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Tech's Dark Secret, It's All About Age
theodp writes "Universities really should tell engineering students what to expect in the long term and how to manage their technical careers. Citing ex-Microsoft CTO David Vaskevitch's belief that younger workers have more energy and are sometimes more creative, Wadwha warns that reports of ageism's death have been greatly exaggerated. While encouraging managers to consider the value of the experience older techies bring, Wadwha also offers some get-real advice to those whose hair is beginning to grey: 1) Move up the ladder into management, architecture, or design; switch to sales or product management; jump ship and become an entrepreneur. 2) If you're going to stay in programming, realize that the deck is stacked against you, so be prepared to earn less as you gain experience. 3) Keep your skills current — to be coding for a living when you're 50, you'll need to be able to out-code the new kids on the block. Wadwha's piece strikes a chord with 50-something Dave Winer, who calls the rampant ageism 'really f***ed up,' adding that, 'It's probably the reason why we keep going around in the same loops over and over, because we chuck our experience, wholesale, every ten years or so.'"
Not to mention the experienced programmer can sometimes avoid months of wasted effort just by having enough experience to see things are going in the wrong direction.
Then why did you bother responding, if you didn't ask or expect anybody to listen? I simply pointed out that you're indulging in ageism yourself when you start painting youngsters as "people just starting out who think they know everything," and the "rare" young people "who value the experience" you bring to the table.
It's kind of funny that you're calling my response touchy when your entire post was lamenting how "nobody values my input because I'm old." In your own words, "Wow, I've been programming longer than you've been alive ... surely my experience is worth something, isn't it?"
Length of experience means very little, quality of experience means quite a bit. I've known people who make the same dumb mistakes over and over again, and never learn from it; I've also known people who learn the first time they make a mistake, and have learned quite a bit in just a few short years.
So, if I'm destined for the bitter old guy heap, I guess I'll see you there. I'll be the one wearing the ironic "Dinosaur Jr." nametag, Pops.
Holy crap, this was considered a trivial homework problem when I was learning Pascal in high school.... Are you seriously saying a group of college graduates considered this a hard problem?