High-Tech Hiring: Youth Matters

In IT engineering, young hires tend to be more energetic and up to date. Older workers need to keep skills fresh, or aim for management posts

by Vivek Wadhwa

In the engineering globalization debate, the battle lines are drawn. Companies like Microsoft (MSFT), Intel (INTC), and Oracle (ORCL) say there are severe shortages of skilled workers and they need more visas to bring in foreign workers to stay competitive. Unemployed engineers say this push for more visas is a plot to suppress wages. My own research at Duke University has shown that there is no general shortage of engineers in the U.S.

The globalization debate shouldn't focus on the issue of visas. Instead, it should examine an issue that tech executives don't like to discuss: age. Tech companies prefer to hire young engineers. Engineering has become an "up or out" profession—you either move up the ladder or you face unemployment. In other words, even though globalization has compounded the difficulties for aging engineers, it's not the culprit.

Documenting Age Discrimination

One of the staunchest opponents of foreign worker visas is Norm Matloff, a professor at the University of California, Davis, who says careers in the programming profession are notoriously short-lived. His research (flip to page 5 of the linked PDF) into attrition rates revealed that five years after finishing college, only 57% of computer science graduates were working as programmers; at 15 years the figure dropped to 34%, and at 20 years—when most were still only age 42—it was down to 19%. This was in sharp contrast to civil engineering, where careers lasted much longer. Matloff says age discrimination is rampant in the tech industry and the importation of foreign workers into the U.S. facilitates this.

I know from my days as a tech chief executive that finding good engineering talent in the U.S. is always difficult. And hiring policies and skill needs vary significantly between companies. Some can only afford to hire young, inexperienced workers, while others can pick and choose. But age is still the issue.

Startup firms are often the most cost-constrained. Consider former tech entrepreneur Jason Williamson, who is now a product manager at Oracle (ORCL). He says that during the six years he spent running BuildLinks, a software company focused on the construction industry, his strategy was to find young, impressionable workers who earned entry-level salaries and could learn on the job. He had limited capital and needed employees who could afford to work through the tough times when his company couldn't make payroll.

Even the well-funded, venture-backed companies usually echo the experiences of JiNan Glasgow, chief executive officer of patent software firm Neopatents in Raleigh, N.C. She says she can afford to pay what she needs, but her best hires and most productive employees have been new college graduates. She explains they tend to be more familiar with the latest technologies, adapt readily to change, are more creative, and try new things. Middle-aged hires have not always worked out as well for her. She says most had dated skills and expected to be paid for experience that wasn't relevant to her firm.

Limited Senior Management Berths

The fact is that in tech, youth is an asset and is in great demand. Experienced engineers are needed mostly in senior architect positions and in management, where they are paid the highest salaries.