Hiring (Superstar) Programmers 570
Ross Turk wrote, "We've been looking for senior engineers to work on SourceForge.net for a while now, and it's been a lot more difficult than it was a few years ago. Has the tech market improved so much that working on a prominent website is no longer enough to attract the best talent? Is everyone else running into the same problems, or is it just here in the Valley and other high-tech corridors?" This is a question that I've seen coming in a lot; the economy has not picked up everywhere — so how are other people handling this? Going outside the traditional Valley/Route 128 corridors? Outsourcing? And how do you find people — beyond just using job boards? (Full disclosure: That's our job board thingie, as you probably have figured out.) Or do job boards alone work? Some people have been swearing up and down that CraigsList works — and there's always something to be said for nepotism.
O RLY? (Score:4, Funny)
All the smart people have left IT (Score:4, Interesting)
Because they could.
The best engineer I know left the profession during the last downturn. He was a doctor, so he returned to medicine.
I think a lot of other smart people changed profession.
It's the law of unintended consequences again.
Re:All the smart people have left IT (Score:5, Interesting)
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Reason being, as an application developer, I've not seen a lot of the crap you describe (well, more rather, I'm the one with the hammer breaking all the mice for you to fix). There is crap as an app dev, but it's more along the lines of unrealistic schedules, dumb PHBs that still think spiral devel
Re:All the smart people have left IT (Score:4, Insightful)
Now you know why entrepreneurship is such a hot market at the moment. The business plan is:
1. Boss won't listen about developing new technology.
2. Leave to found new company based on technology.
3. Technology is very cool, but no massive coporate support.
4. Corporations see that your boss was an idiot (without actually blaming your boss) and purchase your company.
5. You profit!!!
Additional steps:
6. Key developers hate the new corporate work environment because their boss won't listen, and leave for the next startup.
7. Cycle repeats.
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virtuoso != star
Competent != Employed (Just look at our current administration)
Ignoring a potential talent pool (Score:3, Interesting)
Time to up the H1-B quota again??
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Of course, the fact that you think that someone who's clearly advocating allowing more people into the country to work is in favor of illegal immigration pretty much proves you're an idiot in the first place.
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Hubris! (Score:5, Insightful)
I think things like pay, benefits, location, etc. matter far more to the vast majority of techies than merely "working on a prominent website." After all, in today's world, prominent websites come and go in a matter of months.
Re:Hubris! (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Hubris! (Score:5, Insightful)
As someone pointed out before, people trying to hire the top 90% or 95% of employees had better be willing to provide salaries and benefits in the top 90% to 95% as well.
Re:Hubris! (Score:4, Informative)
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So many companies forget that part! Particularly if they can convince the employees that their company is prestigious and worth taking a pay cut over. Don't buy it, somewhere around 4am one night you're going to realize that your prestigious company was just like the dump you got out of, only instead ofm anagers ASKING you to work weekends, they EXPECT it.
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Ross
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FLAME ON!
IANA developer, but on the admin side, higher pay may be indicative of many factors including time and scope of responsibility. The factor to which I find a lot of lip service is paid is skill. I have worked for several companies that "hired me for my skills". The job descriptions were very particular with respect to skills required, and in some cases, my skills were tested prior to hiring. The s
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I think you meant the top 5% or 10%.
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Real, boring, bank type work is picking up, and although it is not very exciting, it is _very_ well paid.
A web start up needs to compete with that.
Dilbert covered this (of course) (Score:5, Funny)
The PHB acknowledged the point, saying that they were looking for the bright but clueless set.
Re:Dilbert covered this (of course) (Score:4, Interesting)
The message was clear, we only hire highly mediocre candidates.
Then they were shocked that when they offered a voluntary separation package 249 out of 251 IT employees volunteered. The two that didn't volunteer were a single mom and the only guy who had work from home privileges.
They had to change the VSP to take people with the most seniority first.
There was actually one case that I know of where the person who had the second highest seniority in a group bribed the guy in front of him by offering to pay him a portion of the separation package to let the second guy get out of the company!
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There's also the issue of organizational self importance: most organizations think that they are better than their competitors, even though statistically that simply cannot be true. I.e., I'm sure that VA Software thin
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I'm bitter that I got an 'up yours' form letter turndown, though.
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Basically, you have to be willing to give competitive pay. Your company can give itself an edge with some items that are 'cheaper than money' like interesting projects and a plush work environment.
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There's a very high turnover rate, and I believe the 50 - 100 (yes, 100) hour work weeks may have something to do with it.
