Apologies and Views on Age and Tech

Please pardon me for my absence, the last few months have been... interesting, both wonderous, and much discontent, though not of the technical variety. I'm currently not working in IT, but hope to return soon. I've been meaning to write on a few issues. Do to time constraints these may be short and come in batches.

Item 1: Being a few thoughts on the tech field and how age is not a reliable indicator of ability.

With many professions, say carpentry, accounting, etc. it is usually the older people who have been doing it for years and years that have acquired the experience and know-how to best perform their work. The gray haired individual in the back can usually do more in their sleep than the kid just starting. I've found though in dealing with people I've met in the field, you can't really use the persons age as a litmus test of their abilities. I know of older gentlemen in the field that don't know their anus from a deep depression in the ground, and people half my age (I'm 33, if you're curious) that could send my ass back to school.

That is not to say however that tech is purely the domain of the young though. When I was dealing with telecommunications, I was schooled on bandwidth requirements by a woman whose voice would lead me to believe her pass-times were more sipping tea and crocheting... probably with a lot of cats in the house.

I've often said, two techs meeting is like two samurai sometimes. We tend to need to establish what the other person's knowledge is, and what level we will be able to talk to them on. One of the people I dealt with in a facility I serviced essentially refused to talk to me until I got him on the subject of Linux for a few minutes, after that he was like an entirely different person.

Crunched for time, so I'll probably be coming back to this at some point. Views, comments appreciated.

Item 2: List of Offenders
Myself, probably everyone at some point

Item 3: Suggested Course of Action:
Make no assumptions, neither undervalue or overvalue a persons abilities until you've talked with them a bit.