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Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

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Re: Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

#71

Post by dvdcxn »

ljf wrote: post #67
dvdcxn wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're projecting your own perception onto others. Let me raise a counterpoint, the cost of living in Cardiff is vastly less than the, frankly, over inflated prices in London. I'm going to reuse your tone here - who would give up Cardiff to go to London to get the same Salary but pay twice as much for rent? I'd raise another point as well - you're assuming people prefer the art and culture scene in London in comparis…

For housing = yes it is crazy. For loads of clubs - you'll pay the same. There are hundreds of tiny clubs in London - many offering free or very cheap entry every night of the week. Yes London has a few expensive clubs (that are generally rubbish once you are in if you aren't paying for champagne) - it has loads of great places to see live music, comedy, djs and acts for pocket money. Just pick up a copy and Time Out…

In my experience the drinks tend to be quite a bit more expensive.

Re: Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

#72

Post by TheCoelacanth »

celticninja wrote: post #60
TomVDB wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I looked that up back in the day when I had to go to Tel Aviv for work during the time of the suicide bombings (2004/2005): The chance of dying a violent death in Israel is much lower than in the US. Cardiff is probably lower than the average of the US, of course. And Tel Aviv may be higher than the average of Israel. But AFAIK, suicide bombing on regular civilian places inside Israel hasn’t been a thing for quite a…

Fair point. I'd argue it is still a tinderbox and with current middle East political situation it could easily find itself without immediate allies (or at least people who don't want to immediately destroy them). If for example the house of Saud fell, it is unlikely to be replaced by anything that would be as friendly toward the US, and by extension Israel, as the House of Saud currently is.

I don't see any Middle Eastern countries invading a nuclear power any time soon.

Re: Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

#73

Post by IshKebab »

wmonk wrote: post #45
dvdcxn wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're projecting your own perception onto others. Let me raise a counterpoint, the cost of living in Cardiff is vastly less than the, frankly, over inflated prices in London. I'm going to reuse your tone here - who would give up Cardiff to go to London to get the same Salary but pay twice as much for rent? I'd raise another point as well - you're assuming people prefer the art and culture scene in London in comparis…

> who would give up Cardiff to go to London to get the same Salary but pay twice as much for rent? Clearly nobody... which is what they are talking about in the article.

That's because the £100k is a lie though.

Re: Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

#74

Post by jfindley »

matthewmacleod wrote: post #54
jfindley wrote: post #13

I am continually amazed at the cynical attempt by hiring managers to try to pretend that the laws of supply and demand shouldn't apply to non-exec level staff. If you can't hire the people you want for what you're offering that should be a signal to pay more, not to whine that you can't force your idea of a reasonable wage on others.

So while there is validity to this, my experience hiring staff is that there is genuinely a lack of skilled tech workers in the UK, especially at senior levels - it’s not just down to salary requirements. Sure - as demand goes up and supply is constrained, salaries have to rise. But it’s more complex than that - first, salary increases don’t magically increase supply. There’s a long lag time between salary rises and…

I'm not sure I find this convincing. There are lots and lots of skilled tech workers in the UK that want permanent roles, but the really good ones already have well paid jobs, usually either for the finance sector or with Google/Facebook/etc. £100k to relocate to Cardiff isn't even slightly tempting to these people (source: I'm one of them).

For many years the UK has had very low tech salaries compared to similar locations, and compared to other similarly skilled jobs[0][1]. As demand for good tech staff rises this is starting to equalise. This is a trend that's unlikely to reverse, and IMO this is a good thing.

I appreciate that if you're trying to run a small business it's frustrating that you can't get the staff you want at the price you want to pay, but the solution isn't to hope that people will work for less you make you richer. You'll need to either adjust your budget, your expectations, or offer something that their current job doesn't give them (share of the business (with the same liquidation prefs that you have), or 100% remote, or something else along these lines). If you really can't do any of those things, then maybe your business just can't afford what you want and you'll need to hire more junior people and train them up.

I've been on both sides of this fence, lots, and I've never once felt there was a shortage of good tech people in the UK, or found it hard to find smart candidates, it's just that the good ones expect to get paid well for the skills they have spent many years honing.

0: e.g. in Zurich finance and tech are compensated similarly, in London finance gets significantly more (sources: https://www.payscale.com/research/CH/Location=Zurich/Salary https://www.cwjobs.co.uk/salary-checker/average-financial-sa... https://www.cwjobs.co.uk/salary-checker/average-software-eng...) 1: http://www.p2pfinancenews.co.uk/2018/02/08/london-tech-salar...

Re: Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

#75

Post by mkingston »

pjc50 wrote: post #25
mattlondon wrote: post #10

In the article they say they are offering London salaries. Fine. But Cardiff is not the same as London ! London is huge comapred to Cardiff. Cardiff has about 500,000 people in its urban area compared to 10,000,000 in London, and Cardiff is about 30 square miles compared to almost 700 square miles for London [1]. As such London just has a lot more going on - theatre, museums, nightlife, restaurants, sports, shopping,…

I'd seriously consider it, and I think a lot of other people would as well. People who are a bit older, a bit less sociable, or have families? Absolutely. Alternatively, new graduates who've not settled anywhere yet but would really like some money thrown at their overdraft. > most people in these salary ranges aren't that badly impacted by high property prices in London Everybody is impacted by high property prices…

I found Cambridge salaries weren't wonderful in general, though I'm aware that's probably changing, and there are exceptions. How have you found Edinburgh salaries compare? Obviously I don't expect data, just an anecdote would satisfy my curiosity.