Funny (Score:4, Insightful)
Each time they would interview what amounted to entry-level candidates (the only ones interested at that pay level, naturally) for months and finally they'd get desperate and make a hire that didn't quite measure up to the extreme the standards they'd set for positions. Then, when it didn't work out and the hire either left or got let go, they wouldn't try to make the position more attractive to someone who was more qualified, they'd just re-list with the same salary and benefits package(s), only each new time they'd add even more required skills and experience, as though they just hadn't been stringent enough the first time.
Meanwhile, for those of us inside already, the workload just got bigger and bigger since we couldn't make any good hires and couldn't keep the ones we made. Needless to say I moved on after just over a year, once I realized that for the amount of work I was actually doing as the result of the (I realized) never-to-be-resolved staff shortage, I was also getting underpaid.
It's like HR thought that if they just kept asking for more, eventually they'd get it.
Re:Location (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean like that bridge to nowhere [salon.com] for 50 people? Thanks a lot for trying to steal our money and spend it on some stupid bridge that no one needs, Alaskan.
You, an Alaskan, complaining about politicians trying to take your money and give it to someone else is a prime example of the pot calling the kettle black. I can't think of a single state currently that more exemplifies this thanks to this example. Even CA and NY don't have such ridiculous public works projects.
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NY and CA? They're not the ones suckling at the Federal teat. The welfare states are the red states. All the states that vote for the tax cut President are the same ones that are putting us in debt.
Money Magazine - Best Jobs (Score:2)
Top o' the list?
Software Engineer [cnn.com]
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I agree. As a general rule, techies are ahead of the intelligence curve, especially when it comes to math skills, so they know to optimize pay and benefits as compared to cost of living. The Valley is one of the worst pay to cost of living ratios anywhere in the country.
Check out thi
Programming puzzles (Score:2, Interesting)
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That and it's to much of a hassl
Re:Hubris! (Score:5, Insightful)
Every time I hear this, I almost feel a little sad. If I didn't have a job writing code, I don't know that I'd write code at home. Frankly, the problems and the meaning behind the code I write for work will get me to work past the 'expected' hours often - I'm writing code to analyze biological data and change how people treat common human disease. I don't think I'm going to have a 'pet project' at home that matches that. At work, I have lots of resources (large data sets, big machines, etc) to work on. At home, what could I do? Put up a dinky website? Maybe make an app to solve some problem everyone else already has?
Maybe I'd get involved in an open source project, but my gut feeling is that if I'm unemployed, I'm going to NOT code for a bit, take a break, get refreshed, then get another job. I like coding, but there's just so much more to life than that. (see: sexy girlfriend, mountain biking, cooking, music, reading, games, friends, etc)
Does this make me not a superstar? Maybe. On the other hand, I've been talking to some people lately about my current job and how well it's (not) going. I'm getting job offers left and right from lots of different people for very nice positions in both academia and industry. So, I must not suck - but this notion that someone who's a good problem solver would always be solving problems, and in one particular area (coding, and there's a lot of other areas you can apply your same understanding of logic, math, statistics, process, etc to.)
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Just post it to slashdot! (Score:2)
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Re:Just post it to slashdot! (Score:4, Funny)
NTH Tier Solutions Careers
Please be patient while we build
Same Problem (Score:5, Funny)
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Dotcom2 is in full swing (Score:2)
You must have missed the memo... (Score:3, Funny)
Show me the Money! (Score:2)
You could always try... (Score:4, Insightful)
That's me! need advice from Slashdotters (Score:3, Insightful)
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I still do my job as per m
Your name won't get you everything (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, a name can get you ahead of the game, but if you pay people 20% less than they can get at another, less well known, company, you are going to have a hard time finding people.
Also, you'll need to have interesting work for your developers to do. If you want highly talented developers, but all you want them to do is help maintain an already stable website, you may have a hard time finding (and especially keeping) good talent.
Also, it helps to be a growing company with good prospects for the future. People don't want to go to a company that is not going anywhere. People want to work at a place where they have a good chance to advance within the company, and where they can expect regular salary increases. The ability to reliably hand out performance bonuses helps too.
If you want to be flooded with resumes from highly talented people, you need all four of the following: a big name, pay at or above the market rate, interesting projects to work on, and a strong and growing financial situation. If you are missing any of these things, you're going to have to work harder to get the really good people.
