Am I Too Old To Be A Programmer?
Aug 17, 2007 10:08 perm link Readers: 8790

• Sanjiv: Aug 17, 2007 12:14
  

  Could it be that your years of experience had nothing to do with it and that you think you did well on the interview when infact you did not meet their expectations?

  They probably already knew your age / years of experience when they interviewed you on the phone based on your resume so if that was a problem they wouldn't have even called you in for an in-face interview.

  Not suggesting that you suck.. just that different companies have different hiring criteria / cultures and they might not have viewed you as a good fit.

• codist: Aug 17, 2007 13:51
  

  Sure it's possible, although in this case it was only a single engineer I met in person. I've not been hired in every interview I've ever had either. But it did lead me to wonder how often age creeps into people's minds.

• Rich Collins: Aug 18, 2007 02:15
  

  I would be glad to discuss working with you. Feel free to contact me :)

• bsm: Aug 18, 2007 02:38
  

  I agree that there's a lot of age-related nonsense out there. I'm 47 and a working programmer, about 10 years (or more) older than most of my colleagues -- or my bosses for that matter. I program because I enjoy it, and have turned down a number of 'opportunities' to do other things (like management) which I don't like as much.

  That being said, it's entirely possible that the reason they prefer younger, less experienced people is that they feel they can get more out of them. Someone who's younger, with less experience, is going to worry a lot more about a 'black mark' on their resume from a company that didn't feel that they contributed

  enough to whatever it was they were working on. Typically, this is the sort of

  behaviour you get from companies that try to bully their employees into a lot

  of unnecessary overtime because the management can't plan a project to save their lives. If they want to push someone around, they probably feel more able to get away with it with a younger employee rather than an older, more experienced one.

  Hey, I once worked for a company that laid someone off a month after he returned to work from having a heart attack because he "couldn't contribute the necessary level of effort" to the project he was assigned to. How stupid is that?

  Count your blessings and move on.

• David: Aug 18, 2007 03:14
  

  I am a 48 year old programmer, I'm coding medical ontology software just now in c# 3.0 writing Linq code to query our object model in ram. I have been contracting for over a decade and my age has never been a factor. BTW I'm in the north of england.

• hafizan: Aug 18, 2007 05:36
  

  I'm start programming serious only on 26 year olds.Lot of script kiddy age 20 do programming are not same as older age.Sometimes older age got a few problem.I know they are experince but sometimes their knowledger is to low.Age doesn't matter to me only who can do programming and design documentation cleary is the prefect candidate for job.New Come doesn't care of documentation ,they just code like idiot and do again(Same as me before)

• zack: Aug 18, 2007 06:04
  

  Salary expectations because of # years of experience have anything to do with it maybe? In my opinion it usually makes sense to spend the extra $ to get the good guys with more experience, but I'm sure not everyone thinks that way.

• yassaman: Aug 18, 2007 06:38
  

  We have the same problem in third world countries. Im 32 years old emigrant in a third world country and people say me "you are an old woman"!

  They cant think healthful...

  But i think that an old programmer (like me :)) must be a boss to . In other way cant find any job at 32...

• mike: Aug 18, 2007 06:41
  

  the main thing is, an older person is much more hesitant to "drink the kool aid", where someone in their 20's can't get enough koolaid; their opinions and notions of the working world are a lot more naive and externally focused, so their heads can be filled with all sorts of unquestioned corporate-friendly priorities. Not to mention they have much less of an eye for politics and can be steamrolled right over. When the project managers under-spec the project and get it all wrong, those of us who've "been there" know they f'ed up, and we shouldn't be the ones who have to pay; the younger programmer has no clue about this and will work til 2AM for weeks in a row, fully accepting that the client's deadline is a life or death matter (its typically some boring website that has absolutely no need to be launched next friday and not say, 3 weeks later).

• Vineet Kumar: Aug 18, 2007 08:53
  

  If this really is a case of you not getting the job due to your age, you should google "age discrimination" and consider contacting EEOC and/or a lawyer. This could easily be that single engineer's unconscious bias rather than an institutional policy, but either way it's insidious and outrageous, and should be stopped.

