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Just one data point... I'm 52, and I work at Facebook. According to the chart in the OP, that's the youngest of the big companies, with a median age of only 2

Just one data point... I'm 52, and I work at Facebook. According to the chart in the OP, that's the youngest of the big companies, with a median age of only 28, and that's totally consistent with what I see when I'm at the main Facebook campus. "Campus" indeed. I feel like a parent, visiting my kids' school. Good preparation for when that actually happens, I guess. Is my situation stressful? Well, sure, but not because of my age. It's stressful because there's a lot to do, and I'm trying to do it while there's all sorts of weirdness coming at me from all directions all the time. It's stressful because I get to be on call every fourth week, and sometimes that can be intense. That kind of thing sucked in my twenties, too. It's a little worse now that I have a family, but on the other hand I've had a lot of time to develop an arsenal of coping strategies. Just because I don't see any additional stress doesn't mean others don't. In particular, I can see how older women face obstacles I don't. Nonetheless, I think a lot of the angst is because of unrealistic expectations. Salary growth is exponential. For you to be worth that salary, your impact has to be exponential too. If you're my age and still a pure individual contributor, you're going to have a hard time justifying that salary unless you're the very best of the best in the whole world at something pretty specialized and valuable. It's not at all unreasonable for employers to expect that people at this level will be multiplying their personal impact by advancing the state of the art, creating powerful new tools, teaching others, etc. If you got this far without learning how to do those things, you really missed your best opportunity. The people "behind" you are still on an upward curve, so you'd better be on one too. I think a lot of stress comes from people realizing deep down that they're not, and - even worse - that they have nobody to blame but themselves.

mixmastamyk 9y ago
The problem at these companies for older workers is not getting an offer at a high salary, it is getting an offer at all.
- notacoward 9y ago
  Could those be related? If somebody's used to making X, they really might not be very happy making less than 75% of X. I've seen plenty of people who thought they would be, then within six months they'd gone to join a friend or start their own company. That can really sting when it's someone you'd hoped to have in a key role leading a team or technology, maybe turning around a bad situation, and you had gone through a longer hiring cycle to match. It's not like losing a "just grab the next one" kid fresh out of college. It can be fatal for a startup. I'm sure a lot of hiring managers who have been burned that way a couple of times get pretty wary of taking people at their word about willingness to take a pay cut. I'm sure many overcompensate and lose out on some great hires, but I'm not sure I can really blame them. "Once bitten twice shy" is a pretty natural human kind of thing.
  - bradknowles 9y ago
    The people in question might be perfectly happy making less money but doing the kind of work they like. I know I am. I also know that most of us never even get the interview, because the assumption on the other side of the table is that we wouldn’t be happy, or any of various other problems.
spike021 9y ago
Any advice for handling on-call? I'm a new grad and while I've been on the rotation for multiple cycles now, I still feel quite stressed and on edge when it's my turn every 4-5 weeks. It even "ruins" weekends where I feel like I can't do a lot outside, and if I do leave my home I feel obligated to carry my work laptop everywhere and be near wifi/internet in the case that I get paged, which honestly isn't even that often for my team's responsibilities.
- notacoward 9y ago
  Trust me, it's worse when you do get paged a lot. I was on call last week, away from my family, in a different time zone, shackled to my $#@! laptop 24/7 like you say. I'm not going to put varnish on this turd. It bites. You should be doing everything you can to make it better, such as fixing alerts that fire too often or developing tools that make it easier to diagnose and fix problems quickly even when you're half asleep (or the next person is half trained). That said, here's my one SUPER IMPORTANT piece of advice: trust your team. Trust the people on other teams when you're working on a problem. They all know the pain just like you do. They're all trying to get through it just like you are. Ask for help early and often. Even if you are imposing on someone else, trust that they won't hate you forever and you'll get a chance to pay it back. Even for an introvert like me, those are calming thoughts. Even if some it's not really true, believing it while you're in the moment will help remove one huge source of stress and let you focus on the problem at hand. You can always come back later and evaluate whether the teamwork was as good as it should be. Usually it does turn out to be. P.S. Also, a little humor goes a long way.
- qachaos 9y ago
  I'm not on call anymore but when I was I hated it like nothing else...especially the time I was on call for two weeks during christmas and new years. I don't know if you could use this but I started taking note of when there were calls and noticed there were days where it would be rare for a call. Those days I would relax a little, knowing that at least by statistics it would be rare to get paged.
- downrightmike 9y ago
  Keep track of all the hours you're working, when you're working them. On average where I work has 10 hours of on call usage on the weekends. To cope we send out an email chain Friday to have people note any upgrades or planned activities which could cause a call. Better to know what may happen and when. It also helps that two people are on call on weekends. One 6am to 6pm and the other from the international team covers nights.
bitwize 9y ago
> It's stressful because there's a lot to do, and I'm trying to do it while there's all sorts of weirdness coming at me from all directions all the time. The fact that you're saying this may be a sign that you're too old for this shit. Kids love weirdness coming at them from all directions, because it's new and cool and they don't know any better.
RyanOD 9y ago
This is a really insightful observation. I'm in complete agreement about the realization people have about not being on the upward curve and the stress that comes from only having themselves to blame. Well said.

