Ask HN: What Happens to Older Designers?
67 comments
I'm 75. You will pull the keyboard out of my cold, dead hands.
"Nobody knows you are a dog on the internet" Ditto being aged ~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_...
Most of the technologies I play with - HTML5, webGL, Three.js etc - did not exist ten years ago. So it's a level playing field.
There's more open source stuff on GitHub that needs help and mentoring than you can shake a keyboard, er, stick at.
My digital afterlife is destined to be a thought-leader for generations to come. Fingers crossed.
As I started to understand that I am a designer, I came to realize that my own life is open to being designed. Day in and day out.
It turns out that that my design of my own life is one of my better efforts. ;-)
"Nobody knows you are a dog on the internet" Ditto being aged ~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_...
Most of the technologies I play with - HTML5, webGL, Three.js etc - did not exist ten years ago. So it's a level playing field.
There's more open source stuff on GitHub that needs help and mentoring than you can shake a keyboard, er, stick at.
My digital afterlife is destined to be a thought-leader for generations to come. Fingers crossed.
As I started to understand that I am a designer, I came to realize that my own life is open to being designed. Day in and day out.
It turns out that that my design of my own life is one of my better efforts. ;-)
I guess the OP referred to ageism as loss of job security.
What’s been your experience? Not everyone is a Spiekermann, Esslinger or Rams. Have you lost out to the newer crowd… more and more folks finish these 3-6 month UX boot camps and not all companies value experience or understand it’s not just about pixel pushing.
Or does OSS design help pay the bills? I’m guessing getting involved in OSS is more about maintaining the design muscle and helping folks out.
What’s been your experience? Not everyone is a Spiekermann, Esslinger or Rams. Have you lost out to the newer crowd… more and more folks finish these 3-6 month UX boot camps and not all companies value experience or understand it’s not just about pixel pushing.
Or does OSS design help pay the bills? I’m guessing getting involved in OSS is more about maintaining the design muscle and helping folks out.
At the moment it does not look like there is a really an issue with job security. Due to the high rate at which boomers are retiring the next generation which always was under the shadow of the boomers has become critical to keep the shops running.
Please sir advise how to become like you, thanks.
Meditation, regular hours of sleep in true darkness, lots of soluble fiber, not much passive transportation. (But I'm just 65 and inventing not designing or coding now.)
What a wonderful message! Keep it up :)
At least now I know I'm not the oldest one here (barely)... =)
Okay, ultimate form it is then.
Next question.
Next question.
Good designers design irrespective of age.
I mean an older designer should have a rolladex full of people who they worked below, beside, and above over the course of their career to break out when they are looking for something interesting to do.
A career is an ecosystem that grows or atrophies based on the careers that surround it. The most important connection to the rest of the ecosystem is will-they-go-out-of-their-way-to-work-with-you-again.
That's true whether a potential move is up or sideways.
Good luck.
I mean an older designer should have a rolladex full of people who they worked below, beside, and above over the course of their career to break out when they are looking for something interesting to do.
A career is an ecosystem that grows or atrophies based on the careers that surround it. The most important connection to the rest of the ecosystem is will-they-go-out-of-their-way-to-work-with-you-again.
That's true whether a potential move is up or sideways.
Good luck.
> an older designer should have a rolladex full of people who they worked below, beside, and above over the course of their career
As a non-traditional professional in a lot of ways, I've found these kinds of assumptions at the core of a lot of discrimination (age and otherwise). A person should be judged based on their skills/value, not based on where someone thinks they "should" be in their life based on stereotypes and bias.
Expecting a person to be a certain way due to their age is harmful to them.
As a non-traditional professional in a lot of ways, I've found these kinds of assumptions at the core of a lot of discrimination (age and otherwise). A person should be judged based on their skills/value, not based on where someone thinks they "should" be in their life based on stereotypes and bias.
Expecting a person to be a certain way due to their age is harmful to them.
