Age bias in IT?

Good article on /. about this, linking to the following site:

https://www.computerworld.com/s/article/print/9219187/Age_bias_in_IT_The_reality_behind_the_rumors?taxonomyName=Careers&taxonomyId=10

Anyone experience this before? It's a common thing I think about, as it seems like employers would rather opt for young , trainable, and lower salary than older, experienced, and high salary.

Thoughts?

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Comments

sambuca69

This definitely happens... I just need to look around me to see it.

"If you can hire someone fresh out of college for $60,000 who is likely to know the latest technology, or you can hire someone 45 years old who's making $140,000, who are you going to hire? That's the harsh reality, whether we like it or not" - thing is, what options do you really have for this, aside for planning for a very early retirement??

whatthehell

sambuca69 wrote: »

This definitely happens... I just need to look around me to see it.

"If you can hire someone fresh out of college for $60,000 who is likely to know the latest technology, or you can hire someone 45 years old who's making $140,000, who are you going to hire? That's the harsh reality, whether we like it or not" - thing is, what options do you really have for this, aside for planning for a very early retirement??

Good point -- it makes me wonder how some of our older members have planned or made it through, sticking in IT the whole time? Mostly sliding into management roles? Switching careers to something else?

Akaricloud

From reading this article it seems that the main cause is people not keeping up to date on technology and expecting their salaries to keep increasing.

"If you can hire someone fresh out of college for $60,000 who is likely to know the latest technology, or you can hire someone 45 years old who's making $140,000, who are you going to hire?"

In all honesty I believe if you keep your skillset up and realize that your salary might reach a plateau then it shouldn't be an issue. Expecting to be paid twice as much as someone else who knows the technology better is just insane. Either realize that you're not worth that much or make yourself worth that much.

Often times I feel like I'm on the other side of this; I'm 21 and look like I'm 15. Who wants a 15 year old supporting all of their staff when they could easily hire someone who's 30?

Mrock4

With regards to employers not hiring younger candidates (who are well-qualified)..I have not experienced this..at all.

A lot of the older engineers I've worked with have not remained current with their skills, unfortunately. If that's the case, well..that's their fault. That holds true for younger candidates not getting hired..maybe they're doing something wrong, too?

But, that's not all of them. One former co-worker comes to mind. He is probably 60 years old, and he could run circles around me with ANY networking topic. This guy still studies on a daily basis (and labs at home!). All I can say..I hope that's the attitude I have when I'm 60.

I think ultimately articles like this are hard to prove, because people are different. One young candidate might not get hired, and chalk it up to their age, but maybe they just sucked at their interview? Maybe the employer valued a traditional education more than their CCNA.

Or that older worker who got canned for a 30 year old replacement..maybe the older worker got complacent and just didn't do his job anymore? Of course, he'd never tell you that..he'd say it was an age thing.

rsutton

sambuca69 wrote: »

"If you can hire someone fresh out of college for $60,000 who is likely to know the latest technology, or you can hire someone 45 years old who's making $140,000, who are you going to hire?

I've not seen many fresh-out-college kids have adequate experience to manage an enterprise network. They probably have the book and lab knowledge, but that is quite different from real world experience. If we are talking Help Desk level stuff, sure hire the college kid. For System/Network admin and beyond, you need someone who has the experience, which costs more.

whatthehell

Mrock4 wrote: »

With regards to employers not hiring younger candidates (who are well-qualified)..I have not experienced this..at all.

A lot of the older engineers I've worked with have not remained current with their skills, unfortunately. If that's the case, well..that's their fault. That holds true for younger candidates not getting hired..maybe they're doing something wrong, too?

But, that's not all of them. One former co-worker comes to mind. He is probably 60 years old, and he could run circles around me with ANY networking topic. This guy still studies on a daily basis (and labs at home!). All I can say..I hope that's the attitude I have when I'm 60.

I think ultimately articles like this are hard to prove, because people are different. One young candidate might not get hired, and chalk it up to their age, but maybe they just sucked at their interview? Maybe the employer valued a traditional education more than their CCNA.

Or that older worker who got canned for a 30 year old replacement..maybe the older worker got complacent and just didn't do his job anymore? Of course, he'd never tell you that..he'd say it was an age thing.

