Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house?

#411

Post by BurningFrog » Fri, Aug 09, 2024, 12:44 PM UTC

danielheath wrote: post #222

alemanek wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is excellent advice but I would back up a few steps and do a few things before bringing in a freelancer team. Identify a part of this system that can work somewhat in isolation and is non-critical if at all possible. Then document the requirements for this part thoroughly. This allows you to: - Have something smaller for your new team to cut their teeth on. - Ensure you have collected all the diffuse domain know…

> This is difficult and time consuming so start now. A specific difficulty you are likely to face: Your expert employees are busy doing their jobs. Writing requirements means taking attention away from that work - a difficult proposition, especially if they have managers who will ask why their KPIs are slipping.

Maybe a nit pick, but I would not accept the expert employees writing requirement documents that are "thrown over the wall" to the dev team.

You need personal access to talk to the experts anytime some question comes up. This means 1-2 experts work part time as PMs more or less, which will impact their regular work.

Costly, but I don't trust any other way.

Re: Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house?

#412

Post by andy_ppp » Fri, Aug 09, 2024, 12:45 PM UTC

Every company is a software company, just some haven't realised it yet.

The only thing I would add to the great advice already here is start off very small, and get this tiny feature being used by the company as soon as possible and then iterate. Every two weeks the programmers should be adding value for your staff. Do not try to go with a big bang where you deliver something that does even 10% as much as the probably awful software you are currently using. This is where projects tend to fail.

If you want to filter out quite a few bad programmers I would use Elixir as the people who know about it and like it tend to be people with excellent programming taste in my opinion. Other programming languages are available of course, but using something slightly niche but excellent will attract the right sort of people to a project like this and help retain them.

If you want to chat my email is in my profile! Good luck!

Re: Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house?

#413

Post by mlhpdx » Fri, Aug 09, 2024, 12:48 PM UTC

If your company is part of a large ecosystem underserved by software vendors, building solutions for yourself and others may be transformational (as AWS has been for Amazon).

The thing with software is that it is rarely (not never) commercially successful to develop single customer solutions. So if you can build something that works for your business and can be used by your suppliers/partners/customers in enough volume to pay for developing and maintaining it, you win.

Re: Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house?

#414

Post by kenoyer130 » Fri, Aug 09, 2024, 12:50 PM UTC

Consider not only freelance developers but a freelance "scrum" type team with a PM or PO. Vet these carefully as a bad PO will sink the project. A good PO will gather requirements, keep the team on track, report back progress etc. Since this is an outsourced solution you must be "waterfall" as in be crystal clear on how the app will work, what is the business logic (the devil in the details) etc. Freelancers will not stop to ask questions or clarifications. They will do exactly as asked no more or no less. While I do agree if software is not your core competency you should not bring it in house it is worth mentioning most software starts as an in house solution that is then upgraded to a commercial offering in the B2B space you operate in. Its a long shot but if you stop thinking of your software as a cost center but as your actual core competency its possible to turn it into a revenue stream that is some cases outstrips the original company. I would say at least 95% of the attempts to do this fail though so don't take it as granted.

Re: Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house?

#415

Post by nirse » Fri, Aug 09, 2024, 12:53 PM UTC

intelVISA wrote: post #249

davedx wrote: post #62

IME what works best getting new projects kick started is hiring a very small team of senior freelancers, making one of them lead, and letting them loose. I worked on such a team once and it was really excellent. The advantage of this strategy is if the experiment doesn't work out, terminating freelancers is much easier than permanent (I noted you're based in Europe). Contrary to what other people said, I wouldn't try…

I'm gonna go against this heavily tbh: If you don't have a 'trusted wrangler' freelancers won't build anything worthwhile as they're not interested in the long term unless forced. There must be somebody you know, or friend of friend, to get a warm intro to an experienced developer you can pay to oversee said team on an interim basis. No consultants, agencies etc. they'll fleece a non-tech like you, save your money an…

I work for a small company, around 10 devs. We've picked up quite a few projects over the years where a freelance team came in, built something and when the going got tough, walked away. That said, I've seen the same happen at renowned companies, so perhaps it's just an issue of generally people taking advantage of the shortage in experienced devs. I would aim to get some longer term stability, either by working with a company you trust through your network, or engage a tech Lead/CTO for a longer term who can oversee the contractors.

Re: Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house?

#416

Post by kenoyer130 » Fri, Aug 09, 2024, 12:54 PM UTC

kenoyer130 wrote: post #414

Consider not only freelance developers but a freelance "scrum" type team with a PM or PO. Vet these carefully as a bad PO will sink the project. A good PO will gather requirements, keep the team on track, report back progress etc. Since this is an outsourced solution you must be "waterfall" as in be crystal clear on how the app will work, what is the business logic (the devil in the details) etc. Freelancers will not…

Also DO NOT CHEAP OUT ON THE FREELANCERS. A good team of freelancers is going to cost MORE then in house developers. The plus side is they are relatively temporary so not a long term financial burden. The projects I see that fail with freelancers are the company gets greedy and pays the bare minimum but as always you get what you pay for. In most cases the work just ends up being thrown away as a CRUD app that does no have your business logic and work flows is actually harmful.

Re: Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house?

#417

Post by uptownJimmy » Fri, Aug 09, 2024, 12:57 PM UTC

Whatever you decide, don't assume that it would be hard to find devs.

There are a lot of us who prefer to work for real businesses offering real products/services, and avoid working in the startup world with all its concomitant pipe dreams, wishful thinking and scams.

Re: Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house?

#418

Post by withinboredom » Fri, Aug 09, 2024, 1:05 PM UTC

I’ve built custom logistics, warehouse picking, and inventory software before, interacting with Amazon, EBay, and others before. Send me an email: rob@bottled.codes

Re: Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house?

#419

Post by JamesSwift » Fri, Aug 09, 2024, 1:12 PM UTC

theshrike79 wrote: post #333

rurp wrote: post #125

My biggest suggestion is to look into ways that the transition can be done in stages, rather than trying to replace everything in one big swoop. This is likely doable, especially since you are already having to rely on outside tools. Then to start building, hire a small team (employees or freelancers) and have them create a single piece of functionality that can be swapped out from the current workflow. This type of…

Strangler Fig pattern works really well: https://martinfowler.com/bliki/StranglerFigApplication.html You split out segments of the old application and rewrite it, slowly moving traffic over - eventually slowly strangling the old application and replacing it with new parts.

Ive never seen it work in practice. Every time I see it end up with Appv1, Appv2, Appv3 all running at the same time because the new systems cant move quick enough to add new features so they get added to the older versions. But the newer systems offer unique things the older didnt. So they all coexist and never die.

Re: Ask HN: Should we bring software dev in-house?

#420

Post by hiddencost » Fri, Aug 09, 2024, 1:13 PM UTC

davedx wrote: post #376

carlcoryell wrote: post #284

I used to run the Singapore and Seattle offices for Pivotal Labs and helped a couple of companies build in-house teams to do exactly this. My first question is to check the basic economics: $2-300M in annual revenue, ~15% margins, you’re probably looking at earnings/profits around $30-45M. Building and running your own software team is probably around $5M/year, which feels like it could be a substantial hit to your m…

$5M/year? In the US maybe. A team of 5 senior freelancers in Europe will cost about 150-200k per person.

For compensation. The carrying cost of an employee is usually twice their total compensation.