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I am based in Bulgaria and I recently had my first experience with a potential Swiss employer. It was rather unpleasant. After I went through 5 interviews we di

I am based in Bulgaria and I recently had my first experience with a potential Swiss employer. It was rather unpleasant. After I went through 5 interviews we discussed my rates (as a remote consultant). I received a low ball counter offer which was about the half of what I usually charge. This quickly became a racist rant and a senior manager at the company tried to persuade me by saying that with the money they offered I'll "live like a king" in Bulgaria. Needless to say I politely declined because I would much rather work with people that value my work. I was really surprised that such unprofessional attitude came from Swiss company, but apparently it's not so uncommon judging by the blog post.

naivepiano 10y ago
Sad as it may be your being based on a low income country was probably one of the main reasons they approached you. And it is quite universal so I wouldn't attribute it to unprofessionalism. From company's point of view it makes perfect sense to outsource to the best quality/price ratio.
- collyw 10y ago
  Maybe at double the price he would still be the best quality /price ratio.
  - toddkazakov 10y ago
    And still, I was probably 30% cheaper than a local consultant. Anyway, if a relationship starts in this way I cannot image what working with the client would be, so I did myself a favor.
- toddkazakov 10y ago
  Actually, this wasn't the reason. I already knew the guy who approached me. They were developing a data analytics solution quite similar to others I have worked on/built in the past. They needed a developer with a real-world product experience in their domain. Unfortunately, it wasn't my acquaintance who was responsible for the hiring. Luckily, the software development market is global and there are some really sane people out there.
eps 10y ago
The manager's rant part aside, the reason to outsource to the Eastern Europe, Ukraine and Russia is and has always been the rates.
- qaq 10y ago
  That's one part of the equation the other is availability of qualified people.
- tribaal 10y ago
  That's very much untrue. EDIT: I stand corrected - this misses the point. Sure, wages are lower than elsewhere (especially Switzerland), but the quality of engineers in eastern europe is very high. Case in point: Google Switzerland employs lots of eastern europeans with Swiss-level wages. That wouldn't make any sense if the only reason was money. EDIT: My math and electronics teachers (both women, data point) in my Swiss engineering school were Russian and Romanian. Their shared theory was that during communism teaching material was not written by teachers, but was written by topic experts (expert mathematicians were forced to write teaching books). It sucked for the experts (they were forced), but was great for students to have a book written by a master to study. Their point, not mine.
  - huhtenberg 10y ago
    > Google Switzerland employs remotely?
    - tribaal 10y ago
      No. On-site, in Zurich. They have arrangements with authorities to get work permits more easily (it made a lot of debate in the press). They "import" qualified workers, paid Swiss salaries. If price was the only matter, that wouldn't happen - Google would open a development office there instead (they have smaller ones, but the Zurich office is the largest that is not in Mountain View).
      - huhtenberg 10y ago
tudorw 10y ago
Do not be surprised, I've interacted with hundreds of companies, many are run incompetently by people unqualified for the position and who have no integrity or morals. Maintain your composure and move on, if you're not being turned down now and again for being too expensive, you're too cheap...
greenspot 10y ago
Saying 'you will live like a king' is not the smartest thing. He should have said: 'Please consider that your local living costs are much lower than in Switzerland. We incorporate those differences in our offered rate like every other company does. Thanks for your understanding.' So the tone was—yes—unprofessional, the attitude not. And even if this attitude is debatable, you have to allow the other party to express reasons for a lower offer in a negotiation.
- moron4hire 10y ago
  No, that would be just as bad. You pay for results, not for where the person lives.
  - _Wintermute 10y ago
    No, you pay the minimum amount you can to get the job done to a satisfactory standard.
    - moron4hire 10y ago
      That's the same thing. But we are apparently only capitalists when it means keeping the minimum wage down.
  - Taek 10y ago
    I don't understand the downvotes here. Results are results. I can understand paying a person more if you are worried about providing a living wage, but really you are paying them to do a service for the company. If you are looking at two remote candidates offering to do the same work, the fact that one lives in India and the other in Paris should not make a difference in what you pay them (well, timezone difficulties aside). You should pay well for good work, and if it's not going to be good work you shouldn't pay at all. 'Pay well' is not relative to where a person lives, it's relative to the market value of that work.
- rantanplan 10y ago
  Both phrases are quite presumptuous. As if I don't know what my cost of living is. This is how much I charge. Thanks for your offer, it's way below of what