Re: Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

#76

Post by celticninja »

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #72
celticninja wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair point. I'd argue it is still a tinderbox and with current middle East political situation it could easily find itself without immediate allies (or at least people who don't want to immediately destroy them). If for example the house of Saud fell, it is unlikely to be replaced by anything that would be as friendly toward the US, and by extension Israel, as the House of Saud currently is.

I don't see any Middle Eastern countries invading a nuclear power any time soon.

Doesn't need to be an invasion, if Saudi regime fell it would likely be replaced with something very religious and would be happy to support Hezbollah or any number of groups that would attack Israel and keep themselves distant. Plus religious nuts are just that, nuts and don't always consider the repercussions for those left behind.

Re: Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

#77

Post by pjungwir »

EnderMB wrote: post #43

So, has MyPinPad actually tried raising their salary offering to £100k? I find it very hard to believe they have, because that would be well-above the average for the area. In relation to standard Web Developer roles, it'd be over double what I could expect in Cardiff for a mid-to-senior level role. Their website currently says "up to £60k", and in my experience companies that say "up to" will rarely go to that numbe…

There was an article last year titled, "I’d Pay You $500k a Year, but You Can’t Do the Work". It said they were looking for "React/Redux specialists, Unity developers, data scientists, and data engineers (proficient with TensorFlow), technical project managers (who used to do the above, but have evolved into managers), and technical account executives". So $500k for React programmers. (Also note the hero image.)

But there was no careers page, no call-to-action to apply, or as far as I could tell any way to contact them at all. Here's what I wrote then: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14248550

It sounds like today's company is similarly interested in getting some press and maybe influencing immigration policy, not in getting applications.

Re: Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

#78

Post by matthewmacleod »

jfindley wrote: post #74
matthewmacleod wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So while there is validity to this, my experience hiring staff is that there is genuinely a lack of skilled tech workers in the UK, especially at senior levels - it’s not just down to salary requirements. Sure - as demand goes up and supply is constrained, salaries have to rise. But it’s more complex than that - first, salary increases don’t magically increase supply. There’s a long lag time between salary rises and…

I'm not sure I find this convincing. There are lots and lots of skilled tech workers in the UK that want permanent roles, but the really good ones already have well paid jobs, usually either for the finance sector or with Google/Facebook/etc. £100k to relocate to Cardiff isn't even slightly tempting to these people (source: I'm one of them). For many years the UK has had very low tech salaries compared to similar loc…

For many years the UK has had very low tech salaries compared to similar locations, and compared to other similarly skilled jobs

Hang on, I think that's a bit off – you're comparing the UK average with the Zurich average. If you compare the London finance sector wage with software, the latter is higher: https://www.cwjobs.co.uk/salary-checker/average-software-eng...

I get that the solution isn't to underpay as a business, but it does seem reasonable to look at ways to get more people into the industry, if the situation is at a point where it's not economically feasible to run businesses because of the cost of staff. We do the same with workers in other sectors, after all.

Re: Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

#79

Post by jfindley »

matthewmacleod wrote: post #78
jfindley wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure I find this convincing. There are lots and lots of skilled tech workers in the UK that want permanent roles, but the really good ones already have well paid jobs, usually either for the finance sector or with Google/Facebook/etc. £100k to relocate to Cardiff isn't even slightly tempting to these people (source: I'm one of them). For many years the UK has had very low tech salaries compared to similar loc…

For many years the UK has had very low tech salaries compared to similar locations, and compared to other similarly skilled jobs Hang on, I think that's a bit off – you're comparing the UK average with the Zurich average. If you compare the London finance sector wage with software, the latter is higher: https://www.cwjobs.co.uk/salary-checker/average-software-eng... I get that the solution isn't to underpay as a busi…

Okay, my other link turned out not to be London-specific, sorry about that, so by that metric it now looks like they're on a par, which is good news, as they didn't use to be, by my recollection.

Certainly the comparative salary for the same tech-related position in London vs places like Zurich, NY, SF, etc seems lower, but I don't have data to support that which I can publicly share, so I guess I can't prove that point.

I'd suggest that if you feel there aren't enough people even at very junior levels, then maybe there's a problem and we should look at why not enough people are in the industry. If there are plenty of junior or poorly skilled people but not enough highly skilled people, then it's more likely that you aren't paying enough (or aren't advertising in the right ways to find them). My perception is that it's the latter, but I don't really have anything beyond my own experience to support that.

Re: Cardiff tech firm: 'We'll pay £100k, but can't get staff'

#80

Post by [deleted] »

matthewmacleod wrote: post #56
dazc wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Evidence you'd accept, probably not, although you can simply observe the kinds of stories they choose to promote and arrive at a reasonable conclusion.

In other words, no. Since the BBC is routinely and equally criticised for being both pro- and anti-Brexit, it’s reasonable to assume that it’s more likely to be neither.

[deleted]
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