Contracting - good idea, often doesn't work in s/w (Score 1)

The idea of a contractor is that you can hire someone for a very specific task and when they are finished, they go. If you're builing a house, works out great, if you're building software, not so much. The job often never really finishes, and contractors end up being hired for years on end. Good for the contractor, bad for the company; contractors are more expensive, and the differentiation between perm/cont can upset team dynamics.

The really strange thing is that in larger companies there's a budget overhead associated with regular employees (for an office, phone service, etc..), but the same overhead is often not factored into a contractors cost. If you're a department head, it can seem 'cheaper' to hire a contractor.

Don't get me wrong, contracting is good, and I contracted for a while, but they are a tool that is often used unwisely.
-Ben