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Mainframe Outreach: Talking to a New Generation

By | March 13, 2025

Written by Emma Skovgård,

The age problem

Although things are improving, with programs such as the IBM Z Ambassador program, it still isn’t uncommon for mainframe departments to have an average age above 50 or even 60 years. We need more students to consider a career in mainframes, so we can maintain existing systems and maybe even switch more systems over to mainframes from other platforms. The world is experiencing a horrible climate crisis and mainframes can potentially help since they are more environmentally friendly. But we need enough people to keep our mainframes running.

Where do we go from here?

We need to take advantage of all that wisdom veteran mainframers have, while they’re still here, by having them train the next generation. We can’t keep postponing the training of new people, in some companies there’s already one or even two generations missing which means the younger generation eventually won’t have enough people to give them guidance at work.

Seems simple, but it isn’t

It’s not as simple as just talking to some students at an event, as my manager put it “they [mainframers] speak a different language”. Many mainframers forget to explain what a mainframe is in rough terms and whystudents should care. Seasoned mainframers will also often name drop technologies like CICS, IMS, and MQ without explaining what they are. This isn’t meant to call anyone out, communication is something you can get better at just like most things in life.

The structure I have personally found works:

  1. Explain briefly what a mainframe is, I usually say it is roughly a very powerful server. But keep it brief, at this stage the technical bits aren’t very important.
  2. Talk about what kinds of companies use mainframes and how many important companies use them.
  3. Talk about the job opportunities with mainframes, students need to know this is a good path for them to go down.
  4. Point them to resources where they can learn more, such as IBM Z Xplore.
  5. Now you can get a bit more into the technical details and answer any questions.

Younger people will have a harder time believing in the mainframe and getting excited about it if it’s being promoted solely by a group of 50+ year old men. If possible try to bring younger team members with you, if you don’t have any try to recruit some! It’s still a good idea to bring the veterans however, their immense technical knowledge can be used to answer questions from the more confident students that are comfortable asking hard questions.

Another important thing I have personally experienced is that when you’re advocating at in person events you should bring a diverse set of people. Young women prefer talking to women, it can feel awkward approaching a booth with a bunch of nerdy men as a woman. Your outreach team should reflect that everyone is welcome in the mainframe industry.

Here’s a few of the questions I often encounter when talking to students, so you can get ahead of them:

  • What does the “z” stand for in z/OS?
  • What programming languages can run on a mainframe?
  • Why are mainframes so powerful compared to normal servers?
  • is z/OS based on Linux?
  • Who makes z/OS?
  • Can you use AI on a mainframe?
  • What is a mainframe usually used for?
  • Do we still use mainframes?
  • Which companies makes mainframes?

This article was originally posted on Emma’s LinkedIn account here. It was re-run on the Open Mainframe Project website with her permission. 

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