[freetanga]

I think you are spot on. I run a medium sized IT Team (400 employees plus 600 external contractors) and I like to go against the grain: In the past 12 months I have hired 15 people, and 13 are over 52 years old.

Most have been laid off, got a juicy check that translates into a good nest egg, but not enough to make it their only source of income until retirement. A good job with a steady (but lower than before) income makes them very happy, and provides us with very senior people for key positions.

However, it was hell to get it past HR, as they all saw it meant we were not a “agile” IT department. Facepalm.

[greenyoda]

Two things surprised me here:

1. What does HR know about running an agile IT department? Why would they second-guess your decision on who to hire?

2. One of HR's biggest responsibilities is to protect the company from lawsuits. If HR itself has a bias against older employees, that would indicate that they're not even qualified to perform their own job, let alone tell the IT department how to do theirs.

[reaperducer]

I find neither of those things surprising.

The companies I've worked with have HR departments staffed by people who are also straight out of college. They have no knowledge or concept of people older than their circle, nor of all the legal consequences of their position. As far as I know, there is no "HR school" that teaches people these things. They learn by failure.

[freetanga]

Sorry for the delay. Overall you are correct on both charges, but Corporate Reality gets in the way

On (1): they don’t know squat, but if I don’t have a multi-ethnic and gender-diverse team of people in their 20s, wearing Avengers tshirts, toting moleskines and matcha cups while scooting around on mopeds, we are “not agile enough” (which is corporate for “the pics from our competitors look cooler, everyone says you can’t be agile without Avengers T-shirts, OMG hire someone youngsters or our share prices will drop”. Sorry if I overused stereotypes, but hopefully you get the point. Dilbertian PHB doing PHB things.

On (2), yes but (a) most HR everywhere are work are hypocritical at best and bipolar at worst. Also, (b) in private they will also tell you they need to keep salary volumes in check, streamline pension fund levels, etc. “Resources” is the main noun, “Human” is just an adjective that was passing by.

I don’t agree to all this, but it’s the same in all big companies I worked at (even in some that hide this crap too well)

[tluyben2]

Yep, my experience is also good with programmers over 50; usually (because of the ageist market) very humble but they understand things just faster. I myself am approaching 50 and I know more and am quicker (which surprises me) than I was when I was 25 (but maybe I was just really slow). I found a 55 year old firmware developer who is simply better (fast arm assembly/c dev shipping with no p1 bugs; this is not stuff you can update once shipped) than anyone I ever met; he was fired from his job a bit into covid and no-one wanted to hire him. It is strange. Even if he retires in 10 years, or worse, young people leave faster for a few bucks/hr more...

[geerlingguy]

> I know more and am quicker (which surprises me) than I was when I was 25 (but maybe I was just really slow).

I think the difference isn't raw speed, it's efficiency.

I know every year I'm better able to stop before I go down too far on the wrong path to solving some problem, because I learned many times in previous projects how that type of solution would end up hurting me in the end.

So less time spent on fruitless efforts, more time spent on fruitful efforts, and in the end usually a better, more maintainable solution, to boot!

[Aperocky]

'Medium sized' lol, I think you're being very humble.

[freetanga]

Thanks. No matter how much you think you climb there’s always someone bigger on top, so I try to err on the side of humbleness rather than the opposite ;)

[jkoudys]

I thought my team became "medium" when I went from managing two people to four.

[tonyedgecombe]

So other peoples biases have created an opportunity for your company. If the market undervalues someone for spurious reasons then you can exploit that. Move on to middle aged female minority programmers next.

[stuff4ben]

>middle aged female minority programmers So you're purposely limiting your market to just a handful of people? I know of 1 maybe 2 middle-aged females who program. None are minority. I know of 0 minority non-greencard holders (in other words Black or Latino). Asian is different, I know several middle-aged female Asian developers.

And I was a manager for a while and couldn't get any resumes of minorities period. They just don't exist or are already happy where they were. It's truly a shame.

[freetanga]

Men, Women, Fish or anything in between. Same for skin or creed. If they can deliver, I take them as they show up (provided I have room and I can feel a good vibe with the existing team)