  A more tame first step may be to just contact the engineer who interviewed you and ask for honest feedback about why he passed on you. You may find that he had a legitimate reason, or you may strengthen your suspicions. Do it over email and save the response, just in case.

• codist: Aug 18, 2007 09:19
  

  It's not that big of a deal, I have 4-5 other opportunities. It was more of "I wonder if" kind of moment.

• Paul: Aug 18, 2007 10:52
  

  In a meeting a younger manager, male or female, will describe some change or new plan for development to follow and due to your life experience it wouldn't be unheard of to think that the vast majority of the time, you'll have an improvement to suggest or outright disagreement with the approach the manager is descrlibing. Do you keep quiet and just plug along with your programming tasks? Seems to me this is the reason its easier for the person hiring to simply float you to management in the first place.

• Rick: Aug 18, 2007 11:37
  

  I'm 40 years old, and I've started looking for a new job last week. Got plenty of offers exactly because of my experience, almost all of the companies I talked to were a) dying to hire someone experience to lead their younger programmers, and b) used recruitment agencies to filter out scriptkiddies from wasting their time.

  I was a bit apprehensive at first, looking for a new job at 40, but to my great relieve it was easier then ever before, and even relatively young companies (and companies lead by people significantly younger then me) were eager to hire experienced developers.

  In my memory things were a lot different 10-20 years ago, when employers definitely preferred the young and eager. Maybe even our industry is finally growing up....

• barbara: Aug 18, 2007 11:47
  

  I'm a 38-year-old *woman* - talk about a double whammy. But I still find myself taken pretty seriously as a developer - I don't deal with nearly as much gender/age discrimination as I expect to. At the same time, I've known programmers much older who really do get set in their ways, don't keep current, don't keep up with the fast pace of changes in the industry. I believe that continued success as a programmer just means being flexible, being willing and able to learn new languages and theories all the time. If you're the kind of person who can do that, you're fine. And then age can only be a positive - you have more experience with problem-solving, managing workflow, etc.

• jcc: Aug 18, 2007 13:38
  

  Hi Codist,

  I am sorry that you have experienced this sort of discrimination. However, I have seen this kind of thing happen from the inside of a company, and I would like to explain what I think the reasoning of the company is.

  The company I work at expects people to move up in their career; you should _always_ be progressing as an employee, not standing still. After a few years, one should be comfortable stamping out significant tasks on one's own, negotiating the business sides of it without management help, etc.

  After 10 or 15 years, the company expects a developer to have "Team Lead"-level skills. This means that the developer should, by his mere presence, have leadership and mentoring capabilities that improves the efficiency of _other_ developers on the team.

  The company is only interested in developers who increase their skills significantly over time. Thus, the company is not interested in hiring someone with 15 years of experience in the "just-above-Jr" role, even if he would be a _damn_ good programmer for that level.

  The reason why is because the company wants developers who will grow even _more_ in the future. That 15+ year pro in the Team Lead role would be expected to be able to be an Architect in the future, and so on. They would not hire someone with 15 years of experience as a "codemonkey", because it would carry the implied assumption that this candidate will never expand in his role.

  So, it's not that the company wants you to be a manager. They just don't want you "off in a corner" developing alone. They want your talents and experience to spread out among the team and company.

  I am not saying that you don't necessarily have any of these skills -- I have no idea, I have never met you. But from the essay you wrote here, it doesn't sound like you are selling these aspects of yourself to the company. Is it possible you were exposing yourself as a "lone gunman"?

  Hopefully this explains why the "15 years experience" can count against you in interviews. It's because they expect a lot more from you than just technical abilities. This is only certain companies, of course. Microsoft (for example) has a whole career track called "Individual Contributor" for secluded code monkeys to flourish, without having to expand into this type of role. The company where I work now expects all developers to grow into leaders.

  Both models have their advantages and disadvantages. My current company (Amazon.com) is not a technology company per se; it uses technology to sell things. This may explain the difference in focus. It is more valuable to Microsoft than to Amazon.com if some hacker codemonkey goes off into the wilderness and produces a novel piece of tech, thus Amazon wants the kind of developer who has business sense, and sees technology as a means-to-an-end.

