My old boss told me to never hire anyone over 40

I was at a coffee shop in Denver about 3 years ago, meeting with my first mentor. He ran a small tech firm and said, 'People over 40 just can't learn new software fast enough, and they cost too much.' He was dead serious. I was 25 and just starting out, so I nodded along. But now, after running my own shop for a bit, I think that's a bad way to look at it. The best project manager I ever hired was 52, and she fixed a client mess in two days that had been going on for months. Has anyone else had a boss give them advice that just felt off once you got more experience?

3 comments

3 Comments

jordanhill29d ago

Totally bought into that idea early on too. Thought younger meant more tech savvy by default. Then I worked with a guy in his late 50s who automated our whole reporting system in a weekend. He just knew how to solve problems we didn't even see. That bias costs companies good people.

seth68322d ago

Exactly! It's not about age at all, it's about how you think. That guy had years of seeing what could go wrong and built a fix for it. Real skill is solving problems, not just knowing the newest tools.

emma_clark29d ago

That's wild. What kind of software was your mentor even talking about? Some of the older devs I know run circles around the new grads with the latest frameworks.