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Comment by sarchertech | Hacker News Reader

> While there is little you can do to hide your physical age, you might consider tweaks to your wardrobe or hairstyle to show that you are up to date on current styles and able to adapt.

This might be good advice, but it’s absolutely terrible that it’s required.

I’m really starting to think we should do voice only interviews, maybe even with voice changers (or maybe slack only interviews).

Many orchestras switched to blind auditions, and it drastically increased the number of female musicians.

https://gap.hks.harvard.edu/orchestrating-impartiality-impac...

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I'm over fifty and I call bullshit.

Dress and appearance convey information about attitude and orientation. Who wants to hire someone who will constantly complain about the 80-character-per-line coding standard because they like 100 characters? Any team has all sorts of subtle norms, and wants someone who will adapt themselves to such things. If someone can't be bothered to dress properly, why would they bother to conform with any other workplace norm?

I wouldn't try to be "current", I'd end up looking like an idiot. But I'd appear in a decent pair of pants and nice blue shirt and proper shoes. I'm very aware that much of my wardrobe would make me look out of touch and stubborn, and no, I don't think it unfair for an interviewer to notice such things.

Really this is basic professionalism.

> If someone can't be bothered to dress properly, why would they bother to conform with any other workplace norm?

> Really this is basic professionalism.

Hmmmmmmmm.

http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/000011.h...

> My gym just fired the opening gun in a new skirmish, by posting dozens of signs reading "All lockers must be emptied of its contents by August 22 at 5:00 p.m."

> Someone has learned, from the "singular their" fuss, a lesson that no one wanted to teach: Universally quantified ancedents should get singular pronouns. Or something like that.

> This is clearly a case of hypercorrection. However, it's not clear which side has gained: the prescriptivists can claim (correctly?) that even their opponents surely agree that THIS is a mistake; the anti-prescriptivists can counter that pedantry is the root cause of the error.

> It's interesting that everyone, prescriptivists and anti-prescriptivists alike, seems to think that hypercorrection is wrong, morally as well as logically. For the prescriptivists, any form that deviates from a postulated universal standard is wrong.. For (at least some of) their opponents, use makes right, as long as you conform to your own group's norms -- but it's a sin to imitate the norms of a more prestigious group, if you get it wrong. On this point, the prescriptivists seem to me to be fairer and more democratic in their attitudes, even if their particular prescriptions are often foolish.

I once read an article breaking the hard-hitting (and outrageous!) news that the Dallas Cowboys provide their cheerleaders with a handbook on how to dress appropriately, groom appropriately, and maintain a standard of personal hygiene that is adequate for "polite company". I had a similar reaction to that as Mark Liberman had to the descriptivist attitude toward hypercorrection.

Do you want to judge your candidates by how willing and able they are to conform to workplace dress norms? Then include an attachment when you invite them for an interview specifying how you want them to dress.

Or is it more that you're uncomfortable with the idea of hiring someone who doesn't know -- as they obviously should -- what you feel is appropriate in your employees' dress?

I don’t know about you, but I just interviewed in a black tshirt at FAANG and got an offer. What does dress have to do with anything?

FAANGs have been very liberal about that for many years now, I don't think that is a good example.

That is 'properly' in these parts.

Interview in a suit & tie, as a dev, next time, and see what happens.

Casual IS the office wear at FAANGs.

Business is very much NOT hip, and you'll get to notice that.

_”basic professionalism”_ means different things for different people.

For me it means show up on time. If it is an online interview, one or two minutes late is ok because sometimes Zoom/Google Meet/etc behave weirdly. As for dress code, it just mean not showing up in pijama or similar. If the clothes are socially acceptable to wear in public, that’s enough professionalism. Style is just personal preference, not professionalism.

>I wouldn't try to be "current", I'd end up looking like an idiot. But I'd appear in a decent pair of pants and nice blue shirt and proper shoes.

So you're saying that you're over 50, so you can't look "current", and it's fine for companies to discriminate based on that?

The advice in the article is literally "look current". The advice isn't "wear proper shoes", it's wear shoes that make you look younger.

Well, that's bad advice. Few things are more pathetic than a middle-aged man trying to look hip. But it is fair of you to notice that I don't agree with the article either.

My point was, it is reasonable for an interviewer to notice my dress and what it says about me. Dress reasonably professionally and appropriately and it won't be a problem.

For me to try to figure out today's sneakers would just be a disaster. I have good business casual shoes and they'll do fine.

It might be reasonable for an interview to notice how you dress. It's certainly not reasonable for an interviewer to discriminate against you because you don't dress like a 25 y/o. The article is about age discrimination.