I don’t expect an older designer to have that Rolodex because I am an older designer and don’t have one.
I just understand that that is a problem that wishing the world was fair in ways that benefited me won’t solve.
If the OP doesn’t have the Rolodex of people who would work with them again - like me - then it is a problem.
Or possibly a symptom of a deeper issue of why people don’t want to work with them.
Or possibly the result of bad luck.
Or some combination of all that.
None of which “it ain’t fair” changes. Either a person is so good they can’t be ignored or they aren’t. And sometimes what can’t be ignored is a chip on the shoulder.
[edit]
The comment points to reasons a younger designer may tend to be a better hire.
A younger designer might ask “what’s a Rolodex?” and then start filling theirs up instead of arguing about it.
It is easy to work with someone who is still learning. It is unpleasant to work with someone argumentative.
Came to understand that the hard way.
I just understand that that is a problem that wishing the world was fair in ways that benefited me won’t solve.
If the OP doesn’t have the Rolodex of people who would work with them again - like me - then it is a problem.
Or possibly a symptom of a deeper issue of why people don’t want to work with them.
Or possibly the result of bad luck.
Or some combination of all that.
None of which “it ain’t fair” changes. Either a person is so good they can’t be ignored or they aren’t. And sometimes what can’t be ignored is a chip on the shoulder.
[edit]
The comment points to reasons a younger designer may tend to be a better hire.
A younger designer might ask “what’s a Rolodex?” and then start filling theirs up instead of arguing about it.
It is easy to work with someone who is still learning. It is unpleasant to work with someone argumentative.
Came to understand that the hard way.
You're going in a tangential direction. GP wasn't complaining about an unfairness, but explaining that an attitude was harmful. You misinterpreted them and then came to an ageist conclusion based on that misunderstanding, really making their case for them.
I'm curious, do you really not stay in contact with anyone you have worked with in the past in any capacity? Or is it more that they wouldn't work with you again?
Just curious since even as someone who sucks at "networking" and that sort of thing, I feel like I've worked with people that we mutually respect each other's skill regardless if it's direct reporting lines.
Just curious since even as someone who sucks at "networking" and that sort of thing, I feel like I've worked with people that we mutually respect each other's skill regardless if it's direct reporting lines.
To paraphrase Peter Thiel paraphrasing Anna Karina, happy careers are all alike, every unhappy career is unhappy in its own way.
Not that I am unhappy.
Rather that instead of having delusions about a professional career, I have a day job and pursue artistic practice and live in paradise.
I go with the luck I have and don’t waste energy over the luck I don’t.
Not that I am unhappy.
Rather that instead of having delusions about a professional career, I have a day job and pursue artistic practice and live in paradise.
I go with the luck I have and don’t waste energy over the luck I don’t.
You should always be networking over your career, regardless of who you are…
Really? What if you take a few year break from contracting? (a mini-startup, personal projects, perhaps you just get a regular job for few years to sort out your finances or build a house). Are you supposed to keep networking with your previous clients during this time when you know well enough you'll not want to take any jobs they may want to give you?
Then there are all those people that transition between technology stacks. I did that few times so far (Linux to Windows, then Windows to Linux, vmware to aws). Your past clients will most likely want you for the stuff you worked on in the past. Also some people relocate internationally, perhaps to different time zones. Among people I came to know over the years many did that.
So I find this idea of "constant networking" work in a very narrow set of circumstances.
Then there are all those people that transition between technology stacks. I did that few times so far (Linux to Windows, then Windows to Linux, vmware to aws). Your past clients will most likely want you for the stuff you worked on in the past. Also some people relocate internationally, perhaps to different time zones. Among people I came to know over the years many did that.
So I find this idea of "constant networking" work in a very narrow set of circumstances.
Took a few years off and need to get back into the industry? Use the network you build while you were working.
This is untrue for the simple reason that your friends’ employers wouldn’t allow it. Hiring practices based on personal references opens the door to discrimination lawsuits, so every HR department creates objective interview processes that remove such advantages.
