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Contract to perm is the best way by far. For whom? It's bad for the worker because you're going to work for a company that is admitting by its behavior that i

by edw519 11y ago

Contract to perm is the best way by far. For whom? It's bad for the worker because you're going to work for a company that is admitting by its behavior that it has little confidence in its abiliity to assess talent. Where else is it weak? (My experience shows that those who can't assess talent usually can't do a whole lot of other important things, too.) It's bad for the company because it limits its pool of candidates. Good luck recruiting desirable high achievers by telling them you can't tell if they're good enough to hire. Assessing talent and determining long term resource requirements is like anything else in I.T.: it's fundamental and must be mastered to become any good. Contract to perm is a red flag that something is wrong.

dragonwriter 11y ago
> It's bad for the worker because you're going to work for a company that is admitting by its behavior that it has little confidence in its abiliity to assess talent. Where else is it weak? You seem to think that willingness to admit that assessing fit for a particular job is unreliable without actually experience of the candidate working in the real conditions is correlated with the relative degree to which the company is unable to assess such skills relative other companies (rather than being driven by the degree to which the company is aware of difficulties affecting all companies hiring for similar jobs, or differences in the features of the specific job which make assessment difficult.) There is no justification that I can see for this assumption.
- edw519 11y ago
  Assessing talent is a predictable scientific process. Good companies know how to do it. Other companies don't, so they use contract to perm to compensate. I have hired hundreds of programmers and have never been disappointed. The recruitment process lasted as long as it had to to know that it was a good fit. Contract to perm was never needed.
  - dragonwriter 11y ago
    > Assessing talent is a predictable scientific process. Good companies know how to do it. Other companies don't, so they use contract to perm to compensate. Alternatively, its a predictable scientific process which is more accurate when actual time in seat is devoted to the assessment, and good companies know this and bad companies just delude themselves into settling with a less reliable process. Or, more accurately, assessing fit for job is a task that varies by the specific job (including, among other things, how much room the role, size, and mission of the organization leaves for customizing the job around the individual) for which suitability is being assessed, and good companies (in this regard, at least are those that understand the mechanisms which are most appropriate for assessing fit for the jobs they actually are hiring for and choose the right methods (which may or may not include contract-to-perm for particular jobs), and bad companies are those that don't (which may include picking contract-to-perm for jobs where its not the best choice -- or not choosing it for jobs where it is.)
ownagefool 11y ago
Honestly, no offense intended but his is bullshit. Everybody competent knows that hiring is crapshoot and all perms get clauses that allow them to be let go fairly quickly here in the UK. I do agree with you, this doesn't work, but that's because once the candidate is of the quality that they can easily grab contracts, they have no incentive to come work for you as a permie. That said, only high end contractors are really that more expensive. You need to remember, your employees are likely getting sick days, holidays, and pensions. You need to pay employers NI and probably offer other benefits. In addition to this after a while getting rid of them becomes difficult. When you think of it like that, a often contractor isn't a bad deal. It's a shame a lot of companies feel like they need ownership of their staff.
robmcm 11y ago
>Good luck recruiting desirable high achievers by telling them you can't tell if they're good enough to hire. Typically here in London these people are already contracting, so all you need to do is convert the best ones.

by edw519 11y ago

dragonwriter 11y ago

> It's bad for the worker because you're going to work for a company that is admitting by its behavior that it has little confidence in its abiliity to assess talent. Where else is it weak? You seem to think that willingness to admit that assessing fit for a particular job is unreliable without actually experience of the candidate working in the real conditions is correlated with the relative degree to which the company is unable to assess such skills relative other companies (rather than being driven by the degree to which the company is aware of difficulties affecting all companies hiring for similar jobs, or differences in the features of the specific job which make assessment difficult.) There is no justification that I can see for this assumption.

edw519 11y ago
Assessing talent is a predictable scientific process. Good companies know how to do it. Other companies don't, so they use contract to perm to compensate. I have hired hundreds of programmers and have never been disappointed. The recruitment process lasted as long as it had to to know that it was a good fit. Contract to perm was never needed.
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  > Assessing talent is a predictable scientific process. Good companies know how to do it. Other companies don't, so they use contract to perm to compensate. Alternatively, its a predictable scientific process which is more accurate when actual time in seat is devoted to the assessment, and good companies know this and bad companies just delude themselves into settling with a less reliable process. Or, more accurately, assessing fit for job is a task that varies by the specific job (including, among other things, how much room the role, size, and mission of the organization leaves for customizing the job around the individual) for which suitability is being assessed, and good companies (in this regard, at least are those that understand the mechanisms which are most appropriate for assessing fit for the jobs they actually are hiring for and choose the right methods (which may or may not include contract-to-perm for particular jobs), and bad companies are those that don't (which may include picking contract-to-perm for jobs where its not the best choice -- or not choosing it for jobs where it is.)

ownagefool 11y ago

Honestly, no offense intended but his is bullshit. Everybody competent knows that hiring is crapshoot and all perms get clauses that allow them to be let go fairly quickly here in the UK. I do agree with you, this doesn't work, but that's because once the candidate is of the quality that they can easily grab contracts, they have no incentive to come work for you as a permie. That said, only high end contractors are really that more expensive. You need to remember, your employees are likely getting sick days, holidays, and pensions. You need to pay employers NI and probably offer other benefits. In addition to this after a while getting rid of them becomes difficult. When you think of it like that, a often contractor isn't a bad deal. It's a shame a lot of companies feel like they need ownership of their staff.

robmcm 11y ago

>Good luck recruiting desirable high achievers by telling them you can't tell if they're good enough to hire. Typically here in London these people are already contracting, so all you need to do is convert the best ones.