Ageism? Good Idea?

unless your tongue is planted firmly in cheek, your post is a wonderful example of why a 55 year old would be far better to employ than YOU -- traits such as maturity, wisdom and compassion are too often lacking in the young. 90% of current IT folk don't know what DOS is? Are you talking about the studens on your college campus, or real life?

Attitude, work ethic, adaptibility and background are the key. some youg people are rigid and unable to adapt as well. It depends on the person
Older people have often moved up the ladder abit and may not always have in-depth knowledge of current technology but many of the same principles learned through experience still apply. Also important is the ability to listen and determine what is bull and what is good value.
This Ageism is the same attitude that exhibits when companies say you must have experience (in decades) to apply for a position, not paying attention to the abilities, attitude, related experience and vigor of youth. Same prejudice, just in reverse.

Robb, what you are advocating is ILLEGAL. I won't even debate the ethics.

IT, it's for Asians because they are more intelligent. It's for men, because they are more logical thinkers than women.

I could come up with statistics to prove these generalities. They just wouldn't matter - while these could be true statements, they have no bearing on the ability of an individual to do a job.

Tech Republic should not have posted this topic.
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Now that I saw your later comment, let me elaborate just a tiny bit. I just hired someone for my team, over 55. Of course, we work with UNIX which is semi old stuff. I passed on a younger candidate - he appeared to lack the temprament I'm looking for. Oh, I'll be 55 myself soon and this is "new" to me because I'm a mainframe systems programmer by background. The stereotypes just don't work. You've got to get in there and find the person who can and will do the job.

Let me get this straight.
Because you are younger you are a better prepared to do the job? (Not likley)

Experience is vital key in problem solving there fore the older worker would have the advantage.

The logic and knlowedge and obtained in working with DOS still has it's place. After all DOS was based on UNIX. Is Unix now invalid?

The way I see it, A company would be better off hiring an older worker due the stability and experience factor alone.

I can't believe how narrow-minded this guy is - and willing to let everyone know. Does he think that everyone under 40 has a corner on the IT skills market? People 40+ are perfectly capable of doing IT work. I'd recommend judging a person by the IT certifications and experience they hold...IT certs are the great equalizer - they don't discriminate or judge anyone..

Chances are you acquired some of your techspertise from someone older than you somewhere in you career. If you discount what you learned from them then you discount what you know.

Knowlege is always passed down from generation to generation. This is why each generation does not have to reinvent the wheel. So, are you just pathetic, an egotistical idiot or a liar(about what you know and where you got it from)?
I am 39. Maybe I am too old to discern for myself which you are.

Wisdom is something you learn over time in life, it can't be taught in a crash course or a college class, there is only ONE way to acquire WISDOM and that is through the process of living.
WISDOM is typically what makes the more mature worker a better worker than a young pup fresh out of college, not always, but more times than not the elder of these two candidates will be the best employee - GAURANTEED!

At 56 I feel you younger geeks need to take a lesson from us older geeks. One day you will be where I am and some snot nosed younger geek will post the same note, and as the worm turns !!!!

Age pertains to judgement more than anything else. In activities where judgement is not required, young is probably better. In a perfectly vertical industry where the chain of command is clear, the mission clear, young is just fine (military). Such a person need not make judgements, merely fix a computer or steer a ship. In fact, it is that persons LACK of judgement that allows him or her (him usually) to be happy with an 80 hour workweek while other workers are surpassing him in pay and social status.

The dot-com crash was a huge demonstration of youthful arrogance. Then came the big surprise -- 200 million Americans did NOT want DSL and cable modems, HDTV, and so on. But just how much of a surprise was it to older America?

I suppose at 60 or 70 it might be hard for a man to learn a new language but more likely he's merely choosing not to learn the newest fad that does not probably do anything new. In fact, many new programming languages are merely interpreters and are somewhat inefficient (perl, php). Others, such as Visual Basic, never did have a good structural foundation and its programmers generally do not have a solid structured programming culture.

Rapid Application Development is sort of fun, but the huge libraries that invariably accompany such an effort, combined with the vulnerability to someone else's work, means that I have never placed into a corporate environment anything made with RAD tools. The tools I use every day are nearly all written in plain "C", absolutely reliable, painstakingly crafted.

Ultimately it is NOT the computer, or the programming language, or any other thing -- but whether or not my existence is valued by someone else by making that person's life better in some way. If so, I get paid and we win; if not, I do not get paid and we lose. It is absurd to concentrate on every gigahertz and gigabyte while failing to learn "WHAT IS WANTED?"

Sure would hire a 55 year old person. They have more knowledge of the progression of technology. More stability in work ethics and are more reliable.

You can't really understand technology unless you know how we got where we are.

I think you might do well to remember who does the hiring and how old WE are. I've never been reluctant to hire older and wiser IT staff, but I've strongly recommended AGAINST hiring snotty 20-somethings with a pissy attitude toward users.

I am more concerned about this young fella's approach that "noone cares what DOS is."
I wonder what this guy does when his "click the picture" doesn't accomplish what he thought it would.
Similar problem was experienced within the mainframe community some years ago. We, finally, learned that somebody still had to understand Assembler, compilers, optimizers.
"The farther you get from your real work, the less you understand."

I'm over 60 and I figure I can hold my own with anyone in the industry in networking, Windows, DOS, VMWare, hardware, wireless, etc. In any case, I believe there is a place for every one of any age ,race, religion, etc. The young may be able to provide a fresh, new approach. And the older ones can draw on their experience for proven solutions. Which is not to say the reverse may be also true in some situations. I have been learning new stuff every day and loving it! And DOS batch is still useful, even under XP! If you want to know how to use it, you can buy the NEW DOS books available, or just ask me. (DoS doesn't just stand for Denial of Service).

