EMPLOYMENT
How I Survived Workplace Ageism
It should have been a great interview — instead, I walked out
Several years ago, I went through a round of phone interviews with a tech startup in Austin. The fit seemed perfect. I possessed the deep layers of software skills they were looking for, and I was ready to try my hand at a startup after several years of working at bigger companies.
My prospective employer was a software services company that integrated visually pleasing graphs into comparative analysis tools measuring the efficacy of medical treatment modalities. When healthcare professionals saw an interesting data point on a graph, they could click a point on the graph to drill down for details.
That’s not particularly exciting, right? But a lot of successful tech companies establish niche products like this. In my initial discussion with him, the startup’s founder rattled off several large healthcare providers who had already signed contracts. Profitability seemed realistic, which meant that any potential equity might mean something.
So, I was excited.
The startup principals used phone interviews to help establish my qualifications. One of the interviewers was the aforementioned company founder, who possessed the tech background necessary to…
