Who is the marketing guy among your team? It seems like you need a "CEO" who knows how to talk and bring projects in. Plus it seems like you are good fit for taking on outsourcing projects.
Ask HN: How do I find a team of 10-15 developers a project to work on?
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Re: Ask HN: How do I find a team of 10-15 developers a project to work on?
#12Who is the marketing guy among your team? It seems like you need a "CEO" who knows how to talk and bring projects in. Plus it seems like you are good fit for taking on outsourcing projects.
We are missing that guy, we have talked about outright hiring that role several times. Currently Hung and I kind of split that role, while the other guys bring stuff to the table from time to time. We have done some outsourcing projects but again, there is a desire in the group to have some ownership or at least belonging to something more permanent than a 6 month to 1.5 year gig.
Re: Ask HN: How do I find a team of 10-15 developers a project to work on?
#13I have been in your shoes and it is how I started 2 consulting companies now. We lost a number of people to two different product acquisitions and then gained a few etc. Always a bit of an ebb and flow, but it has generally worked well for me since 1999. BTW I am also in Florida.
It sounds to me as if you are missing the key ingredient to the mix, you need marketing and business management/development of some sort. My bet is the team as a whole has a good sized network to pull from, you just may lack the experience and knowledge of using it to get deal flow.
Not that you asked, but for 10-15 guys, you need significant project flow to keep everyone employed and happy at fair wages. It will equate to a bare minimum of $140k or so per month in revenue, personally, I'd be more comfortable near $200-210k as a minimum target for the whole team. If you assume you take minimum agreements of $30k or so, you need roughly 5-7 new deals a month to keep cash flow moving or work towards getting larger deals but those generally take time. Additionally you have to see how the mix of your team fits projects to see how that would work, e.g. you may have to support a devops (just an example) person for a few months when there is little devops work coming through.
If you want to chat I am in Central Florida too, happy to met up or chat via email etc. We may have some complementary skills that would benefit both our teams.
Re: Ask HN: How do I find a team of 10-15 developers a project to work on?
#14I have been in your shoes and it is how I started 2 consulting companies now. We lost a number of people to two different product acquisitions and then gained a few etc. Always a bit of an ebb and flow, but it has generally worked well for me since 1999. BTW I am also in Florida. It sounds to me as if you are missing the key ingredient to the mix, you need marketing and business management/development of some sort. M…
It has usually taken the form of 1-3 large contracts but from time to time we pick up smaller stuff. I would love to get together sometime if you would like, I am always down for networking and it's easy to talk me into lunch. My contact info is in my profile, feel free to ping me and we can set something up. I can probably twist Hung's arm into a meal as well.
Re: Ask HN: How do I find a team of 10-15 developers a project to work on?
#15Infosys, TCS, HCL etc
Re: Ask HN: How do I find a team of 10-15 developers a project to work on?
#16Infosys, TCS, HCL etc
yes hire more indians lol
Not.
Re: Ask HN: How do I find a team of 10-15 developers a project to work on?
#17Hey! This is an interesting topic! What kind of technologies you folks are interested in & have worked around mostly?
I have few things in mind, but not sure how plausible it would be for your team!
Re: Ask HN: How do I find a team of 10-15 developers a project to work on?
#18Genius, pitch your service disguised in a genuine question. :)
But in all seriousness, with the team you have, it sounds like you need a full time business development person. Ideally that would be you but maybe this is not part of your skill set. To feed those mouths you need revenue and getting work through the door is a full time job.
A bizdev person can be expensive but the idea is that they pay for themselves (easier said than done). Rather than hiring a full time bizdev, you could instead try to build a network of bizdev people around you. They could receive a bonus if x% for any lead that turns into a contact (again, easier said than done).
Other thing that might work is to get into contact with recruiters (I know, I'm out of a limb). You can let them know that you have a team of devs ready to go that they can fall back on in case of emergencies or what ever.
Re: Ask HN: How do I find a team of 10-15 developers a project to work on?
#19Genius, pitch your service disguised in a genuine question. :) But in all seriousness, with the team you have, it sounds like you need a full time business development person. Ideally that would be you but maybe this is not part of your skill set. To feed those mouths you need revenue and getting work through the door is a full time job. A bizdev person can be expensive but the idea is that they pay for themselves (e…
Genius, pitch your service disguised in a genuine question. :)
I know it's not out of the realm of possibility on HN and I do like that HN is not adverse to shameless promotion but my first and foremost interest is in the opinions of the group on how to parlay this into what the team wants. As we just keep circling this subject, one of our big contracts is winding down again so the subject has once again come to the forefront. All of us have no doubt that we will replace the contract but no one is thrilled about the idea. There is a deep desire to have some ownership or at least some long term interest in a codebase.
Other thing that might work is to get into contact with recruiters (I know, I'm out of a limb). You can let them know that you have a team of devs ready to go that they can fall back on in case of emergencies or what ever.
This has been the majority of our leads, we have about 4 recruiters that when they see a pattern of hiring by a company tend to recommend getting in contact with us, they of course take their margin of the top of the team but it is less than standard recruiting arrangements. One of the things about us is that money is equally split among the team. None of us take a cut off the top.
Re: Ask HN: How do I find a team of 10-15 developers a project to work on?
#20Hey! This is an interesting topic! What kind of technologies you folks are interested in & have worked around mostly? I have few things in mind, but not sure how plausible it would be for your team!
I listed a few of them but it is standard modern technology stacks, a lot of Angular, React, Ember, Node etc. we have a couple of guys that do Ruby on the back end, a few that do Java and some .Net back end guys. Then there are some of us like myself that dabble in the more niche stuff like Clojure and Lisp.