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Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

triplebyte.com

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Re: Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

#111

Post by wocram »

ptero wrote: post #107

Growth is good, but it means different things to different people. Someone might want more money, another opportunities to attend and present at conferences, third a path to management, fourth a path to "technical expert at large", etc. etc. And mistakes can backfire: offer a management path to a person who wants more technology and he may think "ouch, bureaucracy and PowerPoint ahead". I think a general (and genuine…

What does technical expert at large mean to you? I have some idea from my experience, but it seems like it's usually a nebulous role that nobody asked for.

Re: Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

#112

Post by glutamate »

noodle wrote: post #105
glutamate wrote: post #94

Apparently no one is motivated by social or environmental impact

I think many people are, but it's not something that can be put first in your decision making process unless you are already successful. If you're financially unstable, paying down student debt, etc., it becomes much harder to justify picking a lower-paying job that is more personally motivating if you have other options on the table.

I agree with you, but that's ultimately what this survey is about - how you weigh salary against professional growth, autonomy etc.

Re: Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

#113

Post by itronitron »

hidden_arachnid wrote: post #2

Author of this article here. As long as this initial data-dive came out, there are still a bunch of things we’d like to look at. Does location (say, NYC vs Silicon Valley vs affect these preferences? Does which track (generalist, front-end, mobile) a candidate takes through our process? How does this link with how candidates actually behave when given an offer? Our data set has enough information that we can investig…

Your article is a fluff PR piece for your business.

Re: Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

#114

Post by cydanil »

trilila wrote: post #10

Don’t treat developers like bricklayers. Sack any product manager or manager that does it. This is the root of all evil, radical as it may sound. There needs to be a balance between engineering and product delivery, but too much emphasis on product delivery leads to tech debt, cutting too many corners and poor tech choices. Not to mention stress and little to no job satisfaction. Give devs some time to build somethin…

Oh man, I read the article, and I really identify with what you also say: I'm now in a position where I'm pretty good at my job, and my employer is keen to give me a permanent position.

And yet, whilst it's fun to be able to answer questions on the spot, regarding my area of expertise, I'm looking forward to learning more.

Now, I learnt a lot on this job, and it's very challenging on a daily basis, but it's becoming repetitive, and having talk to management, they could not tell me how they see me/my position evolving in the next 6 months/1 year/2 years. And that makes me longing for another job...

Re: Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

#115

Post by john_moscow »

If you want growth as a programmer, you need to learn how to see the business model of the company you are applying to and how your work integrates into it.

It wouldn't be very wise to expect growth if your job is to keep a legacy system running on the minimum possible budget. Or to maintain a "leave us your email" website where the business is all about sales talking to the prospects and all they need from the devs is to make certain a database entry gets created when a user clicks "submit".

You could expect growth if your job is about finding efficient ways to solve a business pain. Or creating a model that makes it easier to understand and navigate domain-specific data. Or anything else where the decisions you make affect how much the paying customers will appreciate the product.

Unfortunately, most developers don't want to go into that domain, and so most of the developer jobs focus on pretty much CRUD where "growth" could at best mean learning a new framework that will get obsoleted in a few years anyway.

Re: Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

#116

Post by hinkley »

cydanil wrote: post #114
trilila wrote: post #10

Don’t treat developers like bricklayers. Sack any product manager or manager that does it. This is the root of all evil, radical as it may sound. There needs to be a balance between engineering and product delivery, but too much emphasis on product delivery leads to tech debt, cutting too many corners and poor tech choices. Not to mention stress and little to no job satisfaction. Give devs some time to build somethin…

Oh man, I read the article, and I really identify with what you also say: I'm now in a position where I'm pretty good at my job, and my employer is keen to give me a permanent position. And yet, whilst it's fun to be able to answer questions on the spot, regarding my area of expertise, I'm looking forward to learning more. Now, I learnt a lot on this job, and it's very challenging on a daily basis, but it's becoming…

Is your manager willing to talk about knowledge transfer of some of your duties to other people? That's a double win, because they get some growth, and you get free time to pursue other interests. And if there is nothing, then at least you feel less guilty about leaving.

Your boss has revealed they have no opinions on your growth options. Do you have any ideas of your own? Offer them up.

Re: Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

#117

Post by opportune »

john_moscow wrote: post #102
opportune wrote: post #49

I have seen employers grossly misunderstand "professional growth" to mean paying for tons of random seminars telling you the basics of being a professional like taking care of your appearance, carrying yourself, setting goals, etc. I don't think they understood that growth == promotions and income advancement. I would have much rather taken home an extra $5k, or get a promotion two months earlier, than waste time sit…

Because the cost per employee of a useless self help seminar would be way below $5K and the HR might even get a kickback.

I don’t think so because they also paid for hotels, airfare, food etc for multiple days. But yeah probably a kickback involved

Re: Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

#118

Post by babuskov »

diminoten wrote: post #90
dpeck wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

in my experience many developers want to be bricklayers (not to discount bricklaying, there's an art to it, but they're focused on the individual bricks, not the other aspects of the building). They get annoyed when they're asked to think about the bigger picture and just want to focus on the code, the architecture, and whatever is new and shiny. It is largely due to these sorts of developers that we've developed all…

This is both true and hard to deal with, because sometimes these bricklayers will a) assume everyone is trying to be a bricklayer, and b) will actively attack non-bricklayers because of the perception that they're being made to look bad. I honestly don't yet know how to fit everyone together.

> I honestly don't yet know how to fit everyone together

Bricklayers should be managed and never put into more senior role. Also, you should never build a mixed team with bricklayers and "other" developers (except for case where there is only one "other" developer and they are the team lead).

Re: Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

#119

Post by cheeky78 »

dpeck wrote: post #50
trilila wrote: post #10

Don’t treat developers like bricklayers. Sack any product manager or manager that does it. This is the root of all evil, radical as it may sound. There needs to be a balance between engineering and product delivery, but too much emphasis on product delivery leads to tech debt, cutting too many corners and poor tech choices. Not to mention stress and little to no job satisfaction. Give devs some time to build somethin…

in my experience many developers want to be bricklayers (not to discount bricklaying, there's an art to it, but they're focused on the individual bricks, not the other aspects of the building). They get annoyed when they're asked to think about the bigger picture and just want to focus on the code, the architecture, and whatever is new and shiny. It is largely due to these sorts of developers that we've developed all…

"The opportunity to contribute more than just lines of code should be offered and encouraged, but don't be surprised at how few will be interested."

I learned a long ago:

1) I can offer the best ideas that go beyond lines of code, but it usually comes down to the decision of someone in a higher position than me (manager, sales, the CEO, etc) and if they just don't feel like utilizing your ideas, they won't. Fighting this is more trouble than it's worth.

2) Most companies, unless you are in a startup where you wear many hats, don't want you offering your ideas. They have the ideas and want the developer to make them into a reality.

3) Most of the time, a project manager is the person that thinks about the bigger picture. I don't really want to have the responsibility of both roles..without the salary increase that comes along with it.

I love thinking about the bigger picture, which is why I have my own company I'm building on the side. But I would much rather just get my job done as a developer for my day job.

Re: Want to hire the best programmers? Offer growth

#120

Post by tonymet »

Not that I fully disagree, but with proper discipline growth can be found in maintenance work. no system is perfect and you can constantly improve, refactor, add coverage, add telemetry, reduce operations etc. It's not only Greenfield or "hip" projects that provide growth. like any endeavor it's up to the artisan to find meaning and challenge in any work
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