I left in 2017 as the talks about older folks discriminaton was heating up. then, IBM seemed to be interested in changing the tune and making things work for older folks as well. How are things nowadays?
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Ha I grew up on UNIX though my first computer was an IBM 1130 in high school.
I learned IBM mainframe technology when I was about 40 years old from IBM masters of the time. It seemed strange to me because I grew up on UNIX and Honeywell GCOS mainframes but IBM experts at the time explained it so I could wring giddy acts of God out of DB2 under MVS on an IBM mainframe. So if you think "old" people are stupid how do you explain that?
The real issue is venture capitalism and MBAs who simply care about nothing but short term profit, with as much leverage as possible.
25 yr olds are just hoping their student loans will be forgiven because they cant find a job that pays enough to make a dent and are stuck in moms basement because they chose IT as a career field.
FYI, the hooped ears, bushy beards, man buns and skinny jeans are so last year bruh
"Let’s be honest... look at the knowledge and skills of a 55+ vs a 25+ who knows all the latest and greatest. I have to be honest... the older people I see at IBM definitely fall into this, they are not up-to-date with the latest tech. They are old schoolers that like spreadsheets and manual processes or are just pencil pushers. They are afraid of automation because it might take away their job. This is IBM’s biggest problem.
Change my mind."
- Doubt that I can change you mind. That said...
What 25 year older, right out of college, knows the internals of say, z/OS, and can develop fixes and enhancements for it?
It's not a question of ability... but a question of "what's hot at the moment"... and that the industry started pidgeon holing people long ago on the false dicotomy of mainframe vs. [whatever new reinvention of the wheel goes here]...
Often as not an older person is trapped by their resume, and not given credit for being able to transcend platform specifics based on the underlying computing science.
That said, as folks get older, they less and less want to change platforms and essentially relearn how to do all the same stuff... in a different way.
No different than spoken languages... after a certain point, you prefer your initial language because you are already facile with it.
The industry allowed a proliferation of "does the same thing in a different languages" things that created this problem.
Cannot think of another degreed profession that made this mistake.
So yes, they may be old-schoolers... but in reality it's a false dichotomy for the most part. There's really not anything new under the sun.
Gene Amdahl and Fred Brookes pretty much built the industry and hit all the issues long ago... this supposed "new stuff" is just same stuff redone... because the youngsters don't want to learn the existing art... they want to write their own redo...
So much so that they are adding IDE's and such to onto mainframes to interest the youngsters... rather than just tell them to learn the platform...
Nobody sat around and made the distributed stuff look like mainframes for the old timers...
So I'd say it's the kids that have the learning block. The old guys would do the new stuff... of paths to it existed.
But about the time Contracting Companies came along (in the run up to Y2K)... career progressions died... the recruiters all wanted "already done x for nn years"... Everyone basically got trapped by that... and then we never got the contracting companies out of the biz...
Certs might be a little help... but in reality they are just profit centers... and an insult to those who actually learned computing science and are degreed in same...
Basically the industry has tried to turn it into a form of labor rather than a profession.
But of course one has to be an old timer to have actually seen all this play out and get negatively affected by it.
In the end... it's the industry and related fads that have come and gone, that created the problem, as a whole... not the old timers just trying to make a living in the craft.
Convince me different. LOL!
62 years old, going strong. There's plenty of work here.
Let’s be honest... look at the knowledge and skills of a 55+ vs a 25+ who knows all the latest and greatest. I have to be honest... the older people I see at IBM definitely fall into this, they are not up-to-date with the latest tech. They are old schoolers that like spreadsheets and manual processes or are just pencil pushers. They are afraid of automation because it might take away their job. This is IBM’s biggest problem.
Change my mind.
The age discrimination internally is far greater than that we know of externally from layoffs.
If I was a youngster I would ran far away from IBM and the IT field in general.
Learn a trade like HVAC and make well into 100k territory after a few years.
There is no such thing as a system analyst anymore, its all automated.
The mind is the organ that gives way last, but in the society of appearances no one has the right to age aesthetically as the old hag thought when she was still 50 years old, to produce hysterical and deviant movements similar to her, now that she too is struggling gone and cannot redeem herself, the engineer cow. Thanks GR.Well done. You have created the living nightmare of your life.300k souls in disarray. Merry Christmas. God forgive you.
I couldn't wait to get RA'ed to leave that miserable sh*t hole. Make it known you want out and it will happen. Might as well get paid to leave vs quitting. I did nothing for over a year while waiting for the axe. id–ts kept paying me too.
SOS (same old sh**)
I was RA'd at 58 years my co-worker was RA'd at 59 Everyone I know that was RA'd was 50 years and older
Troll or shill post. Someone who left 3+ years ago is hanging out here and asking people how they feel? Riiiiiiight.
Well we bought all the young ones with red hat and laid none of them off so yeah...... Same as always
I think it's more prevalent in hiring.
Fresh college grad would get the new Development job over a mid career person, also with degree. Interns in particular benefit from this.
I think it was Palmisano that said something like, "We like to hire recent grads and train them for a life long career at IBM".
Granted that was back before Ginni's watch.
I am in GBS and we never had this problem in my group. As long as you are chargeable you are good.
In Smyrna, Georgia upper management discriminates older employees and RA them.
Hello from a 65 year old US techie in Systems. No layoffs in my Department and I haven't seen any in EMEA, Japan, or China. We are quite busy and as long as there are clients, that will remain true. Next year will be very interesting with how they will build Newco...
I am still here... though may be I am not old enough yet! 54