young-entrepreneurs, hiringThis is a hypothetical question, as I’ve so far been fortunate enough not to encounter a situation wherein it’s been a problem, but how can a young person (I’m nineteen, so not super young but still fairly) be taken seriously in entrepreneurship, particularly in management?
I’m a developer, and I have been for quite some time. Longer than many adults I’ve met, in fact. I’ve worked with several clients who’ve actually appreciated my age, but I often worry about what it will be like when I’m ready to expand my business, a time that’s rapidly approaching.
I’m confident in my technical prowess, and I’m certainly comfortable writing some pretty–if I do say so myself–cool code. But there just aren’t many developers out there who are as young as I am and ready to get going (that is, who aren’t currently attending university). That’s less and less true every year as I get older, of course, but as my business grows and I start thinking about hiring on some extra hands, I wonder what the result might look like if I hire someone who is umpteen years my senior. I’d rather not wait a number of years if I could double my income now.
So are there any good tips on how to be taken seriously as a boss who’s significantly younger than your employees? Or is this just a nonissue and most people are alright with it? Obviously I recognize that the hiring process would weed out some less enthusiastic potential hires.
I do actually have a team now in India, but I’m pretty sure they don’t know my age. I also didn’t hire them on, they’ve been assigned to me through a client. So I have management experience, more or less. This isn’t a question of skill or ability (https://startups.stackexchange.com/questions/64/can-young-people-start-up), but more just logistics.
I’m also focusing this question particularly on my age. The gap between a 19 year old and a 24 year old, as I’m sure we all know, is much wider than that between a person who’s 40 and one who’s 45. I suspect the latter would be a bit easier an age difference to live with.
I’m not sure whether you’re asking:
How can a person (who, like yourself, is young but experienced) avoid suffering prejudice due to their youth?
In theory, this should be relatively easy to overcome.
Perhaps I have been fortunate to only work with very meritocratic people, but my experience (from working in businesses both large and small) is that physical attributes (sex, race, religion, disability, age, etc) only become an issue for others in the workplace when the individual concerned starts to draw attention to them, perhaps because they feel slightly insecure about that feature and their lack of confidence starts to show through things that they say or do.
For example: if 24-year-old Alice finds herself working for 19-year-old Bob and Bob draws attention to the fact that he’s 5 years younger than her, she might well feel upset. If instead Bob focuses on his work and how they can both contribute to their common goals, it’s unlikely ever to cross her mind. After all, the roles of manager and managee are very different and may not suit everyone: plenty of people who are lower down an office hierarchy are more important (to the business) and better-remunerated than their senior managerial colleagues.
However, things don’t always work like that: some people may have a proverbial “chip on their shoulder” and feel that their careers ought by now to have progressed further than they have. They might well feel aggrieved irrespective of Bob’s attitude—in which case Bob could try involving them in a more collaborative team-based decision-making process, giving everyone an opportunity to relate the present challenges to their past experiences. He would thereby be able to draw subtle attention to the fact that he has actually solved similar problems in the past and so build some trust and respect for his competence and abilities.
Of course, the best way to gain the confidence of one’s colleagues is by actually proving one’s own value through the work that one delivers. It may not be immediate, but people do learn to trust reliable colleagues remarkably quickly.
How can a person (who is inexperienced, regardless of their age) demonstrate that they have the competence and ability to handle challenges that they have not before encountered?
This is always a tough nut to crack. I’m sure we’ve all been guilty at some point of judging people not by what they might be able to accomplish but rather by what they have done in the past.
Whilst one might not have any direct experience of having solved an identical challenge, it’s usually possible to identify elements of the current problem that are similar to other experiences in one’s past. Simply being able to articulate that analysis will inspire a degree of confidence in one’s general problem-solving abilities combined with the fact that one has thought the problem through.
Having a plan is absolutely essential: that is, a clear idea of what the objectives are and precisely how one intends to accomplish them; it should also anticipate potential problems and have a strategy for tackling them when they arise. Being able to communicate such a plan articulately will begin the process of overcoming concerns over inexperience.
Faced with someone in that position (inexperienced but with a plan), my next concern might be that they are over-confident. Are they prepared to listen to constructive criticism and adapt their plan accordingly? Will they be too proud to make changes if their plan isn’t working? If they show a collaborative decision-making streak and a readiness to seek out advice from those with more experience, those fears would be considerably reduced.
score: 5
What does matter: one common trait that geniuses and successful entrepreneurs all share is that they always make time for reading, and they always have something new and interesting to read.
Since you asked specifically about hiring a worker who is your senior, the point to keep in mind here is that likely he does not care about it nearly as much as you do.
You will quickly realize working in a group of people much older than you that it’s not necessary for you to know everything nor is it expected. I see old Technicians and Engineers with decades of experience still ask each other and joke about basic concepts like amps & volts. Forgive yourself for being human first, everybody else already has. Then come to them with your situation and problem.
I’m assuming you’ll be hiring a senior developer of sorts to use his experience. Approach him as such, and say, “I got the project up to this point, but I’m unsure whether we should continue using [this method]. You’ve done a lot more of these projects than me, you’ve worked on large teams using this code, what would you say would be the best move here in your experience?”
Stay Professional. — Ignore it. Ignore your age difference, and speak like you’re on even ground with everybody else around you. You probably knew this already, but your inward appearance (self-image) greatly affects your outward appearance (people’s interpretation of you). Speak and act like you are on common ground, because you are, both internally and in the way people treat you. Age difference does not matter.
Acknowledge it. — Joke about it. This is my contradictory advice to #3, and it’s one of my favorites. The sad fact of the matter is that you two are from separate generations, and you will have to address the elephant in the room.
Now, this bit is highly dependent the person you’re dealing with, your relationship together, and your ability to tell a joke (or your “Speechcraft” skill, to steal from the Elder Scrolls series of games). Old guys joke amongst themselves about their being old quite freely. I personally like to play off this by playing the “young guy” role. (again, this advice is not for everybody. Use discretion.) This usually involves some form of role play along the lines of, “I wasn’t born in the 90’s, I have no idea what you’re talking about” or thereof (I’m 23, born in ‘91 btw). Play yourself off as whatever youth stereotype is popular at the momment. Everybody thinks of me as “hipster” at work even though I don’t identify with it, but would I deny it to them? Hell no, I play that shit up big.
Keep in mind, some people simply don’t understand what a joke is. If they had trouble picking up subtle humor and social cues when they were younger, chances are things haven’t changed much. Some people may get it, but have trouble with their own comebacks directed at you. Don’t persist, it’s easy for things to slip from “all in good fun” to “insensitive” when they can’t keep up, meanwhile you’re oblivious because you think you’re both trading even blows.
All in all – offensive humor is only one suggestion! The main point here in ‘Acknowledging the difference’ is just to diffuse the tension about it!
This is a great (and important) question to ask.
I think the best thing to do as a young entrepreneur who wants to be taken seriously is to present yourself that way. A lot of young entrepreneurs don’t care whether they’re taken seriously because they think that they don’t need to be.
If you want to be taken seriously, make that clear with your dress, speech and and tone. It’s a small thing, but it goes a long way.
It’s definitely hard. I’m only 16 and developing an app. Sometimes, elders have respect for young people who are not intimidated by older people in business or app development. I know this from experience
If you make a professional impression, you will come off professional.
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