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Ask HN: Programmers Above 50, Is It Possible to Have a Career Past Your 50s?

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Re: Ask HN: Programmers Above 50, Is It Possible to Have a Career Past Your 50s?

#41

Post by seanmcdirmid »

kabdib wrote: post #28

I'm 54. Got my current job when I was 52 (prior to that, 11 years at Microsoft). I think if you're not over-specialized that you can still do well. Doing be a person who just writes device drivers, or just does web stuff, or just writes toolchains. Do it all, and at depth when you can. I tend to get into projects that are 2-3 years in scope and involve actually shipping new technologies at consumer scale. This will t…

That doesn't bode very well for a PhD (though I'm only 40, I still have time to generalize!).

Re: Ask HN: Programmers Above 50, Is It Possible to Have a Career Past Your 50s?

#42

Post by sheynkman »

I am 48 and a General Partner at a VC fund. On the board of five tech companies. Founded three companies where I was CEO. Coded and still code every day since my Stanford CS days in the late 1980's.

Right now: Scala, Node/AngularJS, Ionic. Use GitHub, CircleCI, and deploy to Docker clusters. Use JIRA to stay sane.

Worked at Oracle, so traditional database (DBA level) and now use Couch + Mongo.

Do my own UI/UX. Can do Photoshop -> LESS/SASS/CSS. Know how to get Gulp to generate spritesheets :-)

Go to tech/programming conferences and meetups.

A full-stack unicorn. How's that for a VC?

Re: Ask HN: Programmers Above 50, Is It Possible to Have a Career Past Your 50s?

#43

Post by juliangregorian »

vonmoltke wrote: post #33
kabdib wrote: post #28

I'm 54. Got my current job when I was 52 (prior to that, 11 years at Microsoft). I think if you're not over-specialized that you can still do well. Doing be a person who just writes device drivers, or just does web stuff, or just writes toolchains. Do it all, and at depth when you can. I tend to get into projects that are 2-3 years in scope and involve actually shipping new technologies at consumer scale. This will t…

> I think if you're not over-specialized that you can still do well. Doing be a person who just writes device drivers, or just does web stuff, or just writes toolchains. Do it all, and at depth when you can. When reviewing job reqs, I see the opposite. Outside the web and mobile arenas, companies seem to want people who are highly specialized in what they do.

Perhaps, but in a few years when the company has a down year will you be replaceable by the next specialist, or are you able to get a few fingers in different pies by being diversified?

Re: Ask HN: Programmers Above 50, Is It Possible to Have a Career Past Your 50s?

#44

Post by vetinari »

vonmoltke wrote: post #33
kabdib wrote: post #28

I'm 54. Got my current job when I was 52 (prior to that, 11 years at Microsoft). I think if you're not over-specialized that you can still do well. Doing be a person who just writes device drivers, or just does web stuff, or just writes toolchains. Do it all, and at depth when you can. I tend to get into projects that are 2-3 years in scope and involve actually shipping new technologies at consumer scale. This will t…

> I think if you're not over-specialized that you can still do well. Doing be a person who just writes device drivers, or just does web stuff, or just writes toolchains. Do it all, and at depth when you can. When reviewing job reqs, I see the opposite. Outside the web and mobile arenas, companies seem to want people who are highly specialized in what they do.

That doesn't mean they will get it.

We are also looking for pretty specialized people, but there are none. So we will take also those, who are willing to learn. The downside is, that the money that goes to their training would be theirs, if they already knew what is needed (i.e. they cannot ask for the same money/benefits as those who are "ready made").

Re: Ask HN: Programmers Above 50, Is It Possible to Have a Career Past Your 50s?

#45

Post by pjmorris »

52 here. I've had a mixed career, ranging from F500's to start-ups, to consulting companies, to solo consultant. At 46, just before the financial crisis, I took a Dev job with the most stable of the companies I'd consulted for. I'd still be there, probably through retirement, but I had/have one more ambition. So, I'm working on a PhD and hope to land in academia. Failing that, I left on good terms, and keep in touch with, the crew at my last job.

I don't know that I'd recommend rolling the dice like I have, but if you keep yourself curious, fresh, and focused on solving problems people have, I think there are ways to beat ageism.

Re: Ask HN: Programmers Above 50, Is It Possible to Have a Career Past Your 50s?

#46

Post by jroseattle »

The only advice I can pass on to the "younger" crew is to simply be prepared. You can do so in two ways, both of which are necessary:

- Stay relatively current but continually grow your knowledge depth. Imagine a full-stack developer who has little awareness of anything new in the past ten years...don't be that person. Complacency for your career will kill your prospects fast. An advantage that you develop over time is that the latest tech is often nothing new, and is instead just a repackaging of prior concepts. Leverage that advantage.

- The "past your 50s" monicker is a moving target. Do not assume that 50 is the threshold that you cross when you have to start dealing with ageism. It will be different for many (it's often much earlier), and you won't see it coming. One day, you'll be relatively dismissed by someone younger than you due to your "age", and you'll think "what the $#@% just happened?"

In the end, I'm still an eager beaver who gets excited at seeing interesting ways to solve engineering problems more effectively than the past. And because of that, I feel like I keep the best parts of what is normally considered a youthful approach.

As always, your mileage may vary.

Re: Ask HN: Programmers Above 50, Is It Possible to Have a Career Past Your 50s?

#47

Post by juliangregorian »

monkeyprojects wrote: post #36
frostmatthew wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've heard many non-technical people say that if you're still coding after ~35, you must be lacking important people skills. I don't agree with that kind of generalization, but it seems to be a common viewpoint. I've never understood that viewpoint either - nobody ever says "if you're still a doctor or lawyer after age X you must be lacking Y"

The answer to that as some one past 35 is that I code because I like to know I produced / created something. Testing - Just confirms it works PM - Just ensured its delivered Programmer - I did that.... Yes I could earn more money as a PM but I'm happy with what I get attached to the sense of achievement of "I created that".

I write code and make more than any PM I've worked for, which I think is normal in my industry and location.

Re: Ask HN: Programmers Above 50, Is It Possible to Have a Career Past Your 50s?

#48

Post by quaffapint »

I'm in my 40s and working the same enterprise programming gig since the late 90s. I keep up to date with doing work and learning on the side. I don't want to manage, not do to the people, but the red tape and politics.

I do often wonder if I should leave and get another job before I appear 'too old'. The few interviews I've had over the past couple years my age didn't seem to be an issue, just weren't positions that would work out. At some point, if I choose to really leave or get let go, I'm rather worried that I will appear too old on paper to get my foot in the door, even though the knowledge and experiences should be there.

Re: Ask HN: Programmers Above 50, Is It Possible to Have a Career Past Your 50s?

#50

Post by knotty66 »

_throwaway_away wrote: post #25

I don't know, i have sent perhaps 25 or so applications during last few years for various remote Frond-End positions. I'm very-very good and i like what I'm doing, thank you very much. My happy day is when I receive automated rejecting letter, that happens in 10% of cases. In other cases, silence. I have failed to score a single interview. And I'm 50 :-) I guess i need to hold on of my current and boring job for as l…

Why do you mention your age in your job application?
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