I think this is true as well. Medicine also requires CME (Continuing Medical Education) credits to be obtained annually, to keep up with current medical knowledge. IT, as well as other fields I am sure, require this (though IT seems to be changing a lot more quicker and more frequent than other fields, but that's the fun of it, no?).

Perhaps it's not the age we should worry about, but more the attitude and drive. If you are not keeping up and doing your job, well age won't matter worth squat and you will get canned. If you get a good attitude, stay open-minded, and actually enjoy the IT field, then I would think it would be fine.

For a period of time, I thought it would be a good idea to change from IT into pharmacy or med, but it's a WHOLE new learning process, way more schooling and classes, and the area just doesn't really appeal to me. It's funny though, that I believe something as solid as Pharmacy/Med will keep on changing as well, as EMR has been mandated, and technology will keep changing it. So if we all stick to our guns, we should be just fine sticking with IT no matter what industry we end up working in.

Just my 2 pennies....

Devilsbane

I've seen the reverse. Why hire some whipper snapper with a fancy degree and no (or little) experience?

WillTech105

Devilsbane wrote: »

I've seen the reverse. Why hire some whipper snapper with a fancy degree and no (or little) experience?

I'll ditto this. Mostly its the guy who has experience and/or certs who gets the high paying job. No one is going to hire a kid fresh outta college to manage their enterprise network -- especially if he has little to no experience.

To get those high $100K+ jobs you need experience so I'd have to somewhat disagree with the article. If you don't keep yourself up to date then of course you'd be out of a job -- wht tout you know Windows NT and Token Ring and expect to be paid the same?

RobertKaucher

Here is my take on this sort of thing. There are two axes that pertain to performance in any field.
X = Competence: Notice I did not say knowledge. Competence is the skill of being able to practically apply knowledge and solve problems with limited resources.
Y = Enthusiasm: This is the joy one extracts from the work in question.

If you plot this on a graph the ideal employee would possess a high degree of both competence and enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is certainly the dominant parameter here because people who are competent but not very enthusiastic will neither accomplish very much nor cause problems; people who lack competence and lack enthusiasm will cause few problems; but people who lack competence but have a high degree of enthusiasm are dangerous. This is why the old dogs know to keep an eye on the PFYs until they have proven themselves a few times.

Now how the hell does this relate to the article? There is a negative correlation between age/years of experience with enthusiasm and a negative correlation between enthusiasm and the ability to grow in competence, and of course a perceived positive correlation between youth and enthusiasm; which, as I said, is the dominant parameter in the equation.

So what employers are really looking for when hiring younger people, is a person of reasonable competence with a perceived higher level of enthusiasm. Many times this is not understood consciously by the person doing the hiring, so it is in the best interest of older IT pros to stress both their high degree of competence and enthusiasm for the position they are interviewing for.

hiddenknight821

rsutton wrote: »

I've not seen many fresh-out-college kids have adequate experience to manage an enterprise network. They probably have the book and lab knowledge, but that is quite different from real world experience. If we are talking Help Desk level stuff, sure hire the college kid. For System/Network admin and beyond, you need someone who has the experience, which costs more.

Okay. Now this takes us back to the "chicken or the egg" problem. I'm pretty much the fresh IT guy with few internship experience you guys are talking about here, and it's perplexing enough that I can't understand how I'm suppose to get the experience.

How do you expect us to gain experience? It's either I have to follow someone to learn the stuff or it's a miracle. Do you think a help desk job will help me get the network engineering job? Apparently I don't think so. I would have to work in a NOC. Even if I work in a NOC, would they even let me touch the physical hardwares RIGHT after I got promoted to network engineer? I doubt it. Either way, I still would have to gain experience by observing someone else doing it and gain their trust. So, pretty much experience is not the only thing that we need to work on. We also need to establish a trust relationship.

whatthehell

RobertKaucher wrote: »

Here is my take on this sort of thing. There are two axes that pertain to performance in any field.
X = Competence: Notice I did not say knowledge. Competence is the skill of being able to practically apply knowledge and solve problems with limited resources.
Y = Enthusiasm: This is the joy one extracts from the work in question.

