter of choice(for some), but anyhow... here in Europe the situation is fine. :-)

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#376

Post by hansel_der »

stooliepidgin wrote: post #303
aweiland wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm in the same boat. Also "senior dev" doesn't mean what it meant 10 years ago. I just had a really quick chat last night with a engineering lead. The position was a "senior dev" with 5-8 years experience in multiple things. Usually those are taken is minimums. They were actually maximums. He was surprised I made it past the initial recruiter screen having 20+ years experience. We thanked each other for our time and…

One has to adapt to the biases and reality for survival. Lie about your age if it ever comes up. Lie downward about your experience too. Fuck their discriminatory bullshit.

i know a career-agent from a job-center that told me the same thing after he had witnessed many qualified and experienced engineers beeing rejected because of age- or buzzword-based discrimination.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#377

Post by greyhair »

In my mid sixties and I am getting as many head hunter hits as I have ever had. Everybody knows my age, I don't hide it. Thirty seven years as an active engineer, consciously avoided moving into management because I know I would not be a good manager, though I have had an excellent time mentoring over the duration of my career. Mentoring an individual is very different from managing a project and a team. My LinkedIn post shows my entire technical career back to 1984.

If anything, my experience is that 60 is the new 40.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#378

Post by greyhair »

ozim wrote: post #346
stooliepidgin wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ageism is real. It's not some sour grapes of under-performers who let their skills decline, or move or think at a dotard pace. It's essentially "We don't want anyone old because old = bad, new = good."

I think it is a lot about under-performers that want to hang onto their "years of experience" as a selling point and being angry that there is not much of a market for "years of experience" only. Maybe they were not under-performers 10-15 or 20 years ago, but if someone gives 20 pages of resume and most of it happened in 90's I would not be interested. Because it is quite easy to see such person is hanging onto his p…

So my resume concentrates on the last five years, with the prior 30+ being mere bullet items, in the event you want to ask. You are correct that no one really cares about what you have done outside the last five years.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#379

Post by greyhair »

quadrifoliate wrote: post #98
jasode wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>At 40, I've done some of the best work I've ever done [...] Its because at 40, I had a much deeper understanding of the tech, The blog post isn't about self-reported cognitive ability getting stronger (or not declining). It's about the job marketplace . Maybe it's instructive to compare/contrast different professional careers that depend on mental abilities and how age affects marketability: - computer programming :…

> Why is experience valued for outside hires of CEOs but not as much for programmers? In other words, a 55-year old programmer would have 35 more years of experience than a 20-year old but that "extra 35 years of programming" doesn't seem to be valued as much as the "extra 35 years of managing" that a 55-year CEO candidate has. Why? I'll bite – I think it is because instead of licensing and regulating our profession…

I always tell people that software development, as a career, is like being in college forever. You have to be in the learning mindset your whole career. Part of that learning, is learning technology, and part of that learning, is learning people and organizations. Organizations are very different, today, than they were in 1990. Less change than the underlying technology, but changed none the less.

Re: Is 40 the New 60?

#380

Post by brandall10 »

Tarucho wrote: post #356
brandall10 wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As mentioned elsewhere in the this chat, I'm a 45 yo principal engineer at my current company who has seen nothing but an increase in attention from recruiters since turning 40. I'm also directly involved in hiring for my team, having helped add 15 members over the last year, working directly w/ the director to review all resumes, handling maybe 30% of the screens, and usually the veto vote. We've interviewed a numbe…

Why do you think they have a pessimistic attitude? I´ll use myself as an example. I started coding professionally at 23 (I´m 43). For years I pushed myself to be the best coder I could. At 35 I got laid-off. After that I just got sucky jobs were I´m treated like they have me there as a favor (and I work with the latest, and I´m, even with the pessimism, a top performer). A coworker of mine that thought that coding wa…

With all due respect, there is no reason to have had sucky jobs over the last 8 years. The market has only gotten increasingly hotter... if you're in a tight spot career-wise, do the work to get into a better company working w/ better people.

If it's an issue w/ passing interviews at better companies, interviewing unto itself is a skill that should be regularly honed.

When I was a younger engineer I was stuck in a job that was unsatisfying for about 5 years... every 1.5 years or so I would interview w/ 3-5 positions, usually one or two would be close to an offer but I ended up empty-handed, would get deflated and give up.

Over the last decade I've taken the job search much more seriously, usually interviewing at 15-20 companies so I can end up w/ 3-5 offers to choose from. Yes, it's very time consuming (probably some 60-70 hours of my time over 5-6 weeks), but the quality of the companies I've worked at has been consequently more satisfying.

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