Given that age discrimination is real, blind interviews could potentially help reduce the effects.

They're AARP, noticing age discrimination is their mission. Myself, I don't see much of it out there.

"Blind" interviews would be bad for everybody. Zoom is already bad enough. There is an enormous amount of information conveyed by facial expression. I can tell by the look on your face if you aren't following me, or if you are super in-tune with it and I get more complicated still.

If we're going to generalize, I suspect that most older candidates would be better at reading and reacting to such nonverbal signals.

This is the equivalent of saying “try looking sexy, women, maybe you’ll get hired.”

It might work, it may be needed, but it’s embarrassing if so.

The sad reality is that if you’re over 50 you need to be applying to positions that are “age appropriate” which usually implies management.

> This is the equivalent of saying “try looking sexy, women, maybe you’ll get hired.”

That’s not really fair (and largely not true.)

What it’s saying is that appearances matter - they’re an important non-verbal signaling channel, and to the extent to which one can control the way you present, you should, and secondly, dress for the job you want.

For both men and women that does not mean dress like you’re going to a club. It is also an admission that even the best of us subconsciously treat attractive people as more competent.

I’m old enough to have worked during an era when you wore a suit and a tie to an interview for any position. If I showed up for a senior role at a startup wearing a suit and tie I would be telling them from the get go that I’m either I’m out of touch with the culture of the org (not good) or I choose to differentiate myself (maybe I’m a lawyer or an accountant.)

Finally, as an example in my case - I am over fifty and overweight, but I am tall. I know (from mirrors) that I look better standing than sitting, so when in person interviewing I try to be standing when people enter the room simply because I get the difference between “former football player” and “fat slob”. Does it bother me? Yes and no. Ultimately I need to be able to deliver the goods, it’s nice not to have to fight through preconceptions.

>even the best of us subconsciously treat attractive people as more competent. //

People who clearly spend/spent a lot of time on their appearance suggests to me that they're trying to use some sort of "trick" to get ahead and that this probably means they're less competent than their peers.

It's like charities that give you a pen, or small quantity of money (bear with me) ... Yes, I know that psychological trick and it strictly suggests to me that yours is a charity I should not donate to.

The whole "dress for the job you want", for example, is really "use people's prejudices to trick them into unconsciously overestimating your competence".

Sadly, marketing tricks (ie the hostile use of psychology) work on all of us, even sometimes when we know we're being tricked. Participating in that kind of thing is a red flag to me.

The "former football player" vs "fat slob" part of your comment suggests you view [or are accommodating others that view] unrelated externalities as more important than intrinsic qualities related directly to the work. That's not uncommon, but it seems like something we need to mature beyond.

>I’m out of touch with the culture of the org (not good) or I choose to differentiate myself //

This seems really sad to me, like a person likes to wear a tie and that's so out there you'd consider you can't work with them? Like, what if they were actually different: came from a different place, spoke different languages, had different body parts? Especially if you're coding, what's it matter if you like to wear a formal thawb (Middle-eastern robe) and they wear Hawaiian shirts and board shorts?

I'm not saying people won't judge you, just that it's wrong.

But that way of thinking cuts both ways. “He’s not even using the most basic forms of marketing tricks. How socially inept this person must be. How can I trust that he writes maintainable code if he’s not aware of these very basic human triggers?”

They're aware of them but don't find the workspace somewhere for silly games?

How can you trust their code, maybe, look at their code?

Again, that cuts both ways.

Don’t look at the fancy clothes(or whatever you think is silly games), look at the code.

Hum... While I agree with it, your comment doesn't bring any reason for people not to dress up to that.

Yes, the people that choose based on it are stupid, and it's a good reason for rejecting the places (and you may refuse just to run the test). But you personally isn't losing anything by looking more "whatever those people are selecting for (not competence, that's for sure)", so it is good advice.

> That's not uncommon, but it seems like something we need to mature beyond.

Wishful thinking won't help in real life, though.

We should:

* stop drinking alcohol

* stop smoking tobacco

* stop consuming any kind of addictive and harmful substance, such as: hard drugs, light drugs, caffeine, massive quantities of sugar, etc

* start sleeping more

* start working out more

* stop using fossil fuels

* stop using plastics

...

> The sad reality is that if you’re over 50 you need to be applying to positions that are “age appropriate”

This is BS advice - the appropriate position is one that you like and you have the skills for. I mean, rephrase that and you can see just how discriminatory it is - “women should apply to gender appropriate positions, not programmers”. You see how terrible that sounds.

It’s a statement of how it is, not how it should be. Once you’re outside of expectations you get a much harder row to hoe.

Which can be somewhat countered by having a solid network by that time rolls around.

