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Anecdote: My father was a Director at <large telecom company> and then an executive at another. He's spent his entire career in the industry. It's coming up

Anecdote: My father was a Director at <large telecom company> and then an executive at another. He's spent his entire career in the industry. It's coming up on almost a year unemployed for him, and at this point he's resigned himself to the idea he'll probably have to re-train and do something else. Take that for what you will.

financetechbro 2y ago
I imagine senior roles in telecom are hard to come by considering the growth of that industry.
tester756 2y ago
Being overqualified is a real thing, ain't it?
- trod123 2y ago
  It wasn't always so. The ignorant socialists among us took over the bureacracies, pushing a cult of qualification, and made it seem like subscribing would promote prosperity through cheap debt. They made it a real thing. Rather than simply looking for baseline requirements to fulfill a role, positions always want a ballerina with contradictory requirements they themselves can't determine is most important. I remember a position asking for 15 years experience in a language, that only existed for 10, and they refused to hire the creator of that programming language. They also have loans fueling them with near free money so they can wait and suppress wages to a point of debt-slavery. Its been quite a trip seeing all the things my grandparents (silent generation) were adamant and warned about coming to fruition within my lifetime. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if a violent civil war starts in the next few years given the social contract has largely been broken by the generation currently in power, and they burnt all the bridges in doing so. There's going to be one hell of a massive correction in our lifetimes. For good or ill its coming.
plussed_reader 2y ago
Easier to hide silver hair than feign ignorance to older questions.
VirusNewbie 2y ago
Does someone need to work if they spent many years as a director and executive at a large telco?
mint2 2y ago
Why wouldn’t he just retire or start his own company if he was an executive for years? That doesn’t sound like he’s working for money anymore
rufus_foreman 2y ago
I'm old, when I get fired, I will never work a day in this industry for the rest of my life. Be prepared.
- lsllc 2y ago
  Well, while you might find it harder to find work, know this -- I'd take a single experienced engineer over 10 inexperienced ones any day of the week (of course, you have to actually be an experienced engineer/manager vs some Boeing-wannabe MBA to actually know this!).
trod123 2y ago
Many of us in the tech sector are seeing exactly this. I've spoken with many colleagues, a record number of which now are unemployed, some of whom are now at two years of unemployment (and each one of them have a decade or more of experience in their profession (Network/System Engineers/Operations/Principal Engineers, etc). The unfortunate part is the numbers don't point out any alternative sector that needs people. Worse, re-training is done at your cost, and age-ism is a very big thing everywhere. Most vocational programs have also been gutted, and the only program that survived requires you to be under 25. The interference of AI companies, and other bad actors in the hiring process has also made it near impossible to find jobs (when they are actually available). Many of the job postings require that submission for a position is contingent upon agreeing to borderline unlawful terms from a third-party company (to sign up for an account). Where they consider the candidates information proprietary information owned by the company, which cannot be shared; even though parts of the vetting process involve sharing sufficient information to identify the candidate... Its all very stupid when you make it impossible and prohibit people from taking working. Historically, nothing good ever comes of preventing people from working. 1776 largely was driven by corruption and because there simply was too many mouths, and too little work.

financetechbro 2y ago

I imagine senior roles in telecom are hard to come by considering the growth of that industry.

tester756 2y ago

Being overqualified is a real thing, ain't it?

trod123 2y ago
It wasn't always so. The ignorant socialists among us took over the bureacracies, pushing a cult of qualification, and made it seem like subscribing would promote prosperity through cheap debt. They made it a real thing. Rather than simply looking for baseline requirements to fulfill a role, positions always want a ballerina with contradictory requirements they themselves can't determine is most important. I remember a position asking for 15 years experience in a language, that only existed for 10, and they refused to hire the creator of that programming language. They also have loans fueling them with near free money so they can wait and suppress wages to a point of debt-slavery. Its been quite a trip seeing all the things my grandparents (silent generation) were adamant and warned about coming to fruition within my lifetime. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if a violent civil war starts in the next few years given the social contract has largely been broken by the generation currently in power, and they burnt all the bridges in doing so. There's going to be one hell of a massive correction in our lifetimes. For good or ill its coming.

plussed_reader 2y ago

Easier to hide silver hair than feign ignorance to older questions.

VirusNewbie 2y ago

Does someone need to work if they spent many years as a director and executive at a large telco?

mint2 2y ago

Why wouldn’t he just retire or start his own company if he was an executive for years? That doesn’t sound like he’s working for money anymore

rufus_foreman 2y ago

I'm old, when I get fired, I will never work a day in this industry for the rest of my life. Be prepared.

lsllc 2y ago
Well, while you might find it harder to find work, know this -- I'd take a single experienced engineer over 10 inexperienced ones any day of the week (of course, you have to actually be an experienced engineer/manager vs some Boeing-wannabe MBA to actually know this!).

trod123 2y ago

Many of us in the tech sector are seeing exactly this. I've spoken with many colleagues, a record number of which now are unemployed, some of whom are now at two years of unemployment (and each one of them have a decade or more of experience in their profession (Network/System Engineers/Operations/Principal Engineers, etc). The unfortunate part is the numbers don't point out any alternative sector that needs people. Worse, re-training is done at your cost, and age-ism is a very big thing everywhere. Most vocational programs have also been gutted, and the only program that survived requires you to be under 25. The interference of AI companies, and other bad actors in the hiring process has also made it near impossible to find jobs (when they are actually available). Many of the job postings require that submission for a position is contingent upon agreeing to borderline unlawful terms from a third-party company (to sign up for an account). Where they consider the candidates information proprietary information owned by the company, which cannot be shared; even though parts of the vetting process involve sharing sufficient information to identify the candidate... Its all very stupid when you make it impossible and prohibit people from taking working. Historically, nothing good ever comes of preventing people from working. 1776 largely was driven by corruption and because there simply was too many mouths, and too little work.