I disagree strongly. Personal referrals are one of the most effective ways to get a job, and also one of the most effective ways to increase hiring quality. At the very least a personal reference will fast track you into an interview stage ahead of most other cold applications.
There are edge cases where a personal reference is valuable. If you’re inexperienced, it can get you an interview. Or it can get you a job at a small company without a real HR department.
But outside of that, a hiring decision made based on a personal relationship is considered cronyism. It isn’t always illegal, but most HR departments go out of their way to prevent it.
“It’s not what you know, it’s who you know” is terrible career advice in general. It can be incredibly seductive because it promises people an advantage over competition. But it’s wrong. It’s a waste of time and in my experience, the people who follow it tend to interview poorly because they come off as arrogant and complacent.
But outside of that, a hiring decision made based on a personal relationship is considered cronyism. It isn’t always illegal, but most HR departments go out of their way to prevent it.
“It’s not what you know, it’s who you know” is terrible career advice in general. It can be incredibly seductive because it promises people an advantage over competition. But it’s wrong. It’s a waste of time and in my experience, the people who follow it tend to interview poorly because they come off as arrogant and complacent.
What you're saying here sounds, to me, like the sort of thing someone who's only worked in a very narrow and constrained corporate environment would think.
Of course, if that sort of environment is all that one's interested in, then it's possibly entirely true.
It just isn't, at all, for someone like me who's not existed in that sort of environment for over twwnty years... .
Of course, if that sort of environment is all that one's interested in, then it's possibly entirely true.
It just isn't, at all, for someone like me who's not existed in that sort of environment for over twwnty years... .
Its easy to slip this past HR. The hiring manager picks the interview panel and sets expectations about the skills they should look for. These are targeted at what you already know the candidate is good at. They pass the committee due to great feedback.
I don't think not-your-friend counts as a protected class quite yet. But considering how outraged people get when they interview for a job but the offer goes to someone's buddy, maybe it will be outlawed sooner or later.
Can you cite a lawsuit over discrimination when someone referred the candidate and that's the aspect in contention?
Spoken like a true optimist.
It depends what you compare it against.
Software development changes all the time, developers constantly have to upskill. Trends drive demand and NIH runs strong in the industry. There is nothing we're doing today that couldn't be done with Java for example.
Design on the other hand is interfacing with humans. Humans are meat sacks who hardly evolve or change, in fact, you might argue, they regress. For this reason, ageing as a designer is really not as challenging as being a developer. Sure, there is the newest shiny CSS frameworks, and people abandon Photoshop for Sketch then Figma. Etc. But overall, it's extremely stable. Trends, skeuomorphism, flat, neo-flat... whatever the industry do, the adaptation isn't too bad. If anything, since we moved away from skeuomorphism, we lost a whole lot of true pixel wizards. Anyone can design flat buttons, but the stuff that interface designers were doing in the early 2000s is a lost art. But I digress, overall, humans don't change, so design is a safe industry to age in. Source: I'm both.
Software development changes all the time, developers constantly have to upskill. Trends drive demand and NIH runs strong in the industry. There is nothing we're doing today that couldn't be done with Java for example.
Design on the other hand is interfacing with humans. Humans are meat sacks who hardly evolve or change, in fact, you might argue, they regress. For this reason, ageing as a designer is really not as challenging as being a developer. Sure, there is the newest shiny CSS frameworks, and people abandon Photoshop for Sketch then Figma. Etc. But overall, it's extremely stable. Trends, skeuomorphism, flat, neo-flat... whatever the industry do, the adaptation isn't too bad. If anything, since we moved away from skeuomorphism, we lost a whole lot of true pixel wizards. Anyone can design flat buttons, but the stuff that interface designers were doing in the early 2000s is a lost art. But I digress, overall, humans don't change, so design is a safe industry to age in. Source: I'm both.