I forgot to add, I'm 54 and drive a Honda S2000. No one told me I'm only allowed a four-door sedan.

I appreciate posts that are respectful of other people's spiritual values/religious beliefs. The use of "Christsakes" detracts from the author's intent. The author could have been more *effective* in his message by using more appropriate words.

At 55 I will be doing the speed limit, on most secondary roads.

You don't want that old fuddy duddy 55 year old cardiac surgeon who has done several thousand dificult operations. Go with that young 26 year old with the ink just dry on his cert, who is up to date on all the latest techniques and is just waiting to try them out. Heck he has a done at least a dozen solo ops.

This IT whiz-bang must be an extremely flexible person considering the location of his head.

Agreed. Studies have proven that although memory does seem to decline with age, those who actively study and work out complicated problems have very little change. In fact those who regularly work on tough logic problems are likely to have better memory at 70 than their 20-something counterparts.

The fact that you may be trying to recall something from 50 years ago vs them recalling something from 5 years ago is hardly a good comparison of IQ.

Speaking of IQ, there is a reason that your raw mental age score is divided by your actual age. If you took two people with the same IQ and different ages, the older one would actually be the one who knows more.

IQ resource: http://www.geocities.com/rnseitz/Definition_of_IQ.html

And on the subject of Age vs IT ability: In my early 20s I was humbled by a 65 year old consultant who's ability to design "systems" was simply amazing (at least to me at that time.) His only shortcoming was actually implementing them. It wasn't mental ability that was the critical factor, it was his refusal to spend time and effort keeping up to date on new technology.

Since then I've realized that how lazy someone is has far more to do with their abilities in IT than their age. The one exception seems to be in the area of planning. The older IT folk tend to universally (even the lazy ones) anticipate potential problems better.

For example, if I hand our intern a programming assignment for a web app and also assigned it to a senior programemr, the intern would almost certainly have a working web app done first. But it will also likely have serious security holes and be near impossible for anyone else to maintain.

Fast forward 12 months and ask for some moderate revisions to the web apps and you'll likely see considerable re-write of the intern's code along with even more security holes being opened up. The expeienced programmer's code, on the other hand, will probably only require a few changes to the modules involved with little or no increase in bugs or security holes.

I am so shocked at the narrow minded attitude that I read in your post, that it knocked the breath out of me. It is people like you who have been the destruction of the high tech industry and have perpetuated attitudes that make me ashamed. No wonder people with talent, wisdom and experience don't want to have anything to do with ageist egotistical people in high tech. Older people in high tech have insight, historical experience and knowledge, and the wisdom to deal with the many problems that exist in the high tech world. I am very sorry for you. I hope you meet with less intolerant and narrow attitudes. What will happen to you when you are layed off for no other reason than the fact you have experience. I hope you learn.

We have a 62-year old who can make hardware and software sing and dance, and woe be the day he retired.

The younger IT people show up sporadically, and do not have the same work ethic, or even education. They have been spoon-fed answers all their lives, become intellectually lazy and do not know how to think, much less think creatively.

When hiring, look at the person, not the person's age.

Well, I read maybe 3/4 of the responses (trying to avoid what might be minor tangents). My first thought was "troll". Then I decided to let myself get sucked into the thread in order to see what might come out of it. (While keeping one hand firmly on the door jam of my office so I could "return".) It was kind of a waste of time, but that's okay. You see, I think it's been shown (here) that chronilogical age isn't a limitation of IT. Brain-age isn't either. In fact, brain-age is what (unknowingly?) is looked for in candidates. It's not just about what you know, but how you express it, use it, develop it and keep it. Those things are the things that come across to others. As you age, you become more secure in yourself and your abilities/limitations. You learn and adapt ... and sometimes you "forget". Well, you don't really forget, it just gets buried ... until you need it. If you were wise, you stored it away somewhere ... anywhere. Wasn't it Henry Ford who said something like, "It's not remembering the information, but knowing where to get it that's more important"? It doesn't matter where that is ... as long as it's retrievable. Years (consequently, age) provides that. Living helps us to understand that - if we "learn".

Wisdom comes with age and learning. Sometimes ... we have to learn to take something less than ideal and turn it into something worthwile. Sometimes, we have to take the youthful enthusiasm of someone and focus it in a more productive way - even if that youthful enthusiasm isn't so young. Even confrontation generates dialogue ... at some point.

Show of hands - How many got a little "bristled" at the idea of being "aged". *raises hand*
All-in-all though ... I like "aged" - but then, I like cheese.

BTW - I've been an "email lurker" for a long time. Sometimes, you just never know what might pop out of the grass.

Pushing 50, with over 20 years under my belt, I really resent this punk's attitude. I have had several young, "certified" technicians forced upon me over the years by management, back when I supervised field support for a global client. I had no say in hiring these bozos, but I did have a say in dumping them... like hot-potatoes! I've had kids with their MCSE how couldn't find Windows Explorer on a W9x machine!

And DOS? It's not a question of whether you know DOS, but a question of whether you can work with a command line interface - DOS, FTP, TelNet, Lynux - and script those commands into a viable, much needed, off-hours process so you don't have to sit there at midnight "dragging and dropping" files to a server in Brisbane!

Go whine to mommy, little boy!

You obnoxious little twit! Assuming you didn?t start this thread just to fire up all us old folk, then let me say? you?re an asshole?.