  I would say, consider in the future what _more_ companies want from a candidate with 20 years of experience than just his coding abilities. The huge efficiency gains from experienced candidates can be even greater if they have leadership as well.

• caneusing-40yo: Aug 18, 2007 23:43
  

  Silicon Valley seems to discriminate on age quite a bit. I was shocked to hear Zuckerberg, Facebook CEO, openly say the two things he looks for are youth and technical ability.

  (http://photomatt.net/2007/03/24/kapor-vs-zuckerberg/)

  At another place or a different era, he would be so sued it's not funny. He didn't just stick with the idea that young people have less baggage. No, he decided to pull out the old "greatest discoveries are made by youngins" argument. I would take a 45 year old Einstein over 99.99999% of 20 year olds any day for my theoretical physics, thank you very much. When did a broad indicator like age mean more than the more specific indicators of technical ability?

• Art Metz: Aug 19, 2007 08:57
  

  May I add a data point?

  I'm 54, still programming after 30 years. I've been a team lead but I never wanted to be a manager. I've gone from Fortran IV on IBM 360s to DEC's RSTS and VMS to PCs to asp.net and Ajax.

  I'm tired. I don't learn new things as quickly as I once did. When I was younger I dabbled in Lisp and Forth for the fun of it; now I look at Python and Haskell and just go "Huh?". I now work in a place which is heavily into CSS, and I Just Don't Get It.

  As for age discrimination in hiring -- I've not particularly encountered it.

• Ed: Aug 19, 2007 15:20
  

  OK, I'm going to tell you what's going on and a lot of people may not like it because I will be talking about the elephant in the middle of the living room. It's about the money. Entire institutions of total B.S. are built simply to make "those who do not know what they are doing appear as if they do". Plug in whatever B.S. you want: extreme programming, UML, Rational Rose, agile programming (whatever that means?!?), and most importantly, object orientation. Real pros don't use these unless they are forced. Many of us have been "agile" for 20 or 30 years before some idiot MBA came up with the term. Institutions would rather implement some of this B.S. and plug in lower paid (and usually younger) programmers. And services firms MUST do this or perish. Why pay you $100K when they could plug in 2 $50K newbies and bill them out at $150 per hour? In IT you don't have to be good; you just have to stay one step ahead of the user. And who couldn't do that?

  My suggestion: find someone smart (they ARE out there, but not always easy to find) who understands the value of a professional who can "hit the high notes". Go to work for them. You both be a lot happier in the long run.

• Phil: Aug 21, 2007 01:09
  

  One factor is the size of the market place in which you find yourself. If the market place is small with not much movement then that is rather different than New York or London where the value of specific skills is appreciated and sought. Small markets breed small minds and petty thinking. You might have become a threat because of your experience. Suggestion: learn some skills that you can market via the Net. You might find the "long tail" out there.

  I am 63, learning python, tangling with SQL Server, messing with hardware devices sending back emails via SMTP, using VB scripting, still having fun and last but not least still dreaming. I used to be a data administor, data manager and an ERP consultant, but at my age you have to be flexible. Being gentle with those who do not know any better because they are younger also helps!

• Mark Leighton Fisher: Aug 23, 2007 10:06
  

  As an older software engineer with a B.S.E.E., I can remember the late 70's when electrical engineers whose experience was with vacuum tubes decided to get out of the job market rather than learn about transistor circuit design. I started with FORTRAN IV and assembly language on the CDC 6000, and now I'm working with .NET and Perl 6 (and looking at LISP and Haskell for inspiration). Although some age discrimination takes place, part of what is happening now is that some companies want you to come in and hit the ground running (already have all the required skills) but never bother to train you to run even faster (acquire new skills that can save the company time and/or money). Such companies will eventually fail, but in the meantime this mistaken attitude causes problems for job seekers.