I agree with the gist of this. After my initial "10k hours" learning the technical craft, my career progression as a product design engineer (I design hardware, mostly medical devices) has been driven by my ability to understand humans and their interactions with objects, not technical. It's important to keep up on the technical side, but that's not what drives good design and good designers in my field. It's Don Norman mind of stuff. I regularly work with long in the tooth designers, ex-ideo types, and they have a keen understanding of the human side of design that's difficult to teach and pick up quickly, it takes experience, wisdom. It's not about typing faster, clicking faster, or even deep technical details, it's the big picture stuff.
> There is nothing we're doing today that couldn't be done with Java for example.
Wow. Strongly disagree.
Wow. Strongly disagree.
Example?
Creating a web SAAS product quick and cheap - rails / django/ JS eat Java's lunch in terms of speed of development and iteration - the amount of productivity a small team of 1-3 devs can have is insane for small companies
I doubt switching the backend to Spring Boot would reduce the speed of development much. You simply want to avoid having to reinvent the wheel, and plenty of languages have mature frameworks for that.
This sort of Java is almost all about boilerplate and patterns. Two or three decent engineers taking a few days to plan for the rest of the project can write 90% of the huge amount of boilerplate that Spring Boot needs.
One might say not as agile as starting to code from day one, but I'd rather take an extra week than risk a major rewrite in the middle of development.
One might say not as agile as starting to code from day one, but I'd rather take an extra week than risk a major rewrite in the middle of development.
You won't ever need to do a major rewrite - the dynamic language web backends scale up to big levels (see shopify using rails for instance), and at that point your infrastructure will be challenging regardless of what language you are using
iOS app? An OS kernel? Anything real-time?
> iOS app?
I'm sure you understand that iOS's problem is not technical but business constrains.
> An OS kernel?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/JX_(operating_system)
> Anything real-time?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_time_Java
I'm sure you understand that iOS's problem is not technical but business constrains.
> An OS kernel?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/JX_(operating_system)
> Anything real-time?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_time_Java
if your only tool is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.
It’s been a while since I wrote Java, but real time processing was always just a C wrapper with JNI. Maybe it’s changed now?
Many go into management, as you say. In my experience the best managers were never even remotely the best designers in terms of pure raw talent. That is sorta secondary to your question, and just kinda my own personal inject. At the same time though, I think it supports the idea that staff/principal/"Distinguished whatever" titles for design serve a use case. In fact, some BigCos have adopted that model similar to Staff Software Engineer, etc. FAANG/FAANG-adjacent types. I think Amazon, Slack, Discord have staff+ level designers. I don't know the official job requirements, but I'd assume 7-10+ years of real actual digital product design work.
I imagine we will see more of that. People like me who have been around a while or longer are getting older, and not all of us want to pivot to management. Can't even imagine doing it!
I've been in this industry for ~10 years, and am getting pretty burnt out on it. Lately though things have been better. If you stick around in the field and find an answer to this question...reach out and let me know? :) Best of luck!
I imagine we will see more of that. People like me who have been around a while or longer are getting older, and not all of us want to pivot to management. Can't even imagine doing it!
I've been in this industry for ~10 years, and am getting pretty burnt out on it. Lately though things have been better. If you stick around in the field and find an answer to this question...reach out and let me know? :) Best of luck!
> I don't know the official job requirements, but I'd assume 7-10+ years of real actual digital product design work.
I'm not sure your point stands any scrutiny. Titles such as principal engineer or staff+ levels are not granted by seniority or at an anniversary. They are granted if an individual meets all the technical and organizational requirements, as well as career accomplishments, that make a case for a promotion. You don't get that just by sitting at your desk.
Also, principal engineers at Amazon, a company renowned for the average SDE career spanning only around 2-3 years, tend to have been in the company for over a decade and comprise a very small fraction of the whole engineering community.
