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As a slightly older engineer, I believe there are 2 sides to the coin. Age discrimination can happen. On the other hand , older engineers don't always help them

by nickd2001 4y ago

As a slightly older engineer, I believe there are 2 sides to the coin. Age discrimination can happen. On the other hand , older engineers don't always help themselves. In my last job, a colleague who was early 50s kept talking about 1980s TV sitcoms (which included various racist, sexist content that would at least come with a warning nowadays). This made him look like a dinosaur to younger colleagues. I generally find, younger engineers can sometimes play it a bit cocky and make out they know more than their older colleagues but when you show 'em a few old skool command line tricks or rapid edits in vim, and generally be a nice person to pair with, they quickly appreciate what you've got to offer, and the combination of youth and experience can be a great team dynamic. But its true I guess, people shouldn't have to get past initial prejudice based on age, and work harder to prove themselves, same as they shouldn't have to for race, gender etc.

ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
> This made him look like a dinosaur to younger colleagues. Can't be helped. We will always look like that, no matter how hard we try to "fit in."[0] Tension between younger and older folks is as old as humankind. I think that a team is best served, with a combination of youthful enthusiasm and creativity, and experienced caution and completionism. I think that the whole from these teams, is greater than the sum of the parts. If we have just older folks, stuff gets done, but it may not be that interesting. If we have nothing but younger folks, we have ... FTX. The difference, this time around, seems to be extremely young C-suite execs. In "the old days," when we watched Archie Bunker rag The Meathead, companies were generally run by folks in their fifties (there were plenty of problems -not exactly the Halcyon days). These folks didn't have anything against older folks, except, maybe, that we were relatively expensive (but not, compared to these days). If they discriminated against older folks, it wasn't personal. These days, we have people in their twenties and thirties, at the top, and their discrimination is personal. They also make it OK for their employees to have the same attitude. What's that saying that the "olds" have? "The fish rots from the head down."? [0] https://i.pinimg.com/originals/48/e5/30/48e53007e190cab89608e185386ae5d3.gif https://i.pinimg.com/originals/48/e5/30/48e53007e190cab89608...

ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago

> This made him look like a dinosaur to younger colleagues. Can't be helped. We will always look like that, no matter how hard we try to "fit in."[0] Tension between younger and older folks is as old as humankind. I think that a team is best served, with a combination of youthful enthusiasm and creativity, and experienced caution and completionism. I think that the whole from these teams, is greater than the sum of the parts. If we have just older folks, stuff gets done, but it may not be that interesting. If we have nothing but younger folks, we have ... FTX. The difference, this time around, seems to be extremely young C-suite execs. In "the old days," when we watched Archie Bunker rag The Meathead, companies were generally run by folks in their fifties (there were plenty of problems -not exactly the Halcyon days). These folks didn't have anything against older folks, except, maybe, that we were relatively expensive (but not, compared to these days). If they discriminated against older folks, it wasn't personal. These days, we have people in their twenties and thirties, at the top, and their discrimination is personal. They also make it OK for their employees to have the same attitude. What's that saying that the "olds" have? "The fish rots from the head down."? [0] https://i.pinimg.com/originals/48/e5/30/48e53007e190cab89608e185386ae5d3.gif https://i.pinimg.com/originals/48/e5/30/48e53007e190cab89608...