Well, THIS is interesting! I myself, am a 56 year old female. I am a systems engineer with 6 years under my belt. I work for myself, and my client base ranges from City Governement to individuals and everything in between. The feedback that I have received actually indicates a gratitude on my client's part, for someone with a work ethic, integrity, and who is willing to be accountable. I have never advertised or solicited business, and am grateful to be in a position of having to turn business away or schedule even a "needs assessment" for businesses, 3 months down the road. Therefore, I believe that if companies are not considering someone of my "vintage", they may be doing, not only the applicant a disservice, but they might be doing themselves and their companies an enormous disservice!

It is impossible to get OLD in the IT industry. The rapidity of change keeps everyone on their toes, regardless of age. While familarity with 'DOS' has its merits, walking through issues with Windows XP requires a constant update to knowledge and skill sets. Actually, the OLD geek is probably better prepared to deal with continual changes the the young, focused geek who has specialized in some aspect of IT that will be obsolete in a few months. Frankly, the constant challenge I have is not so much with changing technology and the associated learning but working to get the IT users to come forward to embrace even some of the IT offerings available. When users are still using 'space bars' and 'Enter' keys like typewriter keys, there is still a long, long way to go to bring this technology to bear. What is most important is whether the IT guy can perform necessary tasks or provide expected solutions - - age has no bearing. Sure, my NT certification is essentially useless in the PC environment utilizing Windows Networking but I would rather have knowledge of both than having never heard of one.

It pisses me off when somebody generalizes like that. I'm 57 I have a current MCSE (2003) I am an expert in rf lans, firewalls, and internet access devices. I still rely on principals I learned in DOS. HELLO computers still run on binary!!! Maybe you're too arrogant and too young to learn something from someone older

Robb, ask yourself where would you be now if not for us "old geeks". Who do you think invented what you are using today? We spent hours upon hours designing, re designing, programming, trouble shooting, you name it before we got it right. We were the pioneers of the IT industries. We invented the NIC cards, the OP system, and lets not forget the DOS. Do you enven know what DOS stands for? I myself have been working with computers for 30 years in some fashion or the other. I am certified in Novell, and have 5 tests completed towards MCSE. I still have mag's with me on the cover detailing work in coxial communication between mini main frames, and remote access over the phone lines at 300/1200 BPS, from the mid 80's. And we thought that was fast back them! We were so pleased to break ground in the robotics, to have a computer move an arm to an exact location +/- 0.001 inches. Oh and the parts to make such an arm was not available at radio shack. We designed it, built it, and programmed it ourself. Can you even begin to understand the knowledge of electronics and programming envolved to accomplish such a thing today? To top this off think of what we had to work with. Many times we burned our own chips with the OP system on them, placed these chips on circuit boards we built. (before the home PC), and yes I remember the joy I had when I designed and build my first computer in late 70's. Which by todays standards is a cheap calculator. So Rob I ask you what will you contribute to the future generations of this world?

Give me an experienced tech or whatever anyday over some snot-nosed know-it-all university type in their 20'.

I'm only 37 but I have plenty of experience from the past 17 years in IT. I would not be where I am if I had not had good mentors that were much older than me. I still respect them to this day. Younger kids today don't seem to believe in mentoring of for that matter respect them.

I would give my soul to know just half of what my mentors have forgotten.

Debug your logic: I speak to your various assertions for which you don't even offer anecdotal evidence.

"Part of that wisdom is accepting that younger people can out perform you on a line-of-code by line-of-code basis."

No, they cannot. First, not very many people can type faster than me. Second, I write "good code" and do not need to re-do much of it. That falls in the "work smarter, not harder". Third code writing speed has no logical causality with regard to code quality.

What is weird about a 70-something writing .NET is WHY IS HE DOING IT? It's like a video game -- for the most part, only teenagers play video games because while they are doing so, more normal human beings are earning money, building families, reproducing the next generation AND by so doing, establishing the social norms.

I've asked many people what is so special about ".NET", including a Microsoft Ambassador at the university (usu.edu) and the replies are fuzzy at best, especially if I ask, "What can .NET do that cannot be done any other way?" The answer is, and must be, no answer at all. .NET is an environment that aggregates pre-existing technology, some of which may be better off not aggregated.

The most efficient client-server applications need not use port 80 or HTTP. HTTP is inherently not suited to interactive work. The most efficient applications profile the workflow and find the point where the least communication takes place, breaks it right there, everything on the right is CLIENT and everything to the left is SERVER. Do it yourself, do it in "C" (*anything* but Visual Basic!), and blow ".NET" away.

I have been using computers since 1966, professionally since 1969, I built my first micro in 1979, and I stopped using mainframes around 1995 (the year before the one the Gartner Group claimed would be when the last mainframe would be powered off). I haven't stopped learning, and I find my past experience invaluable in learning new tricks, largely making up for my longer learning time. Hopefully I'll never stop learning. When called on to correct computer trouble, I can usually spot the source and correct it before any younger "specialist", simply because I've see so much in the past.

So, yes I would hire someone over 55 for an IT job, if I were in a position to hire anyone. I'm not, as I'm an independant IT consultant and trouble-shooter. So maybe you wouldn't hire someone like me. But you sure as h*ll will hire my services if you're in computer trouble in my area.

Oh, and by the way: I'm over 60 years old.

It is illegal under Federal law to discriminate against anyone for any job because of age! End of discussion!

Just a guess but in my 30 years of IT experience 10 in engineering 10 in IS an 10 as a consultant I probably have fogotten more about IT than Robb knows about IT

I certainly wouldn't employ Robb with his attitude which is bound to come over at interview. How old will his interviewers be? The only consolation is he will be unemployed when he gets to 30 if he doesn't understand command line processes.