In my personal opinion... (Score:4, Funny)
The reason you're having problems attracting good candidates is that sign in the hallway leading to the interviewer's office. It reads:
ATTENTION:
Beatings will continue
until morale improves.
Thank you.
The Management
* * * * *
A man's got to believe in something. I believe I'll have another drink.
--W.C. Fields
Everybody can't hire the *best*... (Score:5, Insightful)
I would recommend trying for some new talent. Get somebody fresh out of school... Take in some co-ops and pick the best to stay on full time. If you have a tired technology, you're more likely to get the best engineers at the beginning of their career than later on. This is especially true in the current market where companies have this crazy idea that they should hire somebody who's past experience is an exact match to their current task. The young talent is getting left behind...
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I don't know what started companies down this path, but the ones who follow it should be shot. I've gotten calls from HR people who see my resume online, contact me, and then decide I'm not a match because I haven't made a program that interfaces with a particular database or because I don't
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What have you done? (Score:2)
What has been your efforts in attracting developers to this position? Have you only posted it on your corporate site or have you advertised it on the various popular job boards such as monster and dice? Also, working through head hunters can get you some leads. The best way, however, is to ask your current developers for leads and pursue them yourself.
I am currently evaluating SFEE and I find it to be a great product. Good work! I hope you find who it is you're looking for.
You post on Slashdot, of course (Score:2)
I dunno (Score:5, Insightful)
How much is the pay? A lot of places who have (or think they have) cool points seem to think that those are a substitute for cash. I recently got a job offer from one of those cool places (you've heard of it, I'm sure) in the Bay that paid a paltry 16% more than I make in nowheresville, South Carolina. It hurt, because the job, was indeed cool as all hell, but I've got a family to look after.
Sure, you can talk about the wonderful things I can do in the Bay Area, but after paying the rent, all that would change is that I'm a lot closer to the things that I still can't do because now I can't afford it.
Personally, I'd like to live in a place where I've got at least a ghost of a chance of buying a decent 3 bedroom plus an office house without needing a galactic-scale interest only ARM.
The job offer reads "willing to travel frequently" to I presume Fremont. Does that mean they're willing to pay for that travel, too?
Working insane hours for low pay because the job is "cool" is so 20th century. I think most of us have played on that roller coaster once or twice and don't want to do it again. Maybe you can sell that to fresh graduates, but the senior people have learned these lessons already.
Spot on (Score:2)
Well, air travel is a nightmare these days, and living in Fremont is unaffordable. So I wouldn't even bother to glance at the actual job.
128 Corridor (Score:2)
Job Board Spam Sucks (Score:5, Interesting)
I have my resume up on monster -- clearly as a sysadmin. I get messages about insurance sales, modeling, marketing, and Amway-style multi-level-marketing jobs. Also, there are recruiters up there harvesting resumes, with no actual jobs. I got so mad that I had to do something about it -- so I did.
Recruiter-Rater [zhrodague.net] is a rate-your-recruiter type of website. Have good dealings with a recruter? Please post about it, we'd love to hear your success story. Got a recruiter repeatedly wasting your time? Post about that too. Bad recruiters need to be shamed out of existance, and good recruiters should see their commissions increase.
Seriously. I would get an email about a job in my area. I'd apply, send-in a resume, sometimes talk to the guy on the phone -- and never hear from them again, until they have another req, starting the cycle again.
I've been at this job-hunting game for a while, and just recently I've almost completely given up as a wage-slave, except that I still need money to live. Of course, being here in Pittsburgh certianly does *not* help, but it is easier to be broke and still live pretty well here, than it is to be broke and live in places like Boston.
Engineers ? (Score:4, Funny)
On the link:
Since when are Java Developers "Engineers"?
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So although there isn't a direct correlation, Java certainly helped me get my chartered engineer status.
I'll say it loud and proud: "I'm a Senior Java Developer and I'm an Engineer"... do I get my free coffee, round of applause and a hug now?
shortage of techies (Score:2, Insightful)
If you want to hire techies, you have three alternatives:
1) be prepared to pounce on anyone that does become available due to normal
Speaking of which... (Score:2)
I'm not looking for prominance (Score:2)
For side jobs, I'd much rather work for a good cause than high-profile work. Is Slashdot a good cause? Yes, but I'm thinking charity work.
