4 ms·

I say this as a greybeard myself, but as someone who been on the interviewer/hiring manager side of quite a few interviews with older candidates, it's a lot mor

by jghn 3y ago

I say this as a greybeard myself, but as someone who been on the interviewer/hiring manager side of quite a few interviews with older candidates, it's a lot more common than they realize that they're just *bad*. Yes, there are many good ones, and yes the wisdom they have is a huge benefit. But plenty of them think this applies to them when it does not. The most common issue is they've long since let themselves go technically. They've been flexing the same 2 or 3 muscles for ages, and let everything else atrophy. They haven't been staying abreast of current changes, and by that I don't mean jumping on the latest fad but rather knowing that the fads exist. So it winds up being the case that they have few useful/transferable skills and their "wisdom" really isn't all that useful outside of the exact niche they'd found themselves in for decades. And then another large chunk of them wind up being jerks. I've been this person myself. Whether it being standoffish, crapping over what the company is doing without a full understanding of why they're doing it, or even just clearly being defensive about ageism. My point isn't to dump on older candidates. Again, I sometimes am one :) But as is often the case, plenty of older candidates refuse to look in the mirror.

johnnyanmac 3y ago
>or even just clearly being defensive about ageism. I mean, that makes sense? I would be just as defensive about racism or sexism if the vibe came off in an interview. >They haven't been staying abreast of current changes, and by that I don't mean jumping on the latest fad but rather knowing that the fads exist. I guess it depends on the domain. Sure, I can see web moving fast and the someone who focused on at best JQuery may not be needed for a company on Vue or React or whatever. Other domains don't change as radically though, or the tools are usually not as hard to transfer to as some think. People can underestimate the fundamentals at times as they try to expect 10 years of Swift experience out of a candidate.
- jghn 3y ago
  The actual technologies matter less, and I'm not talking about "the fundamentals". It's more that they tend to have only been doing the exact small set of things for a long period of time. When I've hired such people much more often than not they struggle to learn, because they're no longer used to learning. And much like I said the prior as a fellow greybeard, I'm saying this as someone who is much more cavalier than most people I've met about not expecting an exact set of skills. That said, I've noticed patterns of candidates who really struggle to catch up on their missing skills and this is one of them. EDIT: to clarify a bit, the archetype I'm talking about are people who have pretty much turned off their brain and been on autopilot for 10, 20, or more years. It's not a problem if they're using a "dated" technology or whatever, it's a problem that they've been operating on rote muscle memory for ages. There are absolutely people who are using the dated technologies who don't fall into this trap.
  - johnnyanmac 3y ago
    Given my experience as someone much younger in industry, I wonder if this is less about them struggling to catch up and more about how no one wants to on board new hires these days. It feels like confounding evidence when suggesting that older people struggle to learn but also job training has been on the decline for a decade or so. I'm sure older people are more outspoken. I have to dance around to mention that documentation is inadequate. Someone with more experience and opportunities may be more blunt about it.
hatthew 3y ago
Anecdote about older folks not staying abreast of the latest: A few years ago, I was being interviewed by a programmer far my senior (in both experience and age). I have my github link on my resume, and the interviewer noticed and asked "What's GitHub?"
- intelVISA 3y ago
  I've heard of it, the LLM training data aggregator right?
magicalist 3y ago
Eh, I mean I've interviewed lots of just absolutely terrible candidates of all ages. Part of the problem seems to be that perception of this group is based on a narrative about their age in the first place. (Not to mention, you meet someone for an hour, what do you really know about them? You can evaluate them for a job, but why are we spinning yarns about their internal motivations?)
- jghn 3y ago
  > ve interviewed lots of just absolutely terrible candidates of all ages Yes, absolutely. I didn't mean to imply otherwise. But when a younger candidate gets declined, they don't shake their fist and blame ageism.
  - tharkun__ 3y ago
    No, they shake their fist and blame "nobody wants to hire juniors and train them any more, everyone just wants to hire seniors!"
ilaksh 3y ago
What is the point then? I think that your comment is just pure ageism.
wakawaka28 3y ago
Life is short. Most fads are fads for reasons and I think you can learn to recognize and avoid them. I think the bigger problem is people thinking the fad tech is much harder than it is, or more essential than it is, and assuming bad things about people who don't know it just because they're old.
sharts 3y ago
> They haven't been staying abreast of current changes, and by that I don't mean jumping on the latest fad but rather knowing that the fads exist. Thing is if you’ve been around the block and have a decent understanding of fundamentals…it just doesn’t matter what the fad of the week is. It’s just noise. Old principles repackaged with different conventions. Not sure why that has to be a red flag. It doesn’t mean people can’t learn. Just why bother spending personal investment on another fad? This expectation is a serious problem in this industry.
- carlmr 3y ago
  I'm kind of happy I'm not in webdev but embedded. There's not so much fads in this area. In any case, I agree, fundamentals matter much more than superficial knowledge of fads. Also I'm glad the OOP fad of the 90s and 00s seems to be finally dead. It felt almost religious. And it was frustrating to argue against the obvious issues.
  - edanm 3y ago
    > I'm kind of happy I'm not in webdev but embedded. There's not so much fads in this area. How true is that about embedded though? I started out in that field for the first six years of my professional life, but it's been almost 15 years since then. I still know a lot more about it than the random dev who hasn't worked in it at all, but I kind of doubt I could be very intelligent about it without a bunch of catching up. (Though obviously I agree that there are almost certainly faster changes in web dev.)
    - carlmr 3y ago
      >but I kind of doubt I could be very intelligent about it without a bunch of catching up. I doubt you'd need to catch up because of expired knowledge. Rather things you forgot or areas that you didn't deal with yet. I think embedded can have a lot of depth if you get into certain details. There's basically no framework churn like in webdev, though. C and C++ are still very much current. Rust is becoming more of a contender, but still not common.
xtiansimon 3y ago
The first two points seem subjective. Let’s face it, you’re not accessing people where they are. Your filling positions. Otherwise you’re an agent, or their mom. “…large chunk of them wind up being jerks.” Attitude is a problem. Defensiveness.