Your question actually proves beyond a doubt that Tech savvy is one thing, but maturity, and wisdom have equal weight.

The content of your post really proves how immature you actually are. You need a old foggie to reign you and your geek hormones back in.

BTW- so have ever used the command line for such trivial tasks like ping, net use, dir?

Age should be no more a factor than race or religion. Can the person do the job? Has she or he kept their skills current? Robb probably thinks a good work ethic is to keep multiple copies of your resume around every recruiter in town.

Well after being in IT for over 20 years, I do not give a crap about DOS myself. The problem with individuals like yourself, (limited mental capacity, narrow minded, bloated ego) is that they do not understand the value of being able reach into the 20 plus years of experience and come up with a solution to an issue.

I worked at my first career for 22 years, now I'm on my second career. I have worked here since 2002.

I wouldn't want to be caught evaluating a woman or black on the basis of my perception of these groups. It is illegal and stupid. I would rather evaluate the individual.

I said that nicely, after taking my heart pill and blood pressure meds. My nurse says that I can write more.

I'm an oldy (48). I changed careers to IT when I was near 40. I could care less about DOS. I continue to use my free time to learn new computer languages (and review old natural languages). I'm in an MS program in technology that is very unlikely to increase my pay, but helps me understand IT better, so why not learn? I can walk circles around people in their 20s when it comes to building and debugging SQL queries, not from experience but from raw analytical power.

Some people my age have quit learning. Don't hire them!!! This is a profession for people who want to grow. And that goes for the 25 year old college graduate who hopes to never pick up a book again.

Russ

Can you imagine 20-somethings on a Help Desk? The problem is not usually technical -- sometimes we do get some legacy questions (on investor is still using Windows 95), the difficulty is finding people able to communicate effectively and understand what is really being said when the words are all wrong, and do it day after day with a smile on his or her face. This requires superb skills and experience and a measure of humility.

The old who can pass different intercahnges during his carrer will have a broad experience than the young.
The young is capable to solve a problems that needs to dig into too much details but loose the big picture.
The old ofcourse will get the big picture of the problem without diging into details.
so I do think both of them are a must.
They both complement each other. you need them both.

Our lead tech guy...or geek may be over 50, but he has lots of varied hands-on experience. The DOS or Disk Operating System is now a small part of the overall OS. And some of the DOS commands still exist in windows and have some uses.

Well, I'm 55. I've been in communications and computer for the last 35 years. I've seen dial telephones go to touch-tone. I've seen DOS and it's migration to Windows. Do I consider myself old? Old is only in the mind of the individual. For an employer to consider age as a detraction for an individual, should be the same as considering one's race, religion, etc. Remember, those who think the elderly have nothing to contribute, should remember, they too will be in elderly shoes. Would you like to be rejected for a job, just because you didn't fit into the age bracket you're suggesting? People should be considered on their abilities and capabilities, not their age. Like someone who said it in a previous post, wisdom comes with age.

Listen, you little twerp, if you understood the first thing about any industry you would realize how incredibly moronic you sound. I am inclined to think that the 2 active brain cells you have are both defective. Age has nothing to do with your ability to do this (or any other job); specifically, one's penchant for learning and meeting exciting new challenges are the basis of IT.
You may not give a toss what DOS is or does, but guess what? Everything you do is still based on the same theory of operating systems that were extant 20 years ago. If you spent less time crowing about your youth, you would find that having those DOS skills (or RPG skills or whatever) is essential to your knowledge of current OS's and scripting.
Check back into IT after your mom lets you cross the street by yourself.

My oh my, we're feeling our oats today, aren't we young man. So, just because I'm nearly 50 years young and have well-over 20 years experience in the IT field, I should be put out to pasture... NOT!!!

Thinking of this kind is as bad as any other type of discriminatory policy. Anytime you make sweeping generalizations, the value of the individual is lost.

You were thinking about that movie where anyone over 30 was sent to a comceration camp to get them out of the way of the young kids. And the people who made the movie are how old now??

Because they JUST don't know enough to make wise decisions. Remember to be president of the USA the minuim age is 35. I think it shoud be 55.

I have been servicing computers for over 39 years and can hang in there with the young whipper snappers. I'm A+,NET+,MCSE. I know a lot yongersters who have failed the A+ test one or twice befor passing.
Why don't you find how old Einstine was when he devloped E=MC/2 formula.

One's knowledge of technology, and people, is not limited to how old one is. Rather, by experience, one learns and adapts. If one is unwilling or unable to adapt, then that is the reason for not hiring. Their age has nothing to do with it.

Assuming one's age determines one's abilities and usefullness to a particular job, implies a poor work environment not worth working at in the first place. And probably opens up the company to a legitmate lawsuit.

Yes, I know DOS very well and still program to some extent in Assembly. That knowledge (of how DOS and Windows is put together) is useful, even though I do not need the exact details of DOS API calls. Yet, when spyware infects a customer's PC, I have a much better handle on how to deal with it than some of the new comers just out of school.

(Note: I said some, as I do not assume a kid is not knowledgeable or incapable due to their age. This too would be ageism and discrimination.)

The only thing that matters are the results achieved, not the age of the worker.

Sometimes, understanding business culture, people, and technology can only come with experience. Adapting to these areas is needed to be successful as a Support Technician. Diversity of knowledge as well as workers, plays a vital role in getting answers to problems. I would argue that all ages are needed to maintain a healthy work environment, rich with talent, to make a team of workers successfull for the business.

Judge a person on Merit, not on preconceived and discriminatory beliefs. Fit that person to the team and decide if that person fits.