  Ed, maybe I don't understand what you are saying. I'm a big advocate of multi-paradigm programming, which includes object-oriented programming -- encapsulating data with its methods just makes good sense, and is something I never had to be forced into using (an early exposure to Forth may have helped prepare me for O-O programming). Software engineering is a tremendously young discipline compared to civil engineering (millenia) and electrical engineering (120+ years). We are still working out the best & fastest ways to design our systems, and I am grateful for all the recent advances (learning Perl's Test::More in particular was a great awakening moment).

• Billy Koch: Sep 05, 2007 16:41
  

  I have been considering in plunging into the development world. I am 36 - fixing to be 37 myself. I used to do a little bit of development about 5-6 years ago and then have moved away to more of infrastructure work. And now i realized how much I enjoyed development work and would love to go back to it. So now I'm pretty much working up the technologies that I have fallen behind on. But the question that remains for me - am I too old? or do the companies want one of those newly fresh college graduates. So, I just hope I am not wasting my time but in time we'll see. But it is inspiring to see those who have gone past the challenge and it is fustrating to see those who haven't made it through. But either way - I am hoping it will all go through not just for myself but every other developers as well.

• FrankC: Sep 10, 2007 19:00
  

  I ran into the same thing last year when I was out of work. They never come out and say, "Oh, you're too old" to your face, that could get them in legal hot water, but they find some lame HR code phrase for it like, "We like your skills but you don't fit into our team dynamics."

• Eelco Hillenius: Sep 18, 2007 11:49
  

  I remember a manager (who programmed for a few years himself and of course thought he was pretty good at it) a few years ago who said openly that programmers over 30 are losers. Can you believe a short sighted jerk like that? This was in Holland, where most people study things like "communication", law or business administration. The same country that has had headlines for years on that people don't do enough beta studies anymore, and that we should 'import' technical people. And we worked for a company that has a hard time finding enough qualified people for technical jobs. As nice as the company was to work with, I absolutely hated the fact that 95% of the techies there had less than 3 years experience. Smart kids alright, but it was really painful to see them make all those mistakes that experienced people typically don't make anymore.

  As far as I can judge it from living in the US now and talking with lots of US programmers, the US is a healthier place to be a programmer. Part of that is because it seems that US comps are more interested in skills they can tap now, rather than nurturing people who will stay with them for much of their careers (which probably has to do with more relaxed labour laws and a more hands-on mentality). They seem to be more interested in skills and seniority. Illustrative is that the average programmer in Holland will label him- or herself 'senior' with 3 - 5 years of experience.

  /end rant, a 36 year old programmer :-)

• Meyer: Jan 02, 2008 03:41
  

  Is it just the employers in the software industry who think the older people are "obsolete". These "new technologies" that come out everyday shouldn't be a hurdle. If you are well disciplined in software engineering practices and know a language such as C++ and skill such as networking, the "new technologies" are a bit of a joke, really.

  I'm a very slow learner, and yes I am crap at programming compared to others at my University. But in the last few months when I actually got serious about it and put thought into what I was doing, my confidence has risen 10 fold. It's not about age not is it about individual ability. Anyone willing to put serious time into learning can become an extremely competitive programmer.

  Programming is a craft. The more you do it the better you get. But you have to do it right. Read software engineering books like "Design Patterns" by the gang of four. Read other books like "The Pragmatic Programmer" and the "Practice of Programming". There really are no secrets.

  As to why the employer brushed you off, I think too many employers these days are obsessed about particular languages, hypes, and particular technologies that they forget about what it means to be a good programmer.

• Madhu: Apr 12, 2008 03:21
  

  Hi,

  I have worked for 11 years in programming, from COBOL to DOT NET. I have witnessed a lot of age discrimination - both in position wise and pay wise also. Older programmers are harrased a lot just for the reason they can jump as fast as younger programmers. The employer or your boss knows that, an older programmer however experienced he may be will not get an offer easily and hence keeps exploiting. One of the recent experience i had is, I was expected to work for day and night continuously for more than a week and leave the office only after solving the problem.

  I feel that DBA career would be more rewarding in this view.

• Hadi : May 12, 2008 19:25
  

  I agreed with Your Thingking....

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