If you plot this on a graph the ideal employee would possess a high degree of both competence and enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is certainly the dominant parameter here because people who are competent but not very enthusiastic will neither accomplish very much nor cause problems; people who lack competence and lack enthusiasm will cause few problems; but people who lack competence but have a high degree of enthusiasm are dangerous. This is why the old dogs know to keep an eye on the PFYs until they have proven themselves a few times.

Now how the hell does this relate to the article? There is a negative correlation between age/years of experience with enthusiasm and a negative correlation between enthusiasm and the ability to grow in competence, and of course a perceived positive correlation between youth and enthusiasm; which, as I said, is the dominant parameter in the equation.

So what employers are really looking for when hiring younger people, is a person of reasonable competence with a perceived higher level of enthusiasm. Many times this is not understood consciously by the person doing the hiring, so it is in the best interest of older IT pros to stress both their high degree of competence and enthusiasm for the position they are interviewing for.

Great response and very good points!

WillTech105

hiddenknight821 wrote: »

Okay. Now this takes us back to the "chicken or the egg" problem. I'm pretty much the fresh IT guy with few internship experience you guys are talking about here, and it's perplexing enough that I can't understand how I'm suppose to get the experience.

How do you expect us to gain experience? It's either I have to follow someone to learn the stuff or it's a miracle. Do you think a help desk job will help me get the network engineering job? Apparently I don't think so. I would have to work in a NOC. Even if I work in a NOC, would they even let me touch the physical hardwares RIGHT after I got promoted to network engineer? I doubt it. Either way, I still would have to gain experience by observing someone else doing it and gain their trust. So, pretty much experience is not the only thing that we need to work on. We also need to establish a trust relationship.

Hard work and luck. Whats that saying "the harder I work the luckier I get" -- just keep pushing and eventuall you get your experience. It won't be handed to you, you have to activily seek it (enthusiam).

RobertKaucher

Devilsbane wrote: »

I've seen the reverse. Why hire some whipper snapper with a fancy degree and no (or little) experience?

In IT the proper term is PFY

Bastard Operator From Hell - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

tpatt100

At one of my old jobs they hired a contractor to train a guy who had been there twenty years. The guy did not want to admit he was obsolete. I plan on being management before I am fifty. Technical to stay current but more paperwork and processes

rsutton

hiddenknight821 wrote: »

Okay. Now this takes us back to the "chicken or the egg" problem. I'm pretty much the fresh IT guy with few internship experience you guys are talking about here, and it's perplexing enough that I can't understand how I'm suppose to get the experience.

How do you expect us to gain experience? It's either I have to follow someone to learn the stuff or it's a miracle. Do you think a help desk job will help me get the network engineering job? Apparently I don't think so. I would have to work in a NOC. Even if I work in a NOC, would they even let me touch the physical hardwares RIGHT after I got promoted to network engineer? I doubt it. Either way, I still would have to gain experience by observing someone else doing it and gain their trust. So, pretty much experience is not the only thing that we need to work on. We also need to establish a trust relationship.

Most people start in the Help Desk and by working with senior technicians they gain both trust and experience.

Do you think a help desk job will help me get the network engineering job?

At my third and last Help Desk job I became good friends with the network manager. He started giving menial tasks to help him monitor and troubleshoot the network. My boss was preparing me to move in to his department. If I had wanted to go the networking route, that would have been my ticket. You have to reach out for opportunities to grow and advance your knowledge, granted those opportunities are not always available, and if that is the case, I would start looking for a new company to work for.

Devilsbane

WillTech105 wrote: »

Hard work and luck. Whats that saying "the harder I work the luckier I get" -- just keep pushing and eventuall you get your experience. It won't be handed to you, you have to activily seek it (enthusiam).

It takes a few strike outs before you finally come across someone willing to take a chance on you. Once they do and you have some blanks filled on the resume the next step should be an easier one.

hiddenknight821

rsutton wrote: »

At my third and last Help Desk job I became good friends with the network manager. He started giving menial tasks to help him monitor and troubleshoot the network. My boss was preparing me to move in to his department. If I had wanted to go the networking route, that would have been my ticket.