Ron Metzger

Just because we are getting on a little (41) :-)doesn't mean we are losing it. Although, I have been working in IT for a number of years, I am still learning (we all are). I earned my MSc in IT a couple of years ago.

Experience counts for more than youth.

Paula

and self-motivation specifically. It is very important to consistently grow and learn in IT. While I was teaching, I used to stress to my students that this is one of the only professions (like medicine) where you can never stop going to school and stop learning. You don't graduate and go to work and that is it - done. You have to keep learning, keep growing, keep expanding your understanding.

I do not know about other "old geeks" but this one doesn't give much of a flip about DOS either and I don't have any trouble keeping up with things that interest me. I have been in the IT industry for right at 20 years now. I have seen good ideas come and go. I can work within most of the current network OSes. Why I even know what a router is. I still have most of my own teeth too.

It all depends on whether a person is willing to change with the times and keep up or fall behind.

Us "Old Geeks" can probably start a new job and be on our feet running while newbies are still figuring out the "culture".

I had rather have a few "old geeks" like me than a "slew" of younger guys that think they know everything and when push comes to shove they don't know how to read the manual.

From an "Old Geek" who still knows how to do it.

What in Great Britain if you are over age 40, people have it line up at an euthanasia station? See in Great Britain they pay people not to work, so to say, "be on the dole!" Too bad, if you live long enough, you will be over 40 some day and someone will be saying the same things about you and your experience. Me thinks Mr. Robb got replaced by someone older then he, so this is a way to strikeout about his situation. As for America, unfortunately we 40 + have to work for a living as well. Problem is can you handle anything in EBSCDIC, well sonny I can! How about wiring up "Unit Record Equipment" to run the machinery? How about an IBM 360/20 computer? How about Hollerith cards? See we all have experience, I just have more and it goes deeper then your's.

Great saying. One might say it's deep.

This punk has got to be kidding. He's going nowhere fast until he learns the value of experience. He should ask his girlfriend about that.........

Robb,
What is it that you want to create with this idea? What is your purpose for proposing it? I wonder also how differently you will feel when you are a 'wrinkly'. (And it doesn't matter what you think you will think because you don't have the experience to honestly say.)

As for the "you can't teach old dogs new tricks" ideology you are proposing, my experience is quite the opposite. And on top of that, there is a wealth of usable experience that the 'wrinkly' will bring to the table that does not show up in most young people. Again, this is empirical knowledge. (Pun intended!)

What is your evidence that "oldies struggle to keep up with change" -- I know a lot of over 40s coding .NET, Java, Perl and creating dyno-mite web sites. Some of the 'older ones' have struggled with the change; it is a big leap from procedural coding methodology to object oriented technology. It is a bridgable gap that many have made. And those I know that did not make the change either did not by choice (close to retirement so why bother) or they were struggling to begin with. And I have seen plently of youngsters struggling just out of college with new technology. Some got past it, some not. From my experience, it is not age, but commitment to learning that allows or blocks progress. An open and active mind does not age.

I agree with your comments about DOS. No one talks about it at all. However, in an IT shop with over 500 developers, many do talk about the command line (or shell), creating slick command files/shell scripts to perform mundane tasks. And 90% of them do know what it is even if they don't use it. It can be a bore to have to slow down and teach one of the new young pups how to use it. Strange how they want to spend two days writing a program to do what a command line script will do and take about 15-20 minutes to create. I guess that is the price for "knowing it all".

Can you "spell Unix" in all its 'flavors'? How about use vi to create a script or generate a startup for a daemon for your server? I work with many 40+ guys that do that in their sleep.

So again I ask, what is it that you wish to create with this idea?

Sincerely,
Rick Curry, CPC

Amen to that...when the 'inexperienced' talk about us oldsters, I believe they forget they will be there much sooner than they realize. The advancements in the technology fields are so rapid today that everyone has to work to keep abreast of the new as opposed to just 10 years ago.

You're presuming that every person's capabilities are the same at the same age - BAD assumption.

You're also implying that you have more of a right to an IT job than someone who's older than you - because you're "young".

We can only hope you don't get into a hiring manager's position until you learn to judge people by their capabilities and accomplishments, rather than their age.

I AM a hiring manager and yes, I would consider hiring a person 55 to do network support. I would also consider you, even though I don't agree with your opinion.

One last thing - before you write off "older" people in IT, or any industry, look at folks like Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking. They prove that individuals, not age, are what counts.

Yeah, you guys are the valuable ones, I'll tell ya. Say, and just how old was the instructor that taught you what you young geeks know today?? Nuff said - eventually, even you'll grow up!

Considering where Robb resides, it should not be shocking that he asked this question? In Europe if you are over 40, no need to apply for a job! All European countries discriminate against age, looks, etc.
The funny thing is, he posted the question but he doesn't have the guts to reply to any one of them!
Yes! I am going to hire an older person and yes my network admin is over 50 years old and yes he does do Windows and Novell, and yes he still uses his DOS skills to troubleshoot problems! And NO! I will not replace him with a 20 year old if he retires tomorrow!

If you genuinely think that younger IT folks learn new technology faster than older ones (way to paint with a broad brush there, btw), then your lack of experience is definitely showing. Yup, there's plenty of older folks who struggle to keep up with change, but most of us have seen one whole hell of a lot of it. Those of us who are still here have proven that we can adapt to change, over and over and over again. Have you?

Frankly, it's been my experience that a COMPETENT older tech learns new technology faster than a younger one - because we've had to do it so many times.

As to what do I think - I think you're bored and trying to stir the pot. ;-)

I am 51 and I am still learning and producing. I am a network administrator on a Windows 2003 AD network. My workstations are all Windows XP Pro. And yes, I have built many a network based on Novell, with DOS workstations, and even LANtastic.

