81–90 of 114 posts
For some reason developers/engineers tend to be pessimistic while leaders/idea people tend to be optimistic.
In order to produce really great products you probably need both sides -- so don't dismiss the "idea guy" without giving the proposed idea at least some thought. Perhaps the original idea is too broad but can be the basis for a useful product.
Lots of contracts in London are paying £350 a day. £350 / day * 48 working weeks of the year * 5 days a week = £84,000 / year. £55,498.64 in your pocket after tax. Compare this to ~5 - 10 years of working for peanuts in a startup hoping for an exit. Keep your eye on the clients who agree to short payment terms, forget the dreamers.
I've been freelancing in London and always calculate my yearly expected income by multiplying it with 200 to account for holiday, sick leave and general overhead. £350 * 200 = £70000 before taxes, I think £84000 is overly optimistic here.
Also, which startups here in the UK give you 12 weeks off a year?
Lots of contracts in London are paying £350 a day. £350 / day * 48 working weeks of the year * 5 days a week = £84,000 / year. £55,498.64 in your pocket after tax. Compare this to ~5 - 10 years of working for peanuts in a startup hoping for an exit. Keep your eye on the clients who agree to short payment terms, forget the dreamers.
48 weeks * 5 days a week is really best case scenario. You have included 4 weeks of holiday, but not sickness, training courses, conferences, company admin, next contract sales and worst of all bench time between contracts. My calculation are you are down to 45 weeks after 5 weeks holiday and UK bank holidays. Add 5 days for illness, 7 days for courses and conferences, 1 day a month for admin, 3 days every 6 months f…
IR35 is a good point. If you have multiple contracts and don't work in any one place for more than two years you should avoid any questions around if it's really a contract or not. Most employed coders I know hardly stick around in a place for more than two years here in London.
I'd add underestimate the cost of a decent final product to that too.
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Thanks for the info. Very helpful. Will check out those sources!
Re: where to find experienced developers with no tech connections, that's not really a problem. Here's why: It's similar to a man asking, "Hey, know any models I can date?" Actually, beautiful women are hardly rare. But it's the qualifier that's important: "models I can date? ?" Good developers might be rare , but they're not hard to find . They are, however, hard to woo . You know the drill on how to woo them, it's…
As a guy specialising on developing MVPs for people with ideas, here is the general list of rules I use before taking on a project: 1. Are you willing to pay my normal rate? 2. If so, can you convince me the market is there and you know how to address it. 3. Can you convince me _you_ are the guy who's going to be able to bring it all together? I know that after rule 1 I shouldn't care, but with so many potential proj…
You likely setup the entire system so if something goes wrong, whether its you're fault or not, you're on the line. It's all about reputation. And if you tarnish that by leaving a paid client behind when their server catches on fire, it will be remembered negatively.
It's hard to do this type of contract work continuously. You build up a portfolio of apps that you have to maintain. Most of the time you're clients are out of cash.
Equity is great but it doesn't put food on the table today. On the other hand it puts you in contact with some really great ideas and you get to play startup founder several times and you gain enormous perspective on what works and what doesn't.
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Yeah, pretty sure I take offense at the idea that my skills are equivalent to 6 months of crash education by a novice.
I think that the point is more to demonstrate that "Hey, what I do takes a lot of skill and expertise, it's not just something you can throw together in a weekend". If an idea guy wouldn't be willing to invest at least a year to learn how to do it themselves, the idea's probably not as great as they think it is.
However... I would like to start building out some of those "annoying itch" ideas I have been sitting on and feel this enables me not only to prototype those out, but also allows me to have a half-intelligent conversation about my idea with someone who is a far better dev than me.
Great writers work on their own ideas.
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I've been freelancing in London and always calculate my yearly expected income by multiplying it with 200 to account for holiday, sick leave and general overhead. £350 * 200 = £70000 before taxes, I think £84000 is overly optimistic here.
But 200 days means you're working 40 weeks of the year leaving 12 weeks for everything else. I know some contractors aren't always working but I work next to ten other python developers who are only on six month contracts. Notice periods are anywhere from a day in some places to a month in others. Same as employment really. Also, which startups here in the UK give you 12 weeks off a year?
I think I worked more than 200 days in the end, but I like to calculate pessimistic and be positively surprised at the end of the year.
Lots of contracts in London are paying £350 a day. £350 / day * 48 working weeks of the year * 5 days a week = £84,000 / year. £55,498.64 in your pocket after tax. Compare this to ~5 - 10 years of working for peanuts in a startup hoping for an exit. Keep your eye on the clients who agree to short payment terms, forget the dreamers.
"Keep your eye on the clients who agree to short payment terms, forget the dreamers." OK but then also maybe forget HN and entrepreneurship?
I have met some talented developers who are keen to build a business of their dreams. I'm glad they're doing it as (1) they are trying to reach their goals in life and (2) they aren't competing with me for work :)