Not all help desk jobs have in-house network department. Like the Geek Squad jobs for example. It would be nice to have all help desk job to comes in pair with NOC in case one of us decided to switch over. So, I would still have to work my way up to gain trust and build reputation so my managers can refer me to another company with a network-centric department.

RobertKaucher

Devilsbane wrote: »

It takes a few strike outs before you finally come across someone willing to take a chance on you. Once they do and you have some blanks filled on the resume the next step should be an easier one.

This is the truth. The fact is time is on your side and eventually someone is going to give you the chance you need.

RobertKaucher

rsutton wrote: »

Most people start in the Help Desk and by working with senior technicians they gain both trust and experience.

At my third and last Help Desk job I became good friends with the network manager. He started giving menial tasks to help him monitor and troubleshoot the network. My boss was preparing me to move in to his department. If I had wanted to go the networking route, that would have been my ticket. You have to reach out for opportunities to grow and advance your knowledge, granted those opportunities are not always available, and if that is the case, I would start looking for a new company to work for.

I think this is the critical statement here. At many places I have seen the "help desk" is stuck away and isolated from everyone else in the world. There is no chance of this sort of interaction. Where I work currently the network guys are in the cubes right next to the help desk guys so there is a chance one could move up in an organic way. But if I were looking for my first IT job and I had thrown my lot into the Cisco world, I would not be scouting out help desk positions unless I had to or I was certain there was room for organic growth in your position.

swild

I'm in Arkansas and my experience is this:

If you are being hired by someone in IT, they are looking for enthusiasm and competence, certs and experience. The older you are the more favoritism you get.

If the hiring manger is not in IT, age is all they know. Older = more experienced = better. I have been turned down from 2 jobs because I was too young. Of course they don't say that, but the person they hired has no certs and less experience than me. Even though he looks to be in his 50's.

The job I currently have, the hiring manager is the IT manager. I was the only one who applied for the job (out of about 70) that had any certs.

WillTech105

RobertKaucher wrote: »

I think this is the critical statement here. At many places I have seen the "help desk" is stuck away and isolated from everyone else in the world. There is no chance of this sort of interaction. Where I work currently the network guys are in the cubes right next to the help desk guys so there is a chance one could move up in an organic way. But if I were looking for my first IT job and I had thrown my lot into the Cisco world, I would not be scouting out help desk positions unless I had to or I was certain there was room for organic growth in your position.

I ditto this. Not every job is for everybody. Some jobs better tailor for a persons personality and career goals. If it isnt meeting yours, find another one. It could be bad leadership, the company doesnt value you, or the workload just isnt there.

Lifes too short to be stuck in a place you dont want to be in. Take the chance and shop around (aka: dice.com, careerbuilder, etc) it DOES and SHOULD take you some "strikes out" before you hit that good job.

Akaricloud

swild wrote: »

I'm in Arkansas and my experience is this:

If you are being hired by someone in IT, they are looking for enthusiasm and competence, certs and experience. The older you are the more favoritism you get.

If the hiring manger is not in IT, age is all they know. Older = more experienced = better. I have been turned down from 2 jobs because I was too young. Of course they don't say that, but the person they hired has no certs and less experience than me. Even though he looks to be in his 50's.

The job I currently have, the hiring manager is the IT manager. I was the only one who applied for the job (out of about 70) that had any certs.

I agree with this.

There seems to be a middle-ground that most hiring managers see as experienced but not obsolete. That's not to say that you can't overcome this by showing that you have the right and relevant experience though..

SteveLord

What's new to see here? I call BS on it being a "technology" thing. It's whether you want to choose to pay a younger person less because he needs work and will take it....or the experienced individual that will demand a higher salary. To any newbies reading this: Believe it or not you aren't always hired for your "magnetic personality."

This applies to every profession. And every sector.

Turgon

If you are an old person like me (42) and have boat loads of IT experience there are great jobs as you will be employed by a guy who is older and hanging on for retirement.

If you are an old person like me (42) and looking for your first IT job, you are a bit screwed.

carbonated

I felt quite a bit of age bias until about 26; I've been in the field since I was 19. Its slowed down over the past year or two but i still get the "young" comments.