I am now managing a network and writing applications in Access 2003 (VB) and just finished learning SAP ABAP.

Although I have been building systems since before there was a DOS, I am still current and keeping myself a valuable asset to the I.T. community. And what's even more important, is my experience pays over and over again.

I have worked on the following:

Northstar DOS
CP/M
RSTS/E
VMS
RSX-11
Cyber 170s
DOS
Windows 2, 3, 9x, XP, 2000, 2003
OS/2
MAC
Netware 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
Linux

So, tell me how that can't be worth something???

I rest my case.

Robb is typical of the young punks/geeks that think they have a lock on the IT world. Hopefully he never makes it very far in management so he doesn't exclude valuable, older IT workers. Many of us came into this career path in various ways. I came in at age 53 and had to learn DOS as well as Windows and its various incarnations. I am now learning SQL as well. We are as capable as those under forty who started with video games. Our judgement many times is better having been seasoned with years of life experience as well as work experience. Maybe a younger person will have somewhat of an edge in technological skill but this is more than made up for in workplace maturity that us 'older' workers are more likely to display. There are many, many more reasons that the over 55 IT worker has advantages over the younger folk but I will leave that to the other respondents.

Ahhh. You succeeded in drawing us all out.

You also did a great job knocking off a young smart-aleck. The sad truth is, what you wrote is often true in the hiring place these days.

Good luck to you and thanks for throwing a little gasoline on the fire...

So you're not advocating the practice of discrimination based on age. But rather, want to trigger discussion on why such a policy is bad. Okay, I can live with that!

You'd better hope you are employed at age 55. Putz.

I am currently in the middle age range within IT--I'm 41. I'm not a "newbie", but there are plenty older than I. I agree iwth ckoupal--competence is about attitude, intelligence, work, and patience. I'm no less interested in trying new things now than I was when I started. That's why I got into this business to begin with. My previous career was stagnant--I certainly don't want this one to become so.

Just spotted (futher up this thread) where he confesses to being a 55 year old network engineer.

He wanted to provoke thought. Talk about tossing gasoline on the fire!

The problem is, he's right about one thing - ageism does exist. The guise is age, but my suspicion is that we cost more - but then we know more, don't we?

Age doesn't matter... It is all about attitude, aptitude, experience and work ethic. The most valuable employee has a high degree of all of these things. Certainly some capable older workers are less outwardly enthusuastic in their approach to work. However, generally their experience helps them reduce the number of mistakes made and ultimately makes them at least as productive as the best dedicated and capable youngster.

The real key here is that meaningful IT work these days requires a team approach. A great team will include a mix of personalities and perspectives. I shudder to think of a team made up of all older employees or all young employees. The fact is that the young and old need each other to succeed in this very difficult profession.

There is a lot to be said for experience. As for DOS being dead and gone. Because of a varity of security restrictions, two weeks ago I had to use DOS, that's right DOS... to rename a couple of links so they could be sent through our mail system. Perhaps we should consider that the young and old should and would learn from each other.

Hey Robb...how about you stick it where the sun does not shine. I happen to work in a very large work environment where the majority of techies are over age 40. There is a good reason for it...they are mature employees that don't walk around like they are some kind of god preaching meaningless crap as you.
Just remember feller you will be there someday yourself if your cocky attitude does not get you killed first.
By the way...most of the old cane carrying tech group I work with have not used DOS for years.
You are totally off base with the post.

I agree with you to a certain extent, but I truly believe there are exceptions.

I've been at this second career for seven years now and have truly enjoyed it. I've attained CCNP and MCSE 2003 status over the years and have kept up pretty well in my opinion. My MBA and commercial pilot's license also come in handy for grammatically correcting my younger peers and flying quickly to the site of a network emergency. I've just started work toward a CCIE as I find the entire concept of routing fasinating. I realize I'll be the oldest at the lab and that I'll probably fail the lab portion two or three times like everybody else, but you've got to give me credit for trying. I've taught "30 somethings" how to setup routers, build servers, troubleshoot hardware problems with server and routers, program military encryption devices, terminate fiber in the field and taught them how to be tolerant of the customer's lack of IT knowledge.

I'm not about to engage in a "dogging" contest with you and realize that you're engaging numerous people into a synergistic age discrimination discussion.

I will discuss the lack of apathy that I see shown toward the average IT customer. I find the typical administrator's attitude toward the customer appalling. It matters not to the adminstrator that the customer is a lawyer, accountant, airline pilot, CEO, etc...if they don't understand TCP or IP they're not worth the time of day. Face it, if you're working in IT you're in a service industry whether your ego will allow this admission or not.

From an old man in IT. Work hard, be tolerant of all and learn something from everyone, regardless of their age.

IT needs smart and experienced people and they come in all ages, races and genders.

Does age limiting mean that ALL CEO's, and ALL other high ranking officers should not be into decision making and that their lack of knowledge is what is running the underlings? I guess that we should also forget simple arithmatic so we can better apply the more complex calculus and theory mathmatics. Or maybe even forget studies of any history so we can repeat some of the mistakes made in the ageless past of our world. Have a nice DREAM Robb.

Well, isn't that nice.

What about all of those old guys that went bact to school to "retool" their skills?

Given their experienct, and new tech skills, wouldn't they be a better choice for employers over sumeone just out of school without any other experience than working at some fast food joint while he or she was going to high school?