Unfortunately, I think moving up the hierarchy is one of the biggest security blankets as you get older. No one seems to question when a VP, CFO, or CEO is 50+. Age seems to be an asset in this case.

>positions that are “age appropriate” which usually implies management

There are and always have been many many ICs over 50, what a ridiculous stereotype to propagate.

> The sad reality is that if you’re over 50 you need to be applying to positions that are “age appropriate” which usually implies management.

Nope. My LinkedIn dates me by college graduation date, but it still generates 2-3 inquiries a day for engineering roles. My background has certain trendy buzzwords and the recruiters are interested.

As far I can tell, employers are looking for skills and attitude, and don't much care about anything else.

Would a startup want me? Dunno, haven't tried in a while.

Getting messages from spammy recruiters is a poor signal about whether you will get hired. Recruiters cast a wide net.

Anecdote: I’ve gotten messages from internal recruiters twice on LinkedIn from Amazon Retail about “exiting opportunities” - while working at AWS. It’s clearly stated on my profile where I work.

> The sad reality is that if you’re over 50 you need to be applying to positions that are “age appropriate” which usually implies management.

Wouldn’t this be like misogynisticly saying:

“The sad reality is that if you’re female you need to be applying to positions that are “gender appropriate” which usually implies clerical/secretary.” ?

Apologies if I didn’t understand what you were really trying to convey. The opening argument was non-sequitur with your closing statement.

That’s ridiculous. I’m over 50 and I would be a terrible manager. My sweet spot is as an individual contributor.

Fortunately, the company I work for recognizes that people can take their careers in either a vertical (management) or horizontal (increasing skill set and depth of knowledge) direction and are okay with everyone choosing the direction that best fits their interests, personalities, goals, etc.

nowdays you have the new york times advocating to get rid of blind auditions because they don't produce enough diversity! https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/16/arts/music/blind-audition...

https://archive.ph/b5f9s

To Make Orchestras More Diverse, End Blind Auditions

If ensembles are to reflect the communities they serve, the audition process should take into account race, gender and other factors.

Blind auditions only get rid of one aspect of discrimination. However, when the pipeline is starved because of too few role models in their communities due to historical prejudice, blind auditions become self-defeating and self-reinforcing. The top tier of musical talent is virtually identical in ability (equivalent to an Ivy League applicant pool being all straight-As), so maybe it's time to focus on other aspects like increasing diversity so that more kids have role models to look up to.

Of course, you would know all this if you read the article instead of using it as some kind of "gotcha" that minorities aren't up to snuff musically.

There needs to be more focus on improving the inputs to the pipeline. But that could take generations, and people are looking for quick fixes right now.

I think you're displaying an unconscious bias here by implying the 'top tier of musical talent is virtually identical in ability' and that this somehow excludes various groups from that pool. First, that claim is highly questionable, and second, you are implying that some groups are less talented than others based solely on their identity. This kind of bias is rather common, it's rather redolant of paternalistic attitudes towards 'naturally inferior groups' who need 'inclusive policies' because they just can't make the grade on their own.

If you happen to be unfamiliar with this argument, I'd recommend this: https://tarahenley.substack.com/p/bad-news

I don't think that's quite what he said.

I think he was saying that the top tier of current trained talent isn't equally diverse as the underlying population because of past biases in selection, and that making a blind selection from that pool likely perpetuates some of these biases. E.g. kids who grow up seeing symphonies that exclude people that look like them are less likely to pursue paths that lead toward them being in this pool.

I'm not arguing in favor of affirmative action or a purposeful selection bias to fix this. It's a messy problem but it deserves thought and consideration.

Not less talented, but certainly less able to spend time practicing(as a population) and without as many role models that look like them.

One sees this a lot, but why do you filter interest in subjects by how much the proponents look like you -- don't you find it really limiting? In practice, how does this work, do you get in to someone's thing and then think "hang on, they're not like me, better stop being inspired".

For me inspiration comes from people, and when I think about whether they're similar to me mostly I find they're not at all.

Clearly inspiration must work entirely differently for you as you say physical similarity is vital. Can you explain that? Is it prejudice?

We’re not talking about being inspired. We’re talking about things like access to resources, time to spend learning and practicing, and the availability of people who can mentor you.

> For me inspiration comes from people, and when I think about whether they're similar to me mostly I find they're not at all.

And, if you're privileged-- society has given you the message you can do whatever you want-- that's OK.

If you're in a system with racism embedded into various parts-- one rationally wonders: is there no one like me up there because there's racism filtering it? Is someone at a music school, competition, or academy, somewhere along the way going to decide that I don't really look like someone who's a top-tier violinist and going to exclude me (based on this same logic, in part)? If so, it might be better to select myself out before dedicating a whole lot of resources.