I'm not sure your point stands any scrutiny. Titles such as principal engineer or staff+ levels are not granted by seniority or at an anniversary. They are granted if an individual meets all the technical and organizational requirements, as well as career accomplishments, that make a case for a promotion. You don't get that just by sitting at your desk.
Also, principal engineers at Amazon, a company renowned for the average SDE career spanning only around 2-3 years, tend to have been in the company for over a decade and comprise a very small fraction of the whole engineering community.
>I'm not sure your point stands any scrutiny. Titles such as principal engineer or staff+ levels are not granted by seniority or at an anniversary.
OK, fair enough - instead of guessing, I went and pulled up some current job postings:
-Staff Product Designer @ DoorDash: "You have 8+ years of experience as a product/UX designer in a relevant industry"
-Staff Product Designer @ Opendoor: "Experience: At least 8 years of relevant experience as an individual contributor on an in-house product design team"
-Staff Product Designer @ Mozilla: "5-7 years of professional product design experience"
-Sr. Staff Product Designer @ CNN Digital: "12+ years professional experience, specifically as a Product Designer
-Staff Product Designer @ Ro (Roman): "8+ years of experience shipping high-impact and successful digital products across mobile and web at consumer-facing/focused products and brands"
So to me, the OP question wasn't "What makes a Staff designer?" it was "What happens to designers as they get older and don't want to pivot to management/PMing?" The answer I was attempting to give was "It looks like there are lots of Staff/Product+ roles opening, which may be good fits for such people." Maybe the main hangup you found was my reference to FAANG/FAANG-adjacent companies, and I may have been off the mark there.
And make no mistake about it, I won't hide it - I'm definitely wish-casting here as an old guy in the design industry myself.
OK, fair enough - instead of guessing, I went and pulled up some current job postings:
-Staff Product Designer @ DoorDash: "You have 8+ years of experience as a product/UX designer in a relevant industry"
-Staff Product Designer @ Opendoor: "Experience: At least 8 years of relevant experience as an individual contributor on an in-house product design team"
-Staff Product Designer @ Mozilla: "5-7 years of professional product design experience"
-Sr. Staff Product Designer @ CNN Digital: "12+ years professional experience, specifically as a Product Designer
-Staff Product Designer @ Ro (Roman): "8+ years of experience shipping high-impact and successful digital products across mobile and web at consumer-facing/focused products and brands"
So to me, the OP question wasn't "What makes a Staff designer?" it was "What happens to designers as they get older and don't want to pivot to management/PMing?" The answer I was attempting to give was "It looks like there are lots of Staff/Product+ roles opening, which may be good fits for such people." Maybe the main hangup you found was my reference to FAANG/FAANG-adjacent companies, and I may have been off the mark there.
And make no mistake about it, I won't hide it - I'm definitely wish-casting here as an old guy in the design industry myself.
I believe average tenure at Amazon was 1 year
What exactly is / has been burning you out?
PS your profile needs an email address if you want folks to reach out ;)
PS your profile needs an email address if you want folks to reach out ;)
Hey good call! I thought mine was, but thanks for correcting.
Truly, I think I just find the design work mundane at this point - maybe just by virtue of doing it for so many years. I do a lot of coding work (throwaway UI component prototypes, that kind of thing) and am finding more joy there.
But part of it too is that I work at a big financial corp who are a great employer, but our tools ecosystem and ability to share work with the outside world is _incredibly_ limited. Just a common trade-off of working at such a company, and I understand why that has to be. But nothing fulfilled me more than shipping things at a startup or small, nimble company. Hoping I can get back to that when our family is a little more comfortable financially.
Truly, I think I just find the design work mundane at this point - maybe just by virtue of doing it for so many years. I do a lot of coding work (throwaway UI component prototypes, that kind of thing) and am finding more joy there.
But part of it too is that I work at a big financial corp who are a great employer, but our tools ecosystem and ability to share work with the outside world is _incredibly_ limited. Just a common trade-off of working at such a company, and I understand why that has to be. But nothing fulfilled me more than shipping things at a startup or small, nimble company. Hoping I can get back to that when our family is a little more comfortable financially.