With 30+ years of experience having started in the industry developing software, I've managed to adapt with the changes and am now almost totally involved with network administration and security. Being female, I was recently told that I don't look like a geek (not sure if that is good or bad). My son, who is in one of the top 10 geek colleges still calls me for help with his computer issues. I recognize that my memory is definitely not what it used to be but fortunately my analytical skills and willingness to learn has not declined. So... I actually make the effort to take notes to combat the memory lapses and I still enjoy the work.

Snotty-nose young punk goes out on a limb and tries to bait everyone with such a post. I say lets not try and change his attitude. It will defeat him all by itself.

I'm 30 something and happen to know DOS. While not using older tools has become more common place, who doesn't have to resort to command line access of remote systems or systems that fail to boot into GUI period for whatever reason? What does it mean to hire for experience if someone who has seen the backbones and nerves of our current technologies is not given a chance to work around these younger (don't)know-it-alls in order to give the youngsters a chance to learn something about IT history?

I work with with several individuals older than myself and am constantly amazed at how much I don't know as well as how much I've learned from them in the last four years.

If you think that hiring an older person with a firm experience base in IT is a bad idea, I think you should not be placed in the hiring seat.

That said: hiring someone wanting to change careers and not having the past experience may warrant further consideration as it would be more time consuming to train him or her up. This should not be a hard and fast rule rather than a caution to look carefully. Individuals are just that; there is no group mold to work from.

The young are too inexperienced and immature to work with anyone that knows more then they do. Which is why teenagers don’t listen to their parents most of the time.

The fact that you would post a question about setting a policy for your company to perform an illegal operation such as AGE Discrimination. Shows just how inexperienced you are. Getting caught could actually put your company out of business. And you out of a job.

The young think of age as OLD, the old think of age as EXPERIENCE.
The fact that an old guy has forgotten more then the young will ever know is TRUE.

Most of us old timers learned computers using assembly language and oscilloscopes.
You had to work at the hardware level to make it work or fix it when it was broken. On systems that only had 1K bytes of memory or LESS and NO hard drives or even floppies. The youth of today just copy someone else’s code and make it their own.
Working close to the hardware is almost a forgotten art.

That statement is proven by the job application requests that ask for 32 unique non related languages on 3 or more operating systems. Anyone that has that much knowledge is either 300 years old, or is LYING and isn’t worth a damn at ANY OF THEM.
There are also MANY jobs available for EMBEDDED programmers, yet the people doing the hiring are totally clueless what EMBEDDED REALLY IS. And won’t hire old timers that REALLY know what it’s about.

The ONLY reason managers want to keep a young staff is:
While Inexperienced, they are NOT willing to speak up when they see something wrong, for fear that they might be wrong. And be singled out as a dummy. Or they just don’t know any better.
The longer an error is allowed to continue, the more it costs the company to fix. I KNOW through Experience.

They also don't have the moxy that comes with experience, to stand up to the boss when needed.
Because the boss who usually doesn't keep up with technology made a bad choice.
So the boss knows he can “count on them”, to not embarrass him/her when he/she screws up.

The young are willing to work for minimum wages with little or no benefits to gain the experience the OLD GUYS ALREADY Have! Something an experienced person won’t do.

The young "I'm going to set the world on fire" (and all of us Old Timers have been there) are willing to put in a lot of overtime WITHOUT PAY because they want to make Brownie Points with the boss. The only thing impressing the boss is he/she can go home at night knowing some fool is working like crazy without increasing the dept. budget. So the boss looks good to HIS boss.

Managers and younger staff are afraid if they hire older more experienced people. That every time they come up with a stupid idea that THEY THINK is wonderful. The experienced person will tell them how it was done before and why it didn’t work, making them look as stupid as they really are.

Education is BASIC BOOK LEARNING, there are a LOT of VERY IMPORTANT things that you can ONLY learn through EXPERIENCE, Someone else’s (the less painful) or your own. MUCH More Painful, to the individual AND the Company that’s paying them.

Most of the PhD’s I have worked with could (and did) write white papers about pie-in-the sky theories. But don’t have enough common sense to tie their shoes. And hands-on is out of the question. They get the company “industry exposure” (no one cares that their theories are bogus). But never really accomplish a damn thing.

While the young are making their mistakes (costing the company $$$) gaining experience, the older more experienced individuals. Have ALREADY made those mistakes and KNOW ”not to do that”!

The trend for the past 6 years or so has been to hire only the young, under pay them, while the CEO of fortune 500 companies are pulling in more then $ 4 Million a YEAR in salary and Bennies.
The CEO really doesn’t give a crap if the company folds a couple of years down the line or not.
By then they have made “theirs, screw everyone else.
Including their customers.

Which is why 98% of the commercial software that was written in the last 15 years is full of holes & bugs. Example: When MS Windows 2000 was released it had 63,000 KNOWN BUGS. Yet business bought 18 Million copies the first day it was released.

I have a quote from the CEO of IBM from back in the late 70’s that states, “IBM ISN’T going to get into the Microcomputer industry, because it is only a passing fancy”. Three years later they came out with the IBM PC. Several months ago IBM sold their PC market to China for $ 10 Billion.

When I worked for Exxon Office Systems, the company (only hired young engineers for the most part) developed what we called the “Exxon Many Woman Theory”.
Which is: “If you get ONE WOMAN Pregnant she will deliver a baby is NINE months.
Therefore if you get NINE WOMEN Pregnant then they will deliver a baby in ONE MONTH”.
Logically it’s TRUE, but EXPERIENCE tells us that it’s “White Paper Theory” that will NEVER WORK. The young engineers kept trying to throw more people at the project to get it done faster.
Exxon Office systems folded after 8 years in business. They had all the possible resources you could ask for, except experienced people to tell them when they were screwing up.

