In a past startup, we had at least one person apply to our regular job postings with a cover that transparently said "I know this is a full-time, long-term posting, but I really want to be a contractor for a bounded time." Since it was a great fit and they were available right away (and we urgently needed more people), we made the "hire" and ended up working together for a while. Only worked because it was quite transparent and up front in the application though.
Ask HN: Where do seasoned devs look for short-term work?
51–60 of 179 posts
Re: Ask HN: Where do seasoned devs look for short-term work?
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
Don't almost everyone sell themselves? Many people, as employees, sell themselves for 5 days per week, every week, except days off. And everybody buys stuff, and therefore relies on people selling stuff. The only way I see we could avoid being exposed to selling would be do have a different way to organize the economy / the society.
I think it's the self-promotion part that's seen as slimy and shameful. Yes, as an employee I trade my time for money, but I don't write blog posts at the office about what kind of transformational and high-impact work I'm capable of, and about this week's top-10 coding life-hacks, and how I can single-handedly turn your project around from life support to on-schedule deployment. Admittedly, the people who are good a…
Oh, I see. Well, I guess I'm fine with the self promotion (which you do a bit to get hired even as an employee), as long as it's honest, polite, done a the right place and not annoying.
I'm not on LinkedIn (and I hope I won't need to be there the day I want to freelance) but I guess people are there for exactly this stuff, so posting an ad for yourself there is only fair, I suppose.
Re: Ask HN: Where do seasoned devs look for short-term work?
#53Short term work is more plentiful when money is easy and there’s a lot of entrepreneurial activity going on due to some recent catalyst such as mobile app platforms or the dotcom boom etc. Right now we’re in the AI boom and some people may be making money peddling agentic solutions but money is tight and businesses are hurting. It’s also hard to trust a short term dev who doesn’t really need the money. You have no le…
> It’s also hard to trust a short term dev who doesn’t really need the money. You have no leverage over them. They sort of just do as they please.
On one hand I agree. On the other hand I cannot help but contrast this with how free market capitalism is advertised: free agents entering free mutually beneficial contracts at their own free will, everyone benefits. Then suddenly when the worker is actually free to leave then it becomes a problem.
Re: Ask HN: Where do seasoned devs look for short-term work?
#54Everybody says your network. Is this an US thing? Everyone in my network is employed in bigger or smaller companies. They might search for a full-time hire, but not for project work. Is this different in the EU or is my network too small?
Re: Ask HN: Where do seasoned devs look for short-term work?
#55Your network is always the best bet to start. Leverage past co-workers who can vouch for you, reach out, let people know you're available. If you're a part of YC or other similar investor/tech networks, often those are very strong referral networks. Beyond that, there are various niche job boards and sites like https://www.fractionaljobs.io/ , https://www.hirefraction.com/ , marketerhire.com depending on the type of…
I haven't found these fractional sites to be very useful for development work. The rates are low and the few dev jobs already have 100s of applications.
Re: Ask HN: Where do seasoned devs look for short-term work?
#56Having the right technical skills is only 50% of the requirement (and realistically even less than that). The harder battle is being a good salesman. Push yourself and your services at every opportunity. Send mass emails to friends and old collegues. Write daily puke-inducing posts on LinkedIn. Write blog posts and make toy Github projects with "looking for work" blurbs at the top of each one. Set a goal to post N ti…
Ugh. This is probably one of those "Thanks, I hate it!" moments. You're probably 100% right, and this is why I could never be an independent contractor. This kind of self-promotion and lead generation seems so demeaning, slimy, and shameful, and I'd probably die of embarrassment if I ever had to do it. Yet it comes so naturally to some people. It sucks that this kind of skill is required to make it on your own.
> Yet it comes so naturally to some people.
Maybe, but I think many (most?) people doing it don't like having to do it, and for many people, it's probably not that natural. It's practice, learned and trained skills.
> I'd probably die of embarrassment if I ever had to do it.
If it's because a lack of self-confidence, work on this, being reasonably self-confident makes life so much more enjoyable.
Otherwise, I believe this embarrassment would be ill-placed, and therefore I would suggest, if you haven't done it already, that you think hard on why. And if you've already done that, I'm quite interested in the deep reasons why you think you'd be so embarrassed :-)
> This is probably one of those "Thanks, I hate it!" moments
Yep, can't agree more xD
Re: Ask HN: Where do seasoned devs look for short-term work?
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why’s this shameful, exactly? There’s no shame in saying you’re available to work.
IMHO selling yourself (selling anything, really) is a bit demeaning. But this is probably a class affectation on my part, not real moral intuition.
I hear and understand that gut feeling. Whenever I hit that particular feeling, though, I remind myself that it’s only shameful if you’re knowingly selling something that can’t deliver what you’re promising.
Re: Ask HN: Where do seasoned devs look for short-term work?
#58I did this a few years ago and the winning recipe was a shameless (i.e. deeply shameful) linkedin post where I pretty much just summarized my skillset and explained that I was looking for a senior engineer equivalent of a summer internship, with no chance of extension. Got me 3-4 offers. None of the offering companies had ads out for roles like this, so this was pretty much the only way.
> deeply shameful Your feelings are what they are, but this is the least shameful post I would ever see on LinkedIn. It's someone actually looking for work! and not just posting some super cringe low-IQ engagement-farm copypasta. Finding work is exactly what LinkedIn ought to be for
Could not have said it better.
Re: Ask HN: Where do seasoned devs look for short-term work?
#59Any niche? I mean, possibly large-scale data processing, yet I've seen people go more niche than that. In other words if your resume has 5+ years in one particular industry then that might be whom to target.
Re: Ask HN: Where do seasoned devs look for short-term work?
#60lemon.io :)