They don't like older workers? That's not very tolerant of Silicon Valley.
I am one of those (not in technology, though I tried once). I plan on working at high pay until they fit me for a blue vest and make me a Wal-Mart greeter. Until then I am working for my grandchildren, for some nice stuff, and for helping others.
it doesn't concern them at all. they will hire offshore workers to replace them, and attempt to lay off as many of the ones they have in their 50s, before their pension obligations increase. I see this every day at work.
Considering the tech companies have pooped on their employees for so long, who cares about these companies, the industry is shot as it is.
After proudly working 80 hr weeks for 5 years and realizing they haven't got much in return, they may decide it's time to change jobs and set about repeating the process.
By this point, they've found themselves dealing with at least one recession and if they haven't already been layed off, they consider themselves fortunate to have a job. When things get better and they ask for something in return for all their sacrifices, they then begin to realize things aren't going the way they want them to go with their second employer.
At this point, they try and find a third place to work. Perhaps they even decide to give contracting a try and at least be compensated for their massive overtime and sacrifice.
They get their third job out of college and continue giving it their all, sacrificing social life and many other things. By now, they are highly skilled in a narrowly defined area. They hear of new technologies that present major threats to their industry but because their employers provide no training along the way and because they've been working their @asses off ever since graduation, they haven't been able to keep current. By now, it's time for them to experience their second or third recession.
They probably got through their first recession ok since they were young and just the old "deadwood" was being cleaned out of their company. However, they now grow anxious as they realize striking similarities between themselves and those they considered to be "old deadwood" 10 or 15 years earlier. As supervisors now try to say things to them that 10-15 years previously they naively took to mean they were on a career fast track, they now react with indifference or even cynicism. At some point in the not too distant future, the corporate grim reaper will come for them. In the aftermath, they will do some serious soul searching to determine whether at the age of 40, they should continue or exit the profession, start over and find something else to do.
The performance of those who were fired was not a consideration, only their compensation. The HR bimbos wielding the axe were too stupid. It was just easier to reach their target by firing 20 people making $100,000 than 60 people making $30,000
Get the prima-donna disconnected CEO's out at the top and the useless HR bimbos out at the bottom and maybe I will be a little more optimistic.
My husband isn't at the senior manager level, but he works in the tech industry.
Last year, he *finally* got hired into his company after working 2.5 years as a contractor. We also have a friend who got laid off from his job and is struggling to find another position in the industry. He's going from contract job to contract job because employers aren't interested in hiring someone in if they can get someone else to pay for the benefits. And they don't want to be locked into a person if it turns out that they aren't the right fit for the company.
I think that the idea of retaining employees is becoming a thing of the past. It's all about how to save a dollar.
My "kids" are all over 18 now. I don't have the same distractions as younger people with school age or younger kids. Thirty years of experience allows me to solve problems very rapidly. I make a point of recruiting new members of the staff to learn those special skills so they will be able to take on that part of the workload in the future. The average college grad arrives with a little book learning and little practical experience. It takes time to develop that potential into a reliable core member of the organization.
Ping list for the discussion of the politics and social (and sometimes nostalgic) aspects that directly effects Generation Reagan / Generation-X (Those born from 1965-1981) including all the spending previous generations (i.e. The Baby Boomers) are doing that Gen-X and Y will end up paying for.
Freep mail me to be added or dropped. See my home page for details and previous articles.
Amazing how management suddenly bemoans the lack of workers AFTER it's outsourced they're jobs.
Hi-tech's real problem with older workers is not that there is too many of them, and that their retirement threatens the job pool: it's that they cost too damned much to keep employed. Especially when they get to be 40 or so and those pension payments start adding up.
Expect yet another H-1B bill to bring in younger Indians, Chinese and Russians, at poverty-rate salaries.
Find that in a college grad.
(scoff)
:-)
This is laughable. The high-tech firms spend the last 5 years offshoring our jobs, then they lament the shortage of high-tech workers????? If I were one of the lucky few in demand, I would extort these treasonous bastards until they screamed in pain. Then I'd take the money and open a B&B in Napa and tell them all to go to hell.
We wouldn't have had this problem if the selfish baby boomers hadn't killed off most of mine and the following generations through abortion.
Translation: Wahhh. Give us more H1B visas. Or wages may have to go up.
Young fat slobs wearing parachute pants that are unable to communicate in any spoken or written language should straighten up. And the ho's too.
Just between us (laugh), I know of a few guys that retired and run around as consultants once in a while between fishing, camping or whatever trips. These guys just want to pass on knowledge to someone else. And they WILL NOT go to a college to teach a course.
Why? By 2010, what work that remains that isn't being done by H1-Bs locally will be directly offshored to India.