mixmastamyk 9y ago

The problem at these companies for older workers is not getting an offer at a high salary, it is getting an offer at all.

notacoward 9y ago
Could those be related? If somebody's used to making X, they really might not be very happy making less than 75% of X. I've seen plenty of people who thought they would be, then within six months they'd gone to join a friend or start their own company. That can really sting when it's someone you'd hoped to have in a key role leading a team or technology, maybe turning around a bad situation, and you had gone through a longer hiring cycle to match. It's not like losing a "just grab the next one" kid fresh out of college. It can be fatal for a startup. I'm sure a lot of hiring managers who have been burned that way a couple of times get pretty wary of taking people at their word about willingness to take a pay cut. I'm sure many overcompensate and lose out on some great hires, but I'm not sure I can really blame them. "Once bitten twice shy" is a pretty natural human kind of thing.
- bradknowles 9y ago
  The people in question might be perfectly happy making less money but doing the kind of work they like. I know I am. I also know that most of us never even get the interview, because the assumption on the other side of the table is that we wouldn’t be happy, or any of various other problems.

spike021 9y ago

Any advice for handling on-call? I'm a new grad and while I've been on the rotation for multiple cycles now, I still feel quite stressed and on edge when it's my turn every 4-5 weeks. It even "ruins" weekends where I feel like I can't do a lot outside, and if I do leave my home I feel obligated to carry my work laptop everywhere and be near wifi/internet in the case that I get paged, which honestly isn't even that often for my team's responsibilities.

notacoward 9y ago
Trust me, it's worse when you do get paged a lot. I was on call last week, away from my family, in a different time zone, shackled to my $#@! laptop 24/7 like you say. I'm not going to put varnish on this turd. It bites. You should be doing everything you can to make it better, such as fixing alerts that fire too often or developing tools that make it easier to diagnose and fix problems quickly even when you're half asleep (or the next person is half trained). That said, here's my one SUPER IMPORTANT piece of advice: trust your team. Trust the people on other teams when you're working on a problem. They all know the pain just like you do. They're all trying to get through it just like you are. Ask for help early and often. Even if you are imposing on someone else, trust that they won't hate you forever and you'll get a chance to pay it back. Even for an introvert like me, those are calming thoughts. Even if some it's not really true, believing it while you're in the moment will help remove one huge source of stress and let you focus on the problem at hand. You can always come back later and evaluate whether the teamwork was as good as it should be. Usually it does turn out to be. P.S. Also, a little humor goes a long way.
qachaos 9y ago
I'm not on call anymore but when I was I hated it like nothing else...especially the time I was on call for two weeks during christmas and new years. I don't know if you could use this but I started taking note of when there were calls and noticed there were days where it would be rare for a call. Those days I would relax a little, knowing that at least by statistics it would be rare to get paged.
downrightmike 9y ago
Keep track of all the hours you're working, when you're working them. On average where I work has 10 hours of on call usage on the weekends. To cope we send out an email chain Friday to have people note any upgrades or planned activities which could cause a call. Better to know what may happen and when. It also helps that two people are on call on weekends. One 6am to 6pm and the other from the international team covers nights.

bitwize 9y ago

> It's stressful because there's a lot to do, and I'm trying to do it while there's all sorts of weirdness coming at me from all directions all the time. The fact that you're saying this may be a sign that you're too old for this shit. Kids love weirdness coming at them from all directions, because it's new and cool and they don't know any better.

RyanOD 9y ago

This is a really insightful observation. I'm in complete agreement about the realization people have about not being on the upward curve and the stress that comes from only having themselves to blame. Well said.