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Interviewing Experienced IT People?
thricenightly writes "After more than 20 years in IT I've learned that the most valuable people in a team are frequently the old timers. Young pups straight out of college might (think they) know all the latest buzzwords and techniques, but in the real world, where getting working products delivered on time and on budget is of paramount importance, people who have been doing the job for a decade or two tend to be the people I'd rather be working alongside. I've recently been elevated to a position where I get to interview and choose those who get hired in my department. Although I'm very much focused on choosing the right person for the role regardless of age, experience or whatever, it's probably fair to say the more mature applicants will get a more sympathetic hearing from me than they might from most other interviewers for IT roles. The question is, what do I ask older applicants to get them to demonstrate the value of their experience? My current gambit is something like 'IT is seen as a young man's game. My next applicant after you is 23 years old. What do you know that he doesn't?' This gets responses ranging from the vague to the truly enlightened. All next week I'm interviewing for a number of senior software designer and developer roles. What should I be asking of the more experienced applicants, and what responses should I be looking out for?"
Don't ask anything that even remotely looks like it's age related. If it gets out to the younger applicant, though unlikely, you may have an expensive age discrimination lawsuit to ask. It doesn't gain you or your company a thing to be so candid.
Do not mention other applicant's at all. Simply ask what experience they bring to the table that's relevant to the job, and what similar work they've done. Ask this for each applicant. "I spent 10 years working on critical system XYZ" is a much better response than "I helped the cute chick at the IT lab get her assignment in on time". Also, if an applicant answers this question well (regardless of age) it can lead in to more detailed questions and you follow up with the younger candidate if he or she gives a good answer.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
For kicks, here's a clear-cut quote:
(c) It shall be unlawful for a labor organization-
(1) to exclude or to expel from its membership, or otherwise to discriminate against, any individual because of his age;
By the same token, young people often have things older people lack. Drive, ambition, flexibility, curiosity, and a lot more hours they're willing to work on salary.
Not every older person lacks those. Heck, I've been posting on /. since I was "the young IT worker", and now I'm approaching the time I'm supposed to be put out to pasture.
The real issue, I think, is that too many people suck at learning on their own. They come out of school with Java, and if they can't do that, they fail.
I interviewed an older coder in the past year. He was over 40 for sure, maybe 50, but was playing with RoR, knew python, but still had his C and bash under his belt. The *only* reason I didn't hire him on the spot was he was very expensive and it was early on in the interview cycle. (In retrospect, I'd have pulled the trigger; it turned out to be much, much harder to find good people than I had expected.)
It's very easy to suddenly whip out the discrimination card
I believe that was the GP's point.
Seriously -- my mom worked in human resources for many years (not her proudest moment), and bringing up age is not something you want to do in an interview. Another good way to get slapped with a lawsuit is to tell someone who is calling for a reference that the candidate in question was fired from your company for stealing -- even if he was. If you don't understand these things, I would seriously suggest requesting a sit-down briefing with your own HR department and have them fill you in on the labor laws in your state.
Breakfast served all day!
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Why doesn't Slashdot ever get slashdotted?
This is what I call 'Positive Laziness'. Intelligent lazy people think first if there's a way to shorten/ease an otherwise work-intensive (and often monotonous) task and come up with a nice, (semi-)automated solution.
Whereas real lazy people think of how they can avoid the work at all.
An article I read in Scientific American Mind basically suggests that the key to above-average or genius level intelligence is that sort of laziness.
It suggested that in mental tests given by researchers among two groups; one group of people with average intelligence and one group of people with above average or genius level intelligence, the difference seemed to be maximizing the resources we're all born with by minimizing the things they had to do in order to come to a solution.
It's been a long time.