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I'll give you my perspective as I'm nearing 40; I think there's no problem being an older developer as long as you stay up on current technologies and trends so

by ebbv 10y ago

I'll give you my perspective as I'm nearing 40; I think there's no problem being an older developer as long as you stay up on current technologies and trends so that you can talk to your teammates and potential employers in their own language. If you interview and you constantly sound dated or have to ask for explanations on terms you don't recognize that will be an issue. I honestly am the best developer I've ever been. I am constantly learning new stuff and usually know more new frameworks and languages than young developers I interview. I don't rest on my laurels. I think that's key. Marketing I agree with you is probably harder, depending on the industry you're marketing for and the company you're working for. Ultimately, though there are objective aspects to marketing (e.g. running tests and seeing what works) but if you are having to be a source of ideas, as we get older it may be harder for us to come up with marketing and product ideas that truly interest a younger generation. So if you really enjoy marketing and want to stay in it, you may want to move to a company who is targeting people in your age group. I think that's true for anyone, though. A 20 year old may not know how to market to 40 years olds as well as a 40 year old. If you want to get out of marketing and are looking for other career choices that you can age gracefully in, I think the firs thing is to ask yourself what you would enjoy doing and then from that list pick what you think you'll have the opportunity to age gracefully.

randcraw 10y ago
If the goal is to stay in marketing yet develop deeper skills, why not move toward analytics -- esp. data mining? There has to be a huge potential market for marketing analysts who understand marketing AND analytic metrics. All the marketing people I know at large companies have little or no knowledge of how metrics are acquired or whether they're accurate/precise. If someone like the OP added skills in data mining and probability distributions, especially if they could conduct experiments on databases to shape marketing campaigns, they'd be worlds ahead of a) pure marketers or b) pure data miners. In general, neither expert (a or b) knows enough to properly propose and explore new marketing ideas. Someone who can 1) walk the analytic walk, yet 2) speak the language of business and 3) understand consumer psychology and sales priorities, ought to be an essential contributor indefinitely in a business niche that should outlast us all.

by ebbv 10y ago

randcraw 10y ago

If the goal is to stay in marketing yet develop deeper skills, why not move toward analytics -- esp. data mining? There has to be a huge potential market for marketing analysts who understand marketing AND analytic metrics. All the marketing people I know at large companies have little or no knowledge of how metrics are acquired or whether they're accurate/precise. If someone like the OP added skills in data mining and probability distributions, especially if they could conduct experiments on databases to shape marketing campaigns, they'd be worlds ahead of a) pure marketers or b) pure data miners. In general, neither expert (a or b) knows enough to properly propose and explore new marketing ideas. Someone who can 1) walk the analytic walk, yet 2) speak the language of business and 3) understand consumer psychology and sales priorities, ought to be an essential contributor indefinitely in a business niche that should outlast us all.