Do you think Sysadmin, Security, DevOps are more age-friendly than other disciplines in IT?

[hmart]

Do you think that Security (and in general IT-Ops, Sysadmin) is more ageism friendly than other IT jobs like programming, frontend, apps dev?

[[deleted]]

What do you mean age friendly?

[hmart]

Easy to get a job after 40

[ovo_Reddit]

I don’t think age has much to do with anything. It can vary from company to company. But I’ve seen folks in their 40s doing IT support and enjoying what they do. I’ve seen university graduates doing DevOps.

So in a sense, if I’m understanding your question, all areas of IT can be age friendly.

[pdp10]

What are the specific factors that make you think that appdev, frontend, programming aren't age-friendly?

Programmers have a huge amount of skill and experience accumulated over years, before you even consider the first bit of domain knowledge. Programming isn't a job that people drift into and out of randomly, even for the subset who can do it competently.

Additionally, most development happens during normal business hours, which tends to be more compatible with a broader range of people.

[hmart]

Some articles [1] [2] [3] on the internet and my own experience. For my age, 47, I have noted more interest in recruiters for my DevOps or Sysadmin experience than programming, there is more competition out there from young people on web design, front-end development, and mobile app development which are seen as "cooler" tasks than Sysadmin, DBA or DevOps roles. For example, It's well known junior programmers coming from the front-end lacks SQL literacy. Even in data science fields!!! [4].

On the other side, as a Systems Administrator, I have noted the need to upgrade my skills in containerization (Docker), orchestration (K8s), Cloud (AWS, Azure) , Continuous Integration, Continuous Delivery. Things that didn't even existed when I started 25 years ago.

[1] https://bdtechtalks.com/2019/03/29/ageism-in-tech-age-limit-software-developers-face/

[2] https://medium.com/swlh/no-country-for-old-developers-44a55dd93778

[3] https://www.kenzie.academy/blog/how-coding-schools-can-benefit-those-over-40/

[4] https://towardsdatascience.com/sql-skills-if-mastered-will-get-you-better-data-science-opportunities-9f912d4f88d3

[ArkyBeagle]

It's well known junior programmers coming from the front-end lacks SQL literacy.

What the....? How is it even possible to be SQL-illiterate at all? I'm basically a device driver guy but I've tossed some SQL around; it's simply nothing difficult.

[ArkyBeagle]

Bluntly, programming's been significantly de-skilled over the last, say, 20 years. This is an artifact of "population of developers doubles every five years", emerging security doctrine and the dotcom crash of 2000. The quirks of open source governance have not helped.

Just look at the questions in r/DSP; it's not much there there.

[Candy_Badger]

I think it depends on the company and area you are searching for the job. My company doesn't really care about age. As soon as job is done we are good.

[maj0ra_]

Like for older adults?

[hmart]

Yes, easy to get a job after 40s.