Is it more difficult to find work as an older developer?
-
I think you nailed it on the head. Another aspect (I am 65) is that new fads in code development like agile and DevOps tend to be something programmers used to thinking find hard to accept whole cloth and hiring managers (or teams) my be leary of being questioned.
interviewed two decades ago with a company. The PM was a twit and the lead consultant was a pompous twit that could spout acronyms but didn't do anything. I solved a development issue the team was having in 30 seconds. Still didn't get the job. Pretty sure the twit figured out what I thought of him. One thing you have to realize. I rarely come across people who can actually hire people smarter than them. And it's getting worse.
Charlie Gilley <italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape... "Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783 “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
-
I've noticed a trend (at least in South Africa) that a lot of developer job postings are looking for junior to mid level developers. Posts for senior level developers are scarcer. Companies are looking for young, energetic people. It seems like it gets more difficult to find work as an older developer, even though I would think that you would be valued for your experience. I think part of the reason is also that the salary for junior and mid level developers are less and companies are trying to save money. Perhaps there is also a stigma that older developers skills are not up to date?
I have been working in various aspects of IT since 1966 after taking a programming course in college. Along with copious math & engineering classes, I took a programming class each semester and continued to work doing programming (I had to work my way through college, being the oldest of seven children & family no wealthy). Las year in school I got an off campus job doing programming for the company I eventually went to work for after graduation. I had intended to get into control systems work after graduating with a BSEE. Things being what they were in the US in 1970 when I left college, I ended up taking a job with a small company working in the electric power & steam power control field. Moved around a bit & ended up working for a company that was making aircraft simulators. Learned a whole lot about building device drivers, OS internals, etc. Job eventually moved me to Norfolk/VA Beach VA. During the 1980's I gradually moved away from pure programming. And worked out of town & traveled a lot. had a house to pay for. Fast forward to the nineties, back in VA, not much market for software developers in this area. Got into networking with DOS/NetWare & gradually networking token ring, ArcNet, Ethernet. Moved between jobs a lot businesses seemed to hire for a project & let you go. I also got involved with WIndows programming & eventually Windows NT. I eventually picked up some skills in working with wireless bar code devices. In 1997, landed at my present job working at a shipbuilder. First assignment, more barcode devices, and wireless (pre Wi-Fi), but also did all work on the architecting the system, building servers, installing databases, installing application software, and interfacing to SAP & mainframe. This naturally led to system engineering (in the IT space). Today, I am putting together High Performance clusters for this company. The first one I put together involved actually building out the facilities to turn a large room into a datacenter. This involves being a technical lead and being able to have a conversation with people with many different skills and get them working as a team to pull these things together in a working system. So this is a long winded preface to a couple of observations. Be able to communicate, both verbally & in writing. I worked a number of proposals where you have time limits, page limits, etc. You have to get your information to the customer in a way that they can understand and still stay within the limits. Being flexible; doing what you h
-
What is wrong with you? Did you miss the smiley? :doh:
Charlie Gilley <italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape... "Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783 “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
I was wondering why you singled me out for your "lecture", so I decided to take you up on it. Your responses put you in the "vague jobs to avoid category".
It was only in wine that he laid down no limit for himself, but he did not allow himself to be confused by it. ― Confucian Analects: Rules of Confucius about his food
-
I was wondering why you singled me out for your "lecture", so I decided to take you up on it. Your responses put you in the "vague jobs to avoid category".
It was only in wine that he laid down no limit for himself, but he did not allow himself to be confused by it. ― Confucian Analects: Rules of Confucius about his food
Gerry - we're in the lounge. Think of it as a conversation... you can't read my body language and I cannot read yours. It was not my intention to single you out in any way. If you took it that way, my apologies.
Charlie Gilley <italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape... "Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783 “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
-
It's all sales.
Charlie Gilley <italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape... "Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783 “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
A job is worth what it is. Hoping they'll underbid is taking advantage. Nice way to start an employer-employee relationship.
It was only in wine that he laid down no limit for himself, but he did not allow himself to be confused by it. ― Confucian Analects: Rules of Confucius about his food
-
Gerry - we're in the lounge. Think of it as a conversation... you can't read my body language and I cannot read yours. It was not my intention to single you out in any way. If you took it that way, my apologies.
Charlie Gilley <italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape... "Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783 “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
-
A job is worth what it is. Hoping they'll underbid is taking advantage. Nice way to start an employer-employee relationship.
It was only in wine that he laid down no limit for himself, but he did not allow himself to be confused by it. ― Confucian Analects: Rules of Confucius about his food
The guy who I've worked with for 35 years said something that has always stuck with me: "When negotiating, it is very important that both parties leave satisfied." Otherwise bad business. The problem with engineers, coders, and techies is that most have no experience here. And companies take advantage. Brutally. I'd almost think universities would require a couple of classes...
Charlie Gilley <italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape... "Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783 “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
-
The guy who I've worked with for 35 years said something that has always stuck with me: "When negotiating, it is very important that both parties leave satisfied." Otherwise bad business. The problem with engineers, coders, and techies is that most have no experience here. And companies take advantage. Brutally. I'd almost think universities would require a couple of classes...
