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Don't Hire That Developer

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Re: Don't Hire That Developer

#51

Post by farmerbuzz »

msy wrote: post #24
angrycoder wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Finding the best way of solving problem X isn't what you learn by being under/around good senior developers, what you learn is a set of mental tools and approaches for solving problems & your ethos as a developer. You can't learn that stuff on Stack Overflow.

Anything that can be learned via talking to people can be learned via Stack Overflow assuming you can communicate well using text (although it may get tagged with the feared Subjective tag).

Re: Don't Hire That Developer

#52

Post by kscaldef »

alttab wrote: post #44

Do not get distracted by the 2X+ times money he makes. Everyone has made the point: no 401k, no health insurance. What everyone seems to forget is you also have to pay a 15% self-employment tax at the end of the year out of your pocket because you do not have a W-2. The tax liability is higher as well. So not only do you have to get independent insurance (which is very expensive), you have no 401k or match and probab…

From my personal observations, I'd say the 2x number is BS anyway. Yeah, there might be a few contractors really raking it in. And I don't exactly sit around comparing tax returns with my friends and acquaintances. But, I certainly get the impression that I'm making more as a FTE than most contractors around here. (To be fair, I'm also making more than most salaried employees as well.) The guys I know who contract never seem to have as much work as they want. They're always juggling a couple gigs to make ends meet. Their wives are constantly bugging them to just get a "real job" so they can pay the bills. So, I think the idea that you could quit your job and just step into contracting and double your pay is misleading.

Re: Don't Hire That Developer

#53

Post by nihilocrat »

sethg wrote: post #40

The OP claims that employers don’t value the institutional knowledge that is built up by employeees. I can refute this from my direct experience, which, as I understand, is not atypical for a developer working at a startup. I worked for five years for MetaCarta, which sold geographic search technology, primarily to government agencies and oil companies. In April we were aquired by Nokia, which runs its own search eng…

My company would be lost without institutional knowledge because it (unfortunately) doesn't document things very well and the problem solving methods rely on "tell x to fix it". Somehow we manage to survive when developers start to leave, though, but only after a lot of setbacks and arguing about who the new maintainer is.

I used to work in a situation that couldn't maintain much institutional knowledge: a college IT department with student employees. The students wouldn't work for more than 4 years and buggy or inadequate applications were more often redone entirely in different languages rather than given new maintainers.

Re: Don't Hire That Developer

#54

Post by jasonkester »

jrockway wrote: post #11
bombs wrote: post #4

There 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.

Indeed. I was a contractor for the last year or so. Now I am an associate at the same company. I sit at the same desk and do the same work. Except now my salary is higher, I get a month of vacation, I get 401(k) matching, I get vision/medical/dental insurance, and so on. And I still don't wake up for the "rah rah" meetings :) I worked with people exactly like the contractor in the article. This kind of person cares o…

Sounds like you weren't ever actually a contractor.

There are two types of position that employers describe as "Contractor". The first is the type described in the article, where you bring in a guy for a short term and pay him roughly double what you'd pay a regular dev. The second type is where you bring in a guy, pay him the equivilent of a regular dev salary, but as an hourly rate, and don't give him any benefits.

This second type has a more common name: "Being taken advangage of."

Sounds like that's the type of "contracting" you were doing. Congrats on getting out of it.

Re: Don't Hire That Developer

#55

Post by Gobiner »

angrycoder wrote: post #9
bradhe wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

You can't seriously believe that using StackOverflow is comparable to working alongside an expert.

Re: Don't Hire That Developer

#56

Post by bartl »

e40 wrote: post #48

I'm surprised no one has said this: this is illegal in most of the US (definitely in CA). Contractors cannot do the same job as employees. It is skirting the labor by doing this, and circumventing employment taxes. In the economic hard times, many states (WA, CA, MA) are going after companies that do this. Yes, auditing and fines. You might think they won't find you. Well, here's how they will: contractor Joe has bee…

From what I heard (I could be wrong), here in Belgium it is only illegal to be a contractor with only one customer; for the exact same reason as you state here: because such a contractor is actually a disguised employee and thus unfair competition to real employees.

Re: Don't Hire That Developer

#57

Post by GBond »

One of the issues I had as a contractor was amount of energy I spent chasing invoices. Not being paid on time (or at all) was a big headache for me. I know this is less of a concern for gov't contracts but some of the mid-size corps would place me last on the totem pole when prioritizing their vendors, knowing I was a 1 man shop.

Re: Don't Hire That Developer

#58

Post by theBobMcCormick »

alttab wrote: post #44

Do not get distracted by the 2X+ times money he makes. Everyone has made the point: no 401k, no health insurance. What everyone seems to forget is you also have to pay a 15% self-employment tax at the end of the year out of your pocket because you do not have a W-2. The tax liability is higher as well. So not only do you have to get independent insurance (which is very expensive), you have no 401k or match and probab…

The need for self insurance can be a big issue if you've got any chronic health problems or dependents.

Re: Don't Hire That Developer

#59

Post by nevinera »

Fictional conversations in which one person picks apart another's argument are a farcical way to present a point. It's a way for a writer to avoid having to let an argument stand on its merits - we as humans are not particularly good at divorcing an argument from the arguer.

Time after time, this author presents one character as surprised and incredulous, and the other as collected and confident. While it's a great way to convince people of something, it's underhanded and rude.

I don't appreciate being subjected to this crap.

Re: Don't Hire That Developer

#60

Post by Tamerlin »

philwelch wrote: post #26
zepolen wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose you could split those 60 hours between 3 projects making it 20 hours a piece which won't be as tragic for accounting.

Or just do 40 hours of work every week. If you cut out some of the time-wasting employees have to endure you might be able to get the work done in that amount of time anyway.

If not, then you're not managing expectations well, or the organization your working for is just a sweatshop anyway.
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