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A few years ago I worked at a ~50 person startup, where an informal poll revealed everyone on the engineering team to be in an age range of ~24-30. One day we i
by jtr1 7y ago
A few years ago I worked at a ~50 person startup, where an informal poll revealed everyone on the engineering team to be in an age range of ~24-30. One day we interviewed an insanely qualified dude in his mid-50s. He’d worked with technologicies up and down our stack, their competitors, and their predecessors, and could speak at length to their relative strengths and weaknesses. Tons of open source contributions, mentorship experience galore, super nice - super nice, but also clearly nervous during a few rounds.
At the team standup afterward, pretty much everyone was an unreserved yes except the engineering manager who directly said he was concerned about the candidate’s age, and whether he would “fit in.” He wondered out loud whether we could reject the candidate on this basis. The CTO was at the meeting and immediately shut that line of questioning down, although none of us ever heard from that candidate again. Something I’ll never forget as I get older in this field.
- NeverFade 7y ago> The CTO was at the meeting and immediately shut that line of questioning down, although none of us ever heard from that candidate again. Your CTO shut it down because your engineering manager was breaking Federal law in public. However, I don't need to tell you what happens to candidates that the hiring manager doesn't want to hire. Also, I have witnessed similar situations multiple times. Everyone who worked for over 10 years knows ageism is thriving in tech, especially in the Bay.
- PopeDotNinja 7y agoIf I were the CTO in that situation, I would seriously have considered firing the engineering manager on the spot. Blatant discrimination is a serious fuck up. Period.
- paulkon 7y agoYeah at least make it subtle... /s
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- _cs2017_ 7y agoLet's say the CTO said "I'm concerned the candidate won't fit in because he's not into video games or partying with coworkers or working on the weekends, all the things that help us bond and keep a cohesive team". While not directly mentioning his age, such criteria would still make it very unlikely that the older candidate would be hired. Would you consider this to be age discrimination (from a moral perspective; let's ignore legal considerations since those are incredibly vague and convoluted)?
- jacobsenscott 7y agoOf course it is ageism. The CTO confused finding an employee with finding a fk buddy. The company is toxic, and is certainly discriminating unlawfully in multiple axis. Also, none of the things you mentioned contribute to team cohesion, they are all detrimental to it. Basically you are describing a CTO that has no idea how to CTO. We can take solace in the fact that his startup will fail hard.
- seattle_spring 7y agoI'm not sure working weekends and liking video games are traits of a "fk buddy."
- pmiller2 7y agoYou’re nitpicking and not addressing the point. Substitute “friend,” and the argument remains intact.
- dragonwriter 7y ago> Would you consider this to be age discrimination (from a moral perspective; let's ignore legal considerations since those are incredibly vague and convoluted)? It's straightforward (disparate impact) age discrimination from a legal perspective. The law in this area isn't that vague and convoluted.
- mooreds 7y ago
- hinkley 7y agoEngineering manager was afraid a more experienced dev could call him out on his bullshit. Not being willing to manage someone older than you is likely a sign of cowardice. The first and second really good developers I worked with were around 35 and 45 when I met them.
- LifeLiverTransp 7y agoThis - basically if you are overqualified, and dont jump on the hype-train anymore, and know that all the tech-"trends" are cyclic and have been there at least once - you could wake up the whole team, destroying the cult like atmosphere.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- ikiris 7y agoWell this was a horrifying image