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"Rife" ageism causing IT skills crisis?
Best of Reader Comments: 'Don't write off the over 40s... '

By Natasha Lomas

Published: Tuesday 21 August 2007

Ageism has not only contributed to the UK's IT skills crisis, say readers of silicon.com, but is "rife" in the tech industry.

Responding to results from the exclusive silicon.com 2007 Skills Survey which revealed employers are finding it increasingly difficult to fill IT positions in their organisations, many readers point to discrimination against older workers as a key factor in any industry skills shortages.

An unemployed reader from Virginia, US, said: "When are companies going to wake up and see the correlation between a shortage of skilled talent and their own discrimination against hiring anyone over 45? There are many of us out here who have a wealth of experience and are looking for work but can't even get an interview due to their age."

A reader from South Wales added: "Once I was over 45 the work just dried up and I became effectively unemployable."

Another anonymous reader - hailing from Woking - echoed this sentiment: "One major problem is that there are a lot of highly experienced and competent folks out there - but they are older than 45 and so must be senile - or so it seems."

Skills Survey 2007: the results

Find out from this year's Skills Survey:

♦ Are CIOs getting less cash?
♦ How the staffing crisis is deepening
♦ How techie salaries are faring
♦ Offshoring still a hot potato

According to this reader, ageist recruitment attitudes are a result of "HR departments being staffed by 20-somethings to whom anyone over 40 is old and beyond 50 is possibly speaking from a coffin or a home for the elderly whilst imbibing a Horlicks".

The reader added: "They must wake up and realise that older people have a load of experience that can solve many of the problems of skill shortages. We need to actively stamp out ageism in both of these areas (and I do promise you it is rife)."

Consultant Chris Stevens, a silicon.com reader from London, sees the skills crisis as the combined consequence of ageism and outsourcing.

He said: "The younger generation have it clearly in their mind that IT is a dead-end and their jobs will be outsourced. At the other end of the scale once past 40 and the IT professional is unable to think or be retrained.

"Industry should actually invest in people and show that IT personnel are respected."

But for some readers, the skills crisis is due to technical skills being undervalued by businesses which are reluctance to invest properly in training and acquiring skilled staff.

Anil, a software engineer from Bangalore, wrote: "The problem is that many IT departments of businesses have people who don't really value the technical skills and feel that they can easily be acquired which we in the tech industry know is not easy or as simple as it is."

Another reader, Mark Hosey from Scotland, said: "There is no skills shortage in technical personnel. There is just a refusal to use the perfectly adequate resources presently available in the technical employment market and a reluctance to provide either formal or on-the-job training for new starts."

Hosey added: "It is symptomatic of today's business culture that requires companies to maximise their profits with the least amount of investment."

Is ageism rife in IT? Are you over 40 and finding it increasingly difficult to find work? Tell us your view by posting a Reader Comment below or emailing editorial@silicon.com.