Wow! Sourceforge?!? (Score:5, Funny)
Plenty of Great Jobs (Score:2, Interesting)
Most people are happy enough where they are--good enough pay, good enough benefits, and currently there is a lot of stability... it's hard to get people to want to make the effort to move unless they are Really excited about what you are doing and there is more than
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Of course not. Because candidates are more than the sum of their resumes. One candidate might have a super-impressive resume, but only be a mediocre programmer. (In some cases, they're lousy.) Another candidate may appear to have a mediocre resume, but ends up being a
Why does SourceForge need "superstars"? (Score:5, Insightful)
What are you doing that's really all the cool or interesting? What's the reward for working there? Working for a name people have heard of? People have heard of General Mills too, do they need "superstar" factory workers?
If you don't really have work that's truly interesting and innovative, get off your ego horse and hire good people who can do the job you actually need done.
Valley is too expensive (Score:2, Informative)
Very clever /. (Score:3, Funny)
1. Need tech help
2. Run SysAdmin nomination story
3. Harvest talent
4. PROFIT!!!!
Actually what makes this funny is that sysadminoftehyear is
Think for a moment (Score:2)
But plan for the backlash when you change the domain name to www.outsourceforge.net.
Hire remotely (Score:2)
There is a tremendous amount of development work around right now. Companies should look to the untypical parts of the U.S. for talent, and...Canada. The Canadian dollar is still slightly cheaper than the U.S. dollar, so Canadians are a good dea
It's the way you word it (Score:5, Insightful)
Hire telecommuters (Score:3, Informative)
For 99% of software development, system administration and network management, physical proximity is completely pointless. Hell, most of the time you end up working for a company with more than one office, and you do remote work on remote systems anyway. Yet the majority of tech companies are still afraid to hire telecommuters.
I've been telecommuting for almost 6 years with great success. An employer who is willing to hire remote workers suddenly has a gigantic field of potential employees to pick from.
Maybe because no one (Score:3, Insightful)
Define "superstar" (Score:2, Insightful)
Already Employed (Score:2)
The popularity of your web site has absolutely no bearing at all on my decision. Hell google's president could call and beg me tomorrow but if he cannot put up the dough I would hang up on him in a second. T
Are you really limiting yourself so severely? (Score:2)
Seriously?
I live in Massachusetts, outside 128. It'd take some major amounts of money to get me to commute anywhere near 128.
Also, I don't work in IT. The closest I've come was a year-long stint selling computers at ComputerWorks in Middleton in 88-89. I learned BASIC on a PET in '77 and wrote my own programs to keep track of my paper route customers on a VIC-20 back in the day, but life lead me down a more
why would you want superstar programmers? (Score:2)
Are the best programmers for a business the superstars? I'd say go with people in the top 20% or so and focus more on getting a well-rounded employee than just looking for t
an off topic question... (Score:2)
As an inspiring developer still in school is a SourceForge project a good way to develop experience? I currently have a full-time job (in IT) and leaving it for an internship is not a good option. I'm hoping to build some type of marketable experience elsewhere.
I'm looking for part time (Score:4, Interesting)
Pay more (Score:2)
I have 10 years in IT. From 1996
Here's your problem (Score:2)
Note, I am not one of these people. I wouldn't admit to it if I were. I just know where some of them are hiding. No, I'm not telling.
Why do you need a superstar programmer? (Score:2)
Let's as
I'll tell you why *I* don't apply for Sourceforge (Score:2)
Look outside area? (Score:2)
Programmer Black Hole (Score:2)
SourceForge reputation is *not* that good (Score:2)
Demographics at work... (Score:2)
Slashdot classifieds... (Score:2)
Anyway, to answer the question, yes. I mean, no. Yes, working on a prominent website is no longer enough t
why move if you are content? (Score:2)
Early on there was a bit of a free-for-all as money for Linux gurus was springing up all over the place. Now it's a li
Yeah, we've all pretty much quit. (Score:3, Insightful)
One of my pet peeves (Score:4, Insightful)
I know it's hard to show your hand even that little bit, but if you want exceptional people to respond, you need to make it clear that you're exceptional, too.
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Because with all the talk of outsourcers taking dev jobs away, anyone who knows what they are doing has moving out of coding and into jobs less likely to be offshored?
If you create a market where people don't see any long term future in development, don't be surprised if no-one sees development as a long term career.
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There aren't any.
The ones who are motivated don't know what they're doing and the ones that know what they're doing can be found in a dark corner of the machine room banging their heads against the wall.
KFG
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Leave it to management to screw things up.
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A company I used to work for tried outsourcing to Russian and Indian programmers. The quality of the code coming back was just awful and cost a lot more in after-support than the dev. cost saved.