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64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

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Re: 64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

#301

Post by thefringthing »

ericb wrote: post #250
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That being the case, isn't meritocracy still the correct ideal that we should be doing a better job of striving for? I would actually say no, at least when it comes to when arguments for a meritocracy are used as arguments against redistribution of wealth from the more "meritocratic" to the less. Consider, as a thought experiment, if instead of features like intelligence, communication skills, self-confidence, etc.…

I'm not sure that "fairness" is exactly the right ideal if our goal is the most health and wealth for the most people? I want my doctor to be really great--to be in that job because he is the best at it. I don't want someone placed there by a truly random lottery, and I do want the guy who won the intelligence DNA drawing to be the one I talk to. I also want wealth to motivate people to get into that job, as it is so…

It's pretty telling then you went for male pronouns to describe your hypothetical doctor.

Re: 64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

#302

Post by EADGBE »

gtirloni wrote: post #76
throes_death wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a different gym Perhaps no gym?

You picked the easiest in the list. Try selling your house for a fair price and see how long it'll take.

Try getting out of a gym contract! I'm only half-kidding!

Re: 64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

#303

Post by jki275 »

chrisbennet wrote: post #237
scarface74 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hacking Linux is a specialized skill that isn’t your average everyday job that you can just walk out into the street and get like your bog standard enterprise developer for yet another software as a service CRUD app. Honestly, the broad market doesn’t care about a masters in CS. Of course it’s going to be harder to find a job with a highly specialized skill. Why does it necessarily have to be ageism and not just that…

Previous to the DARPA job, she was doing enterprise development for places like Fidelity - very normal Java, JavaScript, database stuff for decades at multiple companies. I am not attacking you specifically, but there are things you just don’t know or won’t believe if they haven’t happened to you. Heck, I would have been oblivious to this sort of thing (and sexual discrimination) if it wasn’t for my wife.

If she has a clearance and can write code I can get her hired within a week. Nobody cares about age here.

Feel free to hit me up if you're in NOVA and she's seriously looking for work.

Re: 64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

#304

Post by zaarn »

JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #226
Justsignedup wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good project management is invisible. They just make projects happen. They make sure everyone is talking. They make sure decisions are made. Everyone knows what to do when to do it. Etc. I seen good project management. It is magical. Then the manager left. Everything slowed down to a crawl.

Invisible makes it sound intangible. If you can't quantify the value you're adding to an organization, are you adding any at all? Making sure "the right people are talking", "decisions are made", etc. do sound like things that can be tracked to confirm if a PM is indeed adding value.

On a similar thought the IT department of organizations in the past was neglected. After all, they don't add any value, they are only needed to shuffle around dead hardware for new hardware.

Similarly a good manager provides auxiliary value; it doesn't directly add value to the organization but if it's not there then the overall value decreases.

Not everything in an organization is immediate positive effect.

Re: 64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

#305

Post by badpun »

siruncledrew wrote: post #296
towaway1138 wrote: post #15

I'm only in my 50s, but this is very relateable. Did a couple dozen interviews a year or two ago before finally getting a bite. Somewhat amazingly, even passed the hiring committee at a FANG, only to get swatted down by a rare strike from the executive level. In one interview, was asked to produce a class that could serialize and deserialize a list of numbers, to/from a string of chars. Sure, it's not that hard. Took…

This is observational, but I notice older hiring managers are more ok with hiring older applicants. Maybe there’s some kind of relatability or something, but the older hires actually turned out to be cool, insightful people. It’s even pretty funny when they joke about age in a self-deprecating sense. Consequently, I’ve seen that younger people are more wary of hiring people too far removed from their own demographic…

> Consequently, I’ve seen that younger people are more wary of hiring people too far removed from their own demographic like there’s a forethought a 40+ dev is going to be some burdensome fart from an AARP commercial.

Younger people often find it awkward and uncomfortable to manage someone who's closer to their dad than to them. I suspect in such cases they just filter them out if they have other candidates.

Re: 64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

#306

Post by Zigurd »

barrkel wrote: post #67
Zigurd wrote: post #31

So far, this hasn't been my experience. I've written books. I have a very strong network among funders and experienced management. I'm probably in the top few percent of candidates my age because I consciously built those advantages, some of which can't be reproduced by everyone in my age cohort looking for a job. But, just because I saw ageism coming at me, doesn't mean that it is excusable. Age discrimination is so…

Indeed. By definition, not everyone can be in the top few percent.

I hope it's clear that that is effect and not cause.

Re: 64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

#307

Post by TheCoelacanth »

scarface74 wrote: post #135
chrisbennet wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Telling yourself that makes you feel better but it doesn’t change the reality that ageism is a thing. My wife looked for years until I told he to give up and retire. Working as a consultant, I’m making double what I made as an employee but I’m exceptionally lucky.

Yes because it’s not reality that I’m 45 and find jobs quickly. When I was looking for a job at 42, I submitted my resume to 8 companies through recruiters and had no rejections and three offers in the course of three weeks. Two years later it took one or two weeks. My former manager is in his 50s, decided he was tired of managing after his kids retired and now is a full stack React/C# developer working with Azure. A…

45 isn't even old. That's mid-career.

Re: 64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

#308

Post by snotrockets »

ValleyOfTheMtns wrote: post #190
Gibbon1 wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Meritocracy is a lie used by the privileged. There is no such thing in the real world. I remember an essay by a black female engineer. She said what helped her were three things, her dad had a union job, disability payments from the uncle who came home from Korea with no legs. These meant they could fake a middle class lifestyle. And her mother teaching her how to dress and talk like a white person. Seriously a lot…

Seems like that's conflating actual meritocracy with an exploited/fake form of meritocracy. Actual meritocracies are rare, but that doesn't mean we should redefine "meritocracy" to be the the distorted (and more common) version of it.

Just like every example of a communist regime wasn't true communist, and hence failed!

Re: 64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

#309

Post by jammygit »

sephoric wrote: post #66
towaway1138 wrote: post #15

I'm only in my 50s, but this is very relateable. Did a couple dozen interviews a year or two ago before finally getting a bite. Somewhat amazingly, even passed the hiring committee at a FANG, only to get swatted down by a rare strike from the executive level. In one interview, was asked to produce a class that could serialize and deserialize a list of numbers, to/from a string of chars. Sure, it's not that hard. Took…

We're at that point too. My solution is a combination of downsizing our life and making my own app business. So far the only app I released (Autumn) was a bust because I stupidly released it on New Year's Eve so practically nobody knew about it, also it's too niche. But everyone loves the quality, so I figure I'll just keep writing more apps. I've got a lot of ideas and a lot of energy. I may have to work at Walmart…

I don't have any first hand experience with app stores, but I read that 0.01% of android apps make enough money to recoup their development costs. I still find the figure stunning

Re: 64 and unemployed: One man's struggle to be taken seriously as a job applicant

#310

Post by jammygit »

brobdingnagians wrote: post #166
agumonkey wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Serving food is more than honest IMO, but still a bit of a waste.. Also it seems a lot of capable coders are struggling with harsh if not inhuman business structures. Maybe regroup and form a nice company of nice people.

I like this comment; seems like you could make a pretty good company from the older talent that isn't picked up by the young companies. In terms of pure competition, you could give them all a run for their money with the lifelong knowledge bit.

The company I worked for last year was about 1/4 older gentlemen in engineering roles. I'm disappointed that other companies are not as keen to hire them, but they had so freaking much experience and it was a pleasure to work with them
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