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Comment by 4thaccount | Hacker News Reader

Heartbreaking. I'm only partially in what could be considered tech, but I constantly try to move groups in my industry every few years to constantly pick up new skills. I honestly think I have enough random skills now: databases, programming, systems integration, mastery of a variety of common industry tools, project leadership, specific domain theory and understanding of the math that underlays my industry. However, is it enough and if the whole industry fades, where do I go next?

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The problem with tech is that if you did something just a few years ago you are considered "outdated" and this experience doesn't count. For example I wrote heavy duty C++ code until 2012 for more than 10 years but during interviews I often get zero credit for this experience. "You haven't used C++ 17".

When I was on my first job, we got a resume from someone twenty years older than us. Her resume was tossed aside quickly, but I fought with HR to get her to interview with us. She easily turned out to be the best hire ever for our team - she didn't know Java from assembly, but her common sense and problem solving abilities were orders of magnitude higher than any of the "young, hip, programming wizards" in the company at the time. If not for her, my team would've failed miserably. More than a decade later, I still fondly and humbly remember her.

Any time I see younger folks ignoring/mistreating older folks, it annoys me to no end. As a industry, we need to learn to value experience and wisdom as much as we value speed and smartness. And we don't need to accept just because "HR said so" or "manager said so". At minimum, we need to make them understand that there are lots of older folks who can be great asset to the organization.

end rant!

To me, this is what bugs me about the “diversity” brigade - most of the time the conversation is based around ethnicity, physical abilities, or gender but for being long-term thinking we seem to have forgotten that diversity means _everyone_ that can contribute, including age / experience. Simply being old doesn’t necessarily make you better or faster, but it does tend to give you skills. Skills that were acquired over a long career. Skills that make them a nightmare for obscure bugs.

Some folks I’ve hired were older than my father but I valued them for their experience in other industries and to lend their perspectives to how things should be. It is heartbreaking to think that we could be throwing away thousands or millions of man years of valuable lessons - some we should repeat and others we shouldn’t.

That’s one thing I have noticed in all diversity material. It’s always young good looking people. There are no older, overweight, disabled or other types of people. It seems the diversity movement has changed the favored groups but I am not sure it’s much more inclusive.

I guess everyone's idea of diversity is different and no-one's idea includes every group :(

I've tried using paraphrases like this "but it does tend to give you skills. Skills that were acquired over a long career. Skills that make them a nightmare for obscure bugs." It falls flat, and all I get quizzical stares.

We can’t all be James Mickens when it comes to prose in professional discussions unfortunately. If people get it, that’s still a side comment that can carry more depth but the words should still be of substance to the point being made because trying to stop your content for comedic / dramatic effect can backfire as you’ve observed, especially with a diverse audience. Being inclusive and respectful to your audience doesn’t mean stopping with referential humor / puns entirely though IMO. Heck, quoting some random famous person in your slides is kind of the time honored name drop of smart people humblebragging but few seem to say that’s a practice that’s alienating compared to ping pong or beer in the workplace.

A well functioning organization needs a mix of younger and older people.

Yeah, only the last 2 years matter.

It’s really funny, because I’d never worked in Node.js until like 6 months ago, but everyone at the company seemed to think I had years of experience.

It’s surprising how well skills transfer.

Seriously? Like how hard is it to go from C++ prior to 2012 or whatever to 2017? Would it take you a couple of months to get up to speed on the features in 2014 & 2017 that they're actually using? I can understand giving you a bit less credit than someone with up to date experience, but zero? It makes me so glad I'm not a developer.

C++11 and up is legitimately very very different from C++03 and below.

But someone working on C++ prior to 2012 could still have encountered and experienced C++11.

Probably not, there was a really long latency between the spec coming out in 2011 and compiler support. Multiple years.

I am pretty sure I have used things like “auto” and anonymous functions around 2011. The support wasn’t complete but there was already a lot available.

Stuff like range based for would have just come out.

Must be some recruiter saying that because I cannot imagine a tech savvy HR saying that to you?

In a sense it’s probably a filter. Reasonable people give me credit but especially a lot of young guys can’t imagine that people did valuable stuff 5 or 10 years ago.

Our client was impressed with your skills and you are a perfect fit for the team, however your Angular 3.46 knowledge was not enough to consider you for this role at this moment. Please, feel free to re-apply! :)

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