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The Brutal Ageism of Tech

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Re: The Brutal Ageism of Tech

#11

Post by jowiar »

One of the biggest indirect causes of ageism I've seen is the traditional career path forced many engineers out of engineering - there is/was an attitude at places like IBM of: "If you want to make bank, you need to go into management or sales". Years later, an engineering crunch makes engineering into "where the money is", but you largely lost a generation of technical experience that took a break of a decade or two.

My father got lucky in that he was successful in his transition out of engineering, and was 67 by the time his position went extinct, but there are a whole bunch of folks who would rather have been engineers than otherwise, but ended up missing out on a couple decades where the daily tasks of building software changed dramatically so gained less in technical expertise than they should have, and were left hanging around age 50.

I have a ton of cultural criticisms of the current tech industry, but the one thing that it is absolutely getting right is valuing creation. The damage that could have been caused by the Google/Apple cartel has been limited largely by the startup industry that, for all its faults, has as a crucial belief that the act of building things is valuable, and that people who make things are the ones who create the most value.

Re: The Brutal Ageism of Tech

#12

Post by yukichan »

Experience is a liability. You learn all kinds of things as an engineer that quickly become obsolete. Even in the web environment. If you're still worried about hasLayout or rounding corners with images, or god forbid using tables for layout, or even setting explicit widths on your web pages instead of responsive media queries, you're adhering to obsolete ways of doing things that are hurting you more than helping.

Edit: Am I being downvoted because I'm wrong or because you just don't like what I have to say? Both are wrong reasons to downvote, but you go, you go downvote. My comment is reality. It may not be what you want to hear, but it isn't a low quality comment. I'm so tired of this silly site and it's potato filled echo chamber.

Re: The Brutal Ageism of Tech

#13

Post by briantakita »

yukichan wrote: post #12

Experience is a liability. You learn all kinds of things as an engineer that quickly become obsolete. Even in the web environment. If you're still worried about hasLayout or rounding corners with images, or god forbid using tables for layout, or even setting explicit widths on your web pages instead of responsive media queries, you're adhering to obsolete ways of doing things that are hurting you more than helping. E…

Getting stuck in your ways is a liability.

Someone who is continuously improving, while remaining aware of the current environment, will have experience as an asset.

Edit to your edit: You have much to learn...That's reality. Don't worry, I also have much to learn ;-)

Re: The Brutal Ageism of Tech

#14

Post by adamnemecek »

ascendantlogic wrote: post #5
danso wrote: post #3

I don't really get the pragmatism behind ageism in tech entrepreneurship. That is, in a field in which human abilities are augmented by ever-more faster computing, and in which ideas, experience, and relationships would seemingly be as important (if not much more ) as youthful energy...how is it logical that its best people would solely be among sub-30-year olds? It just doesn't make any sense.

It's not a capability thing. It's a make-you-work-more-hours-for-less-money-than-the-older-engineer thing.

But why do they care so much about hours and not about output? I would kind of understand if this was for some web technologies since older devs might not be up to speed with the latest compile-to-JS language but I can't imagine that someone who has been writing say C++ for the last 20 years would not perform better than someone fresh out of school.

Re: The Brutal Ageism of Tech

#15

Post by UK-AL »

danso wrote: post #3

I don't really get the pragmatism behind ageism in tech entrepreneurship. That is, in a field in which human abilities are augmented by ever-more faster computing, and in which ideas, experience, and relationships would seemingly be as important (if not much more ) as youthful energy...how is it logical that its best people would solely be among sub-30-year olds? It just doesn't make any sense.

because 90% of starts ups are just fancy websites and mobile phone apps. They don't really need highly advanced programming/maths/Machine Learning skills.

They rather have naive young developers willing to work constant overtime, to get the fancy javascript frontend web page out faster.

Re: The Brutal Ageism of Tech

#16

Post by yukichan »

briantakita wrote: post #13
yukichan wrote: post #12

Experience is a liability. You learn all kinds of things as an engineer that quickly become obsolete. Even in the web environment. If you're still worried about hasLayout or rounding corners with images, or god forbid using tables for layout, or even setting explicit widths on your web pages instead of responsive media queries, you're adhering to obsolete ways of doing things that are hurting you more than helping. E…

Getting stuck in your ways is a liability. Someone who is continuously improving, while remaining aware of the current environment, will have experience as an asset. Edit to your edit: You have much to learn...That's reality. Don't worry, I also have much to learn ;-)

Yes, you have to continuously improve, and also recognize that the things you learned before may no longer apply. Always know why you have to do the things you do and when that isn't true anymore.

Also I didn't understand half of what you said.

Re: The Brutal Ageism of Tech

#17

Post by UK-AL »

adamnemecek wrote: post #14
ascendantlogic wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a capability thing. It's a make-you-work-more-hours-for-less-money-than-the-older-engineer thing.

But why do they care so much about hours and not about output? I would kind of understand if this was for some web technologies since older devs might not be up to speed with the latest compile-to-JS language but I can't imagine that someone who has been writing say C++ for the last 20 years would not perform better than someone fresh out of school.

Most starts ups aren't using C++. 90% of starts up do the "latest compile-to-JS language" thing.

Re: The Brutal Ageism of Tech

#18

Post by kaliblack »

ascendantlogic wrote: post #5
danso wrote: post #3

I don't really get the pragmatism behind ageism in tech entrepreneurship. That is, in a field in which human abilities are augmented by ever-more faster computing, and in which ideas, experience, and relationships would seemingly be as important (if not much more ) as youthful energy...how is it logical that its best people would solely be among sub-30-year olds? It just doesn't make any sense.

It's not a capability thing. It's a make-you-work-more-hours-for-less-money-than-the-older-engineer thing.

Which, ironically, is tied to the conventional management view that butts on seats equal productivity.

Re: The Brutal Ageism of Tech

#19

Post by gamegoblin »

daveqr wrote: post #7

Guess what, there's a lot of software being written by people not in their 20s in places like Kansas City, Boston and Nashville. The world doesn't revolve around Silicon Valley.

Yyyyep. Step into one of Walmart's cubicle farms in Bentonville, Arkansas and it's mostly middle aged folks hacking away in C# and VB.

Re: The Brutal Ageism of Tech

#20

Post by Fr0styMatt »

I wonder if this is a 'Valley' or just a 'Startup' thing as it doesn't seem too common here in Australia in the part of the industry that I work in (defence and now gaming); though maybe I'm just lucky and have been in the right parts.

We have a massive age range all the way from 20 to 60 (I guess), with most of the better engineers in their 30s-40s it seems, though to be honest you wouldn't really know unless you asked - there are guys here that you wouldn't guess were 40.

Personally I know I'm a far better engineer now in my mid-30s than I was in my 20s and to be honest I STILL feel like a beginner excited to finally find his feet. I don't see this stopping anytime soon. I don't want to get into management and luckily don't have to and I'm sure at 45 I'll be a far better software engineer than I am now (well, I sure hope so at least :) ).

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