Charlie Gilley <italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape... "Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783 “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
When you have a range in mind, and don't say what it is, you're wasting everyone's time. "Negotiating" involves knowing the parameters. If you meet the minimum, expect the minimum, not less because you underbid yourself; that will only create resentment. And if one knows the maximum, and doesn't like it, don't apply ... so "bitching" that they want "too much" doesn't even come into play. But some people like playing games and jerking others around.
It was only in wine that he laid down no limit for himself, but he did not allow himself to be confused by it. ― Confucian Analects: Rules of Confucius about his food
-
I've noticed a trend (at least in South Africa) that a lot of developer job postings are looking for junior to mid level developers. Posts for senior level developers are scarcer. Companies are looking for young, energetic people. It seems like it gets more difficult to find work as an older developer, even though I would think that you would be valued for your experience. I think part of the reason is also that the salary for junior and mid level developers are less and companies are trying to save money. Perhaps there is also a stigma that older developers skills are not up to date?
-
I've noticed a trend (at least in South Africa) that a lot of developer job postings are looking for junior to mid level developers. Posts for senior level developers are scarcer. Companies are looking for young, energetic people. It seems like it gets more difficult to find work as an older developer, even though I would think that you would be valued for your experience. I think part of the reason is also that the salary for junior and mid level developers are less and companies are trying to save money. Perhaps there is also a stigma that older developers skills are not up to date?
I landed a new job last year at the age of 59. The new role has required me to learn a new system and programming language, and skill up on Python. I'm in the UK. My trick was to ditch the agencies, and target employers directly. Exception that proves the rule? Maybe.
-
I've noticed a trend (at least in South Africa) that a lot of developer job postings are looking for junior to mid level developers. Posts for senior level developers are scarcer. Companies are looking for young, energetic people. It seems like it gets more difficult to find work as an older developer, even though I would think that you would be valued for your experience. I think part of the reason is also that the salary for junior and mid level developers are less and companies are trying to save money. Perhaps there is also a stigma that older developers skills are not up to date?
When i got 50, it was not easy to find a job. I got hired by a consulting company. They said me they don't care about age because they have a pool of customers that represent a lot of different programming languages even cobol. I am now 65, sick and taking care of my wife who is sickier but i am working for many years on a project that will end in a year. This project will show what an old guy like me can do with experience.
-
Yeah, look, if I was at Chevron doing PL/X and COBOL, I am sure not much would have changed. But admittedly, I wanted to write software for people/companies. And then on the internet side, software as a service (ASP back in the day, and NOT web pages). I have a friend who worked on the Kernal for Solaris. And is working in debugging for the big Storage Companies. Still doing the same stuff (Heavy C/ASM/Memory dumps... Reading through a core dump like it's a story). There are jobs out there that don't change constantly, which is good. They are NOT usually customer driven solutions!
-
interviewed two decades ago with a company. The PM was a twit and the lead consultant was a pompous twit that could spout acronyms but didn't do anything. I solved a development issue the team was having in 30 seconds. Still didn't get the job. Pretty sure the twit figured out what I thought of him. One thing you have to realize. I rarely come across people who can actually hire people smarter than them. And it's getting worse.
Charlie Gilley <italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape... "Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783 “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
Pretty much exactly what I ran into. It wasn't my attitude or what my face told him I thought of him as I was eager and excited to get the job, but you cannot alter opinions of the inferior.
-
I've noticed a trend (at least in South Africa) that a lot of developer job postings are looking for junior to mid level developers. Posts for senior level developers are scarcer. Companies are looking for young, energetic people. It seems like it gets more difficult to find work as an older developer, even though I would think that you would be valued for your experience. I think part of the reason is also that the salary for junior and mid level developers are less and companies are trying to save money. Perhaps there is also a stigma that older developers skills are not up to date?
In Germany, we have a law that forbids discrimination due age on the job market. That is why in job postings they never explicitly look for younger developers, even if they in fact do. I had to find 3 new jobs in a row at the age of 44 to 46, so I had a lot of interviews. And in about one third of the cases they did not want to have me without telling me any conrete reasons, even when my profile was an almost perfect fit. So I think it was due to my age. In the other two thirds of the cases, age didn't matter at all. So I still had a quite a fair bunch of jobs to choose from. Might be different if you're 50+.
-
I will leave this discussion with this fact. It is a medical and scientific fact (not opinion) that as we age, our memory and cognitive function declines.
In the general sense yes. Even though on average this is true - you cannot use it as a measure of a specific individual any more so than you can use sex or race to determine the quality of an individual. Different people decline at different rates - it is also true (and equally useless) that smart people and those who regularly engage their brains tend to decline more slowly. Medical fact or not, generalizing like that is rather dangerous, and not at all productive IMHO.
-
I will leave this discussion with this fact. It is a medical and scientific fact (not opinion) that as we age, our memory and cognitive function declines.
Quote:
as we age, our memory and cognitive function declines.
Relative to our own prior state. Relative to the rest of the software development team? Meaningless. I was WAAAAAAAAAAY smarter and more productive than you when I was 25. Now I'm just WAAAAAY smarter and more productive. ;)