If you get THIS Far, I have one last statement. AGE Discrimination is ILLEGAL.
And if you listen to the old timers, you MIGHT just live long enough to become ONE.
Then you’ll have gained the experience to see the error of your current thoughts.

You might as well say that IT is for anyone 25 to 35 years old. Ageism is a blade that cuts both ways. When I was breaking into IT as fresh faced 20 year old kid, everyone who was already in was at least 10 years my senior.

Truth is, IT is for anyone who's willing to put forth the effort to learn & adapt in an ever changing enviroment. I'd hire the person with the right set of attitude & skill that the position required.
That said. IT isn't just about keeping up with emerging technology. It's also about being competent with mainstream tech, and legacy tech. DOS maybe dead, but OS's with command line interfaces are not. Neither are the basic concepts used by DOS.
To use your sports car analogy, the 40 year old is probably a better driver than the 20 year old, and is less likely to crash the sports car.

Age doesn't matter! It's what that person has to bring to the table that matters. I'm right inbetween at the age of 40 and just getting ready to graduate with my degree in Computer Information Systems. I sure hope it wasn't for nothing, and in fact, I know it's not. At this point even today, I turned down 2 job offers for technical positions.

At the age of 40, I have tons of professional skills that are valuable to any IT Department, and I learned them from the 50 and above age. It was those people who are above 50 who taught me the many different methodologies which now allow me to construct a program from the Interview stage all the way to implementation and in many different languages, C++, XML, XHTML, VB.net, C#, Dreamweaver, Flash, and the list goes on. It was those of the older generation who have the knowledge to allow some of the little Arregant pricks who think they know it all, to keep their arrogant butts in line. I know some of the arrogant pricks in IT who think their shit don't stink, when in reality, they might have one skill. It's a joke.

And by the way, tech support and networking are a given. Any IT professional should know those skills automatically beyond the actual design and implimentation phases.

Wake up!

Hi and thank you for that.

I am 55 years old and I have been in the IT industry here in the UK for 15 years.

I wrote the topic because I wanted to provoke debate over an issue that rarely gets any air-time. It has been a very busy week. I have received some fairly abusive mail. No matter. I am happy to have made folk think. I just hope that those who do hire and fire have read this and realise that people like me have so much to offer.

Thank you for your time and interest. I do appreciate the response, even if you were being annoyed with me. Well, I deserved it.

Robb

Unbelievable. I see people in their 50's every day that can dance on anyone's head on the technical side. We have one employed as an Identity Management consultant right now, and he blows away all the young geeks. Hardly worth replying, but I just had to. Good grief.

YOu cannot imagine my mail-box!! It creaks with anger and self rightousness (spelling?).

I stand by what I wrote, but I am prepared to admit that I should really have made it clear from which perspective I was doing it from. That was probably a mistake and I would be the first to apologise to you and others who have, rightly, taken me to task.

I hope that you will forgive me on the grounds that my intentions were good. This is an issue. And, from the number of passionate e-mails I have received and the number of replies to this topic that has accrued on the forum, I think I guaged it about right.

Thanks for your comment. I take it as an honest response.

Happy trails

Robb

What makes you think the users will get ANY reports, in 5 years. "What's a Report Anyway it wasn't in my cert's class!"
The kids today, you buy them books & send them to school. All they do is ripe out the pages and draw dirty pictures.

Be careful of what you wish for. What truth? YOUR version of the truth? Someday you will be that 40 something IT person. Yes, there may be some older IT professionals that fight change, but, age is no indication of that.
Presentation of change is also key to success. Also, you can perform some tasks faster in a command prompt window than you can through windows explorer.

I resemble that...
I'm 40+ and have been in IT since 1994, and will graduate with a networking degree next year. Unlike some of my counterparts my way of thinking is different, I'm open minded, and enjoy exploring innovation, and being able to use creative thinking, and imagination in the sloution process. Yeah DOS IS old, but if you need to crack a displaced workers password, you'll be glad you know it,how do you think these guys are writing virus variations, in C++? I DON'T THINK SO...

As an aged Consultant, (and I believe I should have been put out to pasture years ago, according to this writer), I find my expertise is now more sought after than ever. Yes, one must stay current, however - the mature 'legacy' environments that exist in most large financial and other well established environments demand real depth of knowledge. This isn't available in many younger 'geeks'. A glaring instance of the need for an older 'geek' is this: Move a datacenter.
Or - "Migrate a 3270 App. to a web based app."
Or - "Mitigate risk in a migration - H/W and S/W"

May the lord forgive them, for they know not what they say!

This 61 year old geek just spent a goodly amount of time this day explaining how an OLAP 'cube' works, how it is populated, etc. And.. I am an old Network Guy, currently functioning as a Strategic Architect.

And, speaking of "strategic vs Tactical" solutioning - (I do like inventing good sounding words) - would the 'young geeks' be willing to put their careers on the line as some of us 'old geeks' do on a daily basis?

Age and stealth will always win over youth and exuberance. And, we dont get in as much trouble, since our idea of recreational time is a nap.

Regards,
Hal Blanthorn
hblanthorn@aol.com

I was taught to respect my elders, cause you can learn something from them. You might be suprise what they can teach. I was taught on a dos base system and a cpm system. I can tell you this dos have save my rear many of times. If I didn't know dos I would have been able to fix a computer that wouldn't boot.
Beside there are still some legacy computers out there still doing a good job in the work force. Disrespecting the older people cause of age that down right disgraceful, would you fire your dad cause he was to old for you think about it, I learn alot from my dad later on in life. The mature generation have a lot to offer even in the computer field.

Darned tootin'... and for proof, my network manager is 55 and runs
circles around everybody else