After reading the article you make still less sense.

The article says that blind auditions dramatically increased the proportion of women players. It does not explain why this effect wouldn't apply to other "under-represented" groups.

Clearly some applicants are _not_ "virtually identical in ability" with other applicants.

Let me introduce you to the concept of social capital and how it relates to white privilege.

See, the parents of white (and Asian) kids have, or can buy, access to social networks that underrepresented groups (particularly black and indigenous) are systematically excluded from. That gets the white and Asian kids into better music schools and affords them more opportunities to get good enough to audition to major orchestras, as well as exposure within the classical-music world so people know who they are. This has the effect of reinforcing a certain racial profile for classical musicians.

The solution to this problem has been known since the initial civil rights movement in the USA at least: affirmative action. Unfortunately that means denying really talented white and Asian musicians orchestra seats, so that talented people of other communities have a shot at the levels of achievement and recognition whites have taken for granted. But ultimately, it's for the greater good.

How do you know it's social capital and not other factors influencing what schools the kids go to?

Do you think there will be a push for affirmative action to increase the number of male students at colleges and universities?

I think we all know the answer.

There might be a push, but its success is doubtful. Too many entrenched interests and theories that back them (glass ceiling, gender gap) would be threatened by such development.

The only thing that could actually move the needle is the fact that with a highly skewed sex ratio on campus, female students will find their dating experience unsatisfactory. People place high premium on finding a suitable mate.

Huh? It's already happening. It's not labeled AA, but admissions officers do it anyway because women don't want to attend universities where they are a significant majority.

Aka, let me introduce you to why the Democrats are going to get pummeled in the upcoming midterms.

Tale old as time - https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/05/white-back...

> Let me introduce you to the concept of social capital and how it relates to white privilege.

It is amazing how progressives assume the problem is the ignorance and stupidity of their opponents.

But, it is good to get the real argument out in the open.

As an obese person, a big advantage of the Zoom/WFH era is that people usually just see your head and shoulders, so won't judge you on the size of your belly (or the clothes that never fit us fatties well)

This is true.

You sound like a lovely person. There are other factors in obesity other than personal choice. Judging a person solely by their weight and not their abilities is so short-sighted. What if you hire someone who looks great and spends all of their time at the gym, and are as dumb as dirt.

Back when I was a hiring manager I also asked my recruiters to obscure the name of the candidate. E.g. always referring to them by their initials and blacking out their name on their resume. I was thinking about the experiment [1] where researchers found that the whiteness of your name affected how likely companies were to follow-up to your job application.

+1 to the general idea that the interview process should remove as much unconscious bias as possible.

[1] If I recall correctly the researchers submitted the exact same resume to many companies. The only variable was the name. E.g. "John Franklin" versus "Imani Jordan".

> unconscious bias

When did this become an accepted term? I didn't know our science had advanced enough to explain how unconscious bias happens. AFAIK we can run some experiments and observe results, but can't explain the underlying biology as to why we observed those results.

If you asked the interviewers, they would generally say that they’re unaware of themselves being biased, thereby making their bias unconscious.

> Many orchestras switched to blind auditions, and it drastically increased the number of female musicians.

> https://gap.hks.harvard.edu/orchestrating-impartiality-impac...

That study made a big splash with a lot of claims that were unconnected to the data.

https://jsmp.dk/posts/2019-05-12-blindauditions/

The number of female musicians in orchestras increased, but we can't actually attribute that to the audition process.

> Many orchestras switched to blind auditions, and it drastically increased the number of female musicians.

This is incorrect, see https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2019/05/11/did-blind-...

That blog post isn't nearly strong enough to support the statement that "this is incorrect".

The conclusion of the unrefereed blog post is merely the much more equivocal:

" What about that much-publicized “50 percent” claim, or for that matter the not-so-well-publicized but even more dramatic “increases by severalfold”? I have no idea. I’ll reserve judgment until someone can show me where that result appears in the published paper. It’s gotta be there somewhere."

You should have quoted the sentence just before:

> I agree that blind auditions can make sense—even if they do not have the large effects claimed in that 2000 paper, or indeed even if they have no aggregate relative effects on men and women at all.

so, what the OP said

> Many orchestras switched to blind auditions, and it drastically increased the number of female musicians.

is incorrect because quoting again from the article:

> or indeed even if they have no aggregate relative effects on men and women at all.

A clause that begins with "even if" is a hypothetical and should not be taken as declarative. The author is saying that they don't know whether the number in question is correct, they're not saying that they believe it to be incorrect. Hence "I’ll reserve judgment".

