Don't Hire That Developer
itmanagement.earthweb.com
Don't Hire That Developer
1–10 of 69 posts
Re: Don't Hire That Developer
#2Speaking as someone who is currently a contractor dealing with arcane legacy code without documentation (as is usually the case in my experience), institutional knowledge matters.
Re: Don't Hire That Developer
#3Speaking as someone who is currently a contractor dealing with arcane legacy code without documentation (as is usually the case in my experience), institutional knowledge matters.
To you or to management?
Re: Don't Hire That Developer
#4There have been times where my longer term contractings jobs were normal jobs, except I had to pay for my own benefits. I think the government now frowns upon this practice though.
Re: Don't Hire That Developer
#5Speaking as someone who is currently a contractor dealing with arcane legacy code without documentation (as is usually the case in my experience), institutional knowledge matters.
To you or to management?
Both. First, Your job is harder if you have to turn over every rock in a company looking for an answer, only to find the only people who had the answer left last year.
Second, management's job is harder because no one ever has the answer. They are constantly stuck training every employee on the most basic historical project knowledge. I would wager that most projects are enhancement projects - moving from one version of something to another and not replacement projects. In enhancement projects historical knowledge is vital, in replacement projects it isn't.
There are more than these two reasons - bottom line, it's important all around.
Re: Don't Hire That Developer
#6He got paid more and he has more expenses. No health coverage - he'll be lucky to find a group policy with an organization or professional association. No matching 401K, no tuition reimbursement, and on and on. It's not a valid comparison. Line up the employee's benefits and income against the contractor's expenses and income and then see where you come out.
Then realize you've only looked at one piece of the equation and you can start weighing the pros and cons of continued employment, opportunities for career advancement, etc.
Re: Don't Hire That Developer
#7He got paid more and he has more expenses. No health coverage - he'll be lucky to find a group policy with an organization or professional association. No matching 401K, no tuition reimbursement, and on and on. It's not a valid comparison. Line up the employee's benefits and income against the contractor's expenses and income and then see where you come out. Then realize you've only looked at one piece of the equatio…
What I hated about contracting was not working with other people. I wasn't afforded opportunities to learnbfrom senior people like some of my peers were. When I did decide to get a "9-5" I was a bit behind everyone else,
Re: Don't Hire That Developer
#8He got paid more and he has more expenses. No health coverage - he'll be lucky to find a group policy with an organization or professional association. No matching 401K, no tuition reimbursement, and on and on. It's not a valid comparison. Line up the employee's benefits and income against the contractor's expenses and income and then see where you come out. Then realize you've only looked at one piece of the equatio…
The thing to remember about contractors is they're not fellow employees, they're another company providing services to your company. There's a strong case IMHO that contractors shouldn't even be paid during the period they're "getting up to speed" - what is the service that they're providing during that period? Certainly many I've worked with should have been paying us for teaching them basic IT skills!
Re: Don't Hire That Developer
#9He got paid more and he has more expenses. No health coverage - he'll be lucky to find a group policy with an organization or professional association. No matching 401K, no tuition reimbursement, and on and on. It's not a valid comparison. Line up the employee's benefits and income against the contractor's expenses and income and then see where you come out. Then realize you've only looked at one piece of the equatio…
What I hated about contracting was not working with other people. I wasn't afforded opportunities to learnbfrom senior people like some of my peers were. When I did decide to get a "9-5" I was a bit behind everyone else,
With stack overflow, blogs, irc, message boards, etc I think the idea of a live expert is face to face is overrated. Rather than going to the guru and eating his words as gospel, I can go on the internet and get 10 different opinions on a problem I am having. Then I can critically evaluate those different viewpoints and pick the one that is right for the way I work.
Re: Don't Hire That Developer
#10There have been times where my longer term contractings jobs were normal jobs, except I had to pay for my own benefits. I think the government now frowns upon this practice though.
The government frowns on it (ala big Microsoft lawsuit a few years ago) but it is still very common.
I've worked for alot of companies that have been able to quickly and easily ramp up a big project by bringing in contractors and treating them similar to employees. 9 to 5-ish type hours, though with much more flexibility to set schedules, work at home, take random days off, etc. But in a way its a win-win, because the freelance contractor gets 40-60+ hours of work at a 2x+ hourly rate, and the company can let them go when the project ultimately is finished or gets cancelled.
If the cash keeps flowing, these captive contractors often stay around for multiple projects, so the company doesn't even lose the IP.