>What happens to ageing / older designers? What is their path if not for an inevitable pivot to management / product management?
They are brought to the farm. The slow country life lets them recover from the burnout/stress.
In all seriousness, discrimination isn't universal. If someone doesn't hire you because of your skin colour or age, someone else will. Their loss, not your loss.
They are brought to the farm. The slow country life lets them recover from the burnout/stress.
In all seriousness, discrimination isn't universal. If someone doesn't hire you because of your skin colour or age, someone else will. Their loss, not your loss.
This is my experience.
I feel everyone had an opinion on this thread, but i’d be more interested in hearing a first hand experience with being older and a designer.
I know lots of them, they typically exist outside the typical career politics, bureaucracy, etc. The ones I know still doing it do it amazingly well, and are kept busy with consulting and working for people they've known and met through their careers.
They keep working till retirement, as everyone else.
Hmmm.. not quite 70 but retiring Real Soon Now. I'm allegedly a software developer but I make small (efficient) web sites as well. I spend a lot of time with side projects that are getting more complex than the day job ever was. I've survived by (a) always having a side-project on the go all the time, and (b) using own time and self-education to teach myself skills that my soon-to-be-ex-employer wouldn't pay for. Oh, and (c); self-hosting to create proofs-of-concept - great fun! 70-onwards? More of the same, and I quote.. https://dilbert.com/strip/1995-06-24
I've worked with some designers who were coming right up on what's typically 'retirement age', who were basically still individual contributors, but just at a very high level. They bring an incredible wealth of experience – everything we think is new has probably been tried at one point before. But the best ones don't take a jaded "we tried that already" view – they're just able to riff-off the new ideas while sharing insights and learnings over an incredibly long time window.
There's being physically young, and then there's having a 'Beginner's Mind', which is something that one can have at any age – or never grasp at all.
There's being physically young, and then there's having a 'Beginner's Mind', which is something that one can have at any age – or never grasp at all.
I'm 69, about to turn 70. I'm in a senior technical consulting role which often requires me to go on the tools. I work for a big, successful software firm that can afford to pay well. Most of my peers are 20+ years younger than me and quite smart, so I have to work hard to keep up. But I manage. Next year I will quit my job and 'retire'. In fact I'll be using my financial security to start up a SaaS. business. I have a bunch of ideas I've been wanting to work on. Working keeps me focused and connected. My rule is: stay interested, stay connected.
> My rule is: stay interested, stay connected.
This is inspiring and what a great way to think about working & retirement!
This is inspiring and what a great way to think about working & retirement!
>What happens to ageing / older designers?
They will be rounded up and killed as part of the "not economically viable" class when Dalle-10 comes out.
Unfortunately the same will happen to us when Copilot 15 hits the market.
They will be rounded up and killed as part of the "not economically viable" class when Dalle-10 comes out.
Unfortunately the same will happen to us when Copilot 15 hits the market.
I’m going to start smashing virtual looms if this happens
What's old to you? What's supposed to happen to designers as they get older? I'm assuming they just keep on designing. Unless there's a fresh school of design that's explicitly created to push out older design, and carve out a niche for a younger generation. Like in programming and IT. It's just that with design, there's no assumption of a design being objectively better than another. Whereas in IT, we hear a lot about rationalizing things when in reality nobody wants to maintain daddy-o's stuff.
What “design” are you referencing?
Exactly, on HN it typically means UI/UX. To me, because it's what I do it means physical hardware design, industrial design and product design engineering together.
Design is timeless artistry, web is a medium of many
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They...get older? Dieter Rams and Jony Ive both designed well into...at least their 50s.
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They get better
It probably depends on the country. It can be a problem in Europe with large public sector, and less of a problem in USA (since companies care about results).
What happens to ageing / older designers? What is their path if not for an inevitable pivot to management / product management?