The bit starting with "even if" is just saying that it doesn't matter to them: either way they're still in favor of blind auditions.

> Many orchestras switched to blind auditions, and it drastically increased the number of female musicians.

Sadly, there's talk of going back to sighted auditions:

See: https://americanorchestras.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Re...

and https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/16/arts/music/blind-audition...

Voice can carry a fair amount of information about someone's mindset. Arrogance, uplifting spirit, bad mood.. that said most of it is irrelevant unless you're on the spot. Hiring processes should focus on that.

You okay the cards that you are dealt. I met a former manager for lunch one day and he told me how surprised he was that I was “over 35” at the time I was 45.

I found out that most non-Blacks have no idea how old a Black guy is that is cleaned shaven. I don’t have any of the signs when I keep my hair cut off - no gray hair or receding hair line.

It’s much more culturally acceptable for Black guys to shave their heads.

I try to do voice-only calls wherever possible, especially for hiring. (and text > voice!). Especially for initial screening; less annoying as the hiring manager, and also protects us somewhat from some discrimination claims (obviously only one element of that, and neither necessary nor sufficient on its own)

"Read this source code and tell me the age of the person who wrote it, when it was written."

The age of the coder is directly proportional to the number of comments included in the code.

I disagree that it's terrible. If someone 23 years old came into a job interview wearing mid 20th century business attire and hair/glasses while everyone else was adopting modern dress, I think all else equal that should count against him. Old age is not excuse for knowing how to fit in with the things you have the power to change.

Mid 20th century business attire for men is very much out, but for women it would register as hip and fashionable.

Only in the tech sector do we think we should be able to show up with a T-shirt and greasy hair.

Looks/hygiene/culture fit is important and there isn't a single field where it isn't.

If you can be bothered to try to fit in a little bit, it goes a long way. Otherwise, feel free to be unemployed and bitch about it in your basement while the world moves on.

???

Showing up not looking like this, can also cause you to not get hired. Discrimination on non-performance factors is real on all sides of the fence.

Anyway this isn’t the point; the point was that it’s sad you need to hide your age using clothing.

It not hiding your age. It's showing that you are still in touch with new things and able to go with the flow. It's not even that hard. If you're 55, just don't show up with a baggy suit and fat tie you bought in the 80s. This is good advice for anyone - know how to dress for an interview.

T-shirt and greasy hair are as much a uniform and a declaration of tribal orientation as a business suit is.

Clothes are always a uniform and a social signal, whether or not they're formally labelled as such.

It's also one of the covert reasons age is an issue. It's not about competence, it's about the fact that it's very difficult to have equal relationships with people who are the same age as your parents or kids. An age gap that wide goes with a generation gap in expected behaviours, cultural references, implied ethics - and more, including default problem solving habits.

It would be good if this wasn't true, but it's hard to see how it can be avoided. It would take extremely unusual maturity and self-awareness not to be influenced by it in either direction.

It's not that it can't be made to work, but I don't think it can be made to work easily. It's an extra level of friction, which is why it's an unpopular option when hiring teams.

TBH I suspect that anyone over - say - 40 is probably best off hiring themselves out as a consultant rather than trying to find work as a full-timer on a relatively young team. Consultancy isn't just professionally distinct, it creates a different social dynamic which seems to be easier for everyone.

I agree that the scruffy tech is a uniform of it's own. I used to do it consciously myself, partly as a "joking but really". Different images for different audiences or different aims.

As for friction, that diversity should be actively saught, not allowed through blindness.

That friction and diversity of approach and standards and reasoning is a good thing. I'm over 50 now so now I'm almost not allowed to express such reasoning because it is taken as self serving, but when I was 30 the old-timers in my shop were the people I admired the most, still do. Even though yes there were a few differences of opinion and approach that never really went away. I picked my battles instead of being a baby about every single thing, and they in turn actually respected my input when I decided to take stance on something, state my case, and force us both to explain and defend the different positions and hash it out. Either I convinced them or they convinced me, and whichever way that went, we did that.

There were a few things where neither convinced the other, but, really very few. It's tolerable and worth it. I got way more out of working with these people, and so did the company and our customers.

I don't think I was a incredibly mature 30 year old. I mean, I've seen some of my old newsgroup posts. I really wasn't :)

> Clothes are always a uniform and a social signal, whether or not they're formally labelled as such.

As a product of the 1960s there was a reaction by lefty columnist Paul Krassner, IIRC. He referred (if it wasn't someone else who popularized this) to grey flannel sandals. A take-off on the standard criticism of "grey flannel suits.

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