4 ms·

What are some of the warning signs? What do you considerable tolerable/intolerable?

joslin01 11y ago
Well you should keep in mind I hire on Upwork, so not everything carries over to real-life. In real-life, these kinds of issues should be recognized during the hiring process. Since most Upwork devs are BS-artists, it's not worth my time to do some lame Skype interview. Instead I just throw them in the gauntlet and see what they can do. Some further background: I don't talk to my devs with my vocal chords -- ever. It's a waste of my time and the communication is better documented in Slack (Zach actually has a good post on this). They join Slack, I assign them Pivotal stories, and they make pull requests that I review. Their onboarding is just me telling them a little about the project and their first task. I don't explain our grand purpose or any of that stuff because 4 times outta 5, they don't make the cut. Warning signs: * They struggle profusely with setting up the project or it takes a long time. If I have to hold your hand installing our necessary dependencies, chances are you're an inexperienced dev and/or have weak problem solving skills. * They have very little to say besides "ok". The good ones always start asking a bunch of questions as they attempt to genuinely understand what's going on. The poor ones feign expertise. * It takes them a long time to deliver their first unit of work and/or it's very low quality and barely meets minimum requirements. * Their work diary shows few hours logged. I ask everyone you're willing to do 30-40 hours a week? They all say yes. About 10% actually take the hours I'm willing to give to them. * They have a poor attitude * They need to be constantly prodded for status updates and to work more Good signs: * They ask questions * They have a positive attitude and seem appreciative of the opportunity * They dive right into work * They work a lot * They hit me up randomly with status updates People reading this are like "well ya," but what makes life interesting is the gray area. It's never this black & white and I have to just monitor them. In fact, I prefer to somewhat leave them alone to see how they really work. Anyone will log on and start coding under fear of being fired, but there's only few that take the reigns into their own hands. Over the course of almost 2 years, I have 2 core guys who have done wonders for me each at $15/hr. They both are very happy with the opportunity and I've made them into very competent devs who I would put up against a college grad (or higher) any day of the week. I have a third who has all the right good signs, but is somewhat rough skill-wise. I don't mind because my core guy was rough in the beginning and he started reading a Scala book to get better. In general, my team is always about 4-5 since I code myself and can only do so much. Honestly, it all comes down to attitude. I can train an earnest, hard-worker into an amazing dev but it's impossible for me to inspire someone who just doesn't care. I'm sure all this stuff carries over into the real world, but it's a lot more rapid fire in the Upwork game.
- voltagex_ 11y ago
  > * They have a positive attitude and seem appreciative of the opportunity I wonder if you've tested the impact of higher/lower remuneration on this.
  - joslin01 11y ago
    Well, we don't have tons of money to play with, but in general lower price is better and telling them to work up toward the higher price. Money can have an odd effect on people; give them too much, they might appreciate it and work hard or think they "made it" and work lazily. Give them too little, and they might work hard for more or feel used and work begrudgingly. The culture / economy they live in dictates the actual figure.

Well you should keep in mind I hire on Upwork, so not everything carries over to real-life. In real-life, these kinds of issues should be recognized during the hiring process. Since most Upwork devs are BS-artists, it's not worth my time to do some lame Skype interview. Instead I just throw them in the gauntlet and see what they can do. Some further background: I don't talk to my devs with my vocal chords -- ever. It's a waste of my time and the communication is better documented in Slack (Zach actually has a good post on this). They join Slack, I assign them Pivotal stories, and they make pull requests that I review. Their onboarding is just me telling them a little about the project and their first task. I don't explain our grand purpose or any of that stuff because 4 times outta 5, they don't make the cut. Warning signs: * They struggle profusely with setting up the project or it takes a long time. If I have to hold your hand installing our necessary dependencies, chances are you're an inexperienced dev and/or have weak problem solving skills. * They have very little to say besides "ok". The good ones always start asking a bunch of questions as they attempt to genuinely understand what's going on. The poor ones feign expertise. * It takes them a long time to deliver their first unit of work and/or it's very low quality and barely meets minimum requirements. * Their work diary shows few hours logged. I ask everyone you're willing to do 30-40 hours a week? They all say yes. About 10% actually take the hours I'm willing to give to them. * They have a poor attitude * They need to be constantly prodded for status updates and to work more Good signs: * They ask questions * They have a positive attitude and seem appreciative of the opportunity * They dive right into work * They work a lot * They hit me up randomly with status updates People reading this are like "well ya," but what makes life interesting is the gray area. It's never this black & white and I have to just monitor them. In fact, I prefer to somewhat leave them alone to see how they really work. Anyone will log on and start coding under fear of being fired, but there's only few that take the reigns into their own hands. Over the course of almost 2 years, I have 2 core guys who have done wonders for me each at $15/hr. They both are very happy with the opportunity and I've made them into very competent devs who I would put up against a college grad (or higher) any day of the week. I have a third who has all the right good signs, but is somewhat rough skill-wise. I don't mind because my core guy was rough in the beginning and he started reading a Scala book to get better. In general, my team is always about 4-5 since I code myself and can only do so much. Honestly, it all comes down to attitude. I can train an earnest, hard-worker into an amazing dev but it's impossible for me to inspire someone who just doesn't care. I'm sure all this stuff carries over into the real world, but it's a lot more rapid fire in the Upwork game.

voltagex_ 11y ago
> * They have a positive attitude and seem appreciative of the opportunity I wonder if you've tested the impact of higher/lower remuneration on this.
- joslin01 11y ago
  Well, we don't have tons of money to play with, but in general lower price is better and telling them to work up toward the higher price. Money can have an odd effect on people; give them too much, they might appreciate it and work hard or think they "made it" and work lazily. Give them too little, and they might work hard for more or feel used and work begrudgingly. The culture / economy they live in dictates the actual figure.