by jghn 3y ago

johnnyanmac 3y ago

>or even just clearly being defensive about ageism. I mean, that makes sense? I would be just as defensive about racism or sexism if the vibe came off in an interview. >They haven't been staying abreast of current changes, and by that I don't mean jumping on the latest fad but rather knowing that the fads exist. I guess it depends on the domain. Sure, I can see web moving fast and the someone who focused on at best JQuery may not be needed for a company on Vue or React or whatever. Other domains don't change as radically though, or the tools are usually not as hard to transfer to as some think. People can underestimate the fundamentals at times as they try to expect 10 years of Swift experience out of a candidate.

jghn 3y ago
The actual technologies matter less, and I'm not talking about "the fundamentals". It's more that they tend to have only been doing the exact small set of things for a long period of time. When I've hired such people much more often than not they struggle to learn, because they're no longer used to learning. And much like I said the prior as a fellow greybeard, I'm saying this as someone who is much more cavalier than most people I've met about not expecting an exact set of skills. That said, I've noticed patterns of candidates who really struggle to catch up on their missing skills and this is one of them. EDIT: to clarify a bit, the archetype I'm talking about are people who have pretty much turned off their brain and been on autopilot for 10, 20, or more years. It's not a problem if they're using a "dated" technology or whatever, it's a problem that they've been operating on rote muscle memory for ages. There are absolutely people who are using the dated technologies who don't fall into this trap.
- johnnyanmac 3y ago
  Given my experience as someone much younger in industry, I wonder if this is less about them struggling to catch up and more about how no one wants to on board new hires these days. It feels like confounding evidence when suggesting that older people struggle to learn but also job training has been on the decline for a decade or so. I'm sure older people are more outspoken. I have to dance around to mention that documentation is inadequate. Someone with more experience and opportunities may be more blunt about it.

hatthew 3y ago

Anecdote about older folks not staying abreast of the latest: A few years ago, I was being interviewed by a programmer far my senior (in both experience and age). I have my github link on my resume, and the interviewer noticed and asked "What's GitHub?"

intelVISA 3y ago
I've heard of it, the LLM training data aggregator right?

magicalist 3y ago

Eh, I mean I've interviewed lots of just absolutely terrible candidates of all ages. Part of the problem seems to be that perception of this group is based on a narrative about their age in the first place. (Not to mention, you meet someone for an hour, what do you really know about them? You can evaluate them for a job, but why are we spinning yarns about their internal motivations?)

jghn 3y ago
> ve interviewed lots of just absolutely terrible candidates of all ages Yes, absolutely. I didn't mean to imply otherwise. But when a younger candidate gets declined, they don't shake their fist and blame ageism.
- tharkun__ 3y ago
  No, they shake their fist and blame "nobody wants to hire juniors and train them any more, everyone just wants to hire seniors!"

ilaksh 3y ago

What is the point then? I think that your comment is just pure ageism.

wakawaka28 3y ago

Life is short. Most fads are fads for reasons and I think you can learn to recognize and avoid them. I think the bigger problem is people thinking the fad tech is much harder than it is, or more essential than it is, and assuming bad things about people who don't know it just because they're old.

sharts 3y ago

> They haven't been staying abreast of current changes, and by that I don't mean jumping on the latest fad but rather knowing that the fads exist. Thing is if you’ve been around the block and have a decent understanding of fundamentals…it just doesn’t matter what the fad of the week is. It’s just noise. Old principles repackaged with different conventions. Not sure why that has to be a red flag. It doesn’t mean people can’t learn. Just why bother spending personal investment on another fad? This expectation is a serious problem in this industry.

carlmr 3y ago
I'm kind of happy I'm not in webdev but embedded. There's not so much fads in this area. In any case, I agree, fundamentals matter much more than superficial knowledge of fads. Also I'm glad the OOP fad of the 90s and 00s seems to be finally dead. It felt almost religious. And it was frustrating to argue against the obvious issues.
- edanm 3y ago
  > I'm kind of happy I'm not in webdev but embedded. There's not so much fads in this area. How true is that about embedded though? I started out in that field for the first six years of my professional life, but it's been almost 15 years since then. I still know a lot more about it than the random dev who hasn't worked in it at all, but I kind of doubt I could be very intelligent about it without a bunch of catching up. (Though obviously I agree that there are almost certainly faster changes in web dev.)
  - carlmr 3y ago
    >but I kind of doubt I could be very intelligent about it without a bunch of catching up. I doubt you'd need to catch up because of expired knowledge. Rather things you forgot or areas that you didn't deal with yet. I think embedded can have a lot of depth if you get into certain details. There's basically no framework churn like in webdev, though. C and C++ are still very much current. Rust is becoming more of a contender, but still not common.

xtiansimon 3y ago

The first two points seem subjective. Let’s face it, you’re not accessing people where they are. Your filling positions. Otherwise you’re an agent, or their mom. “…large chunk of them wind up being jerks.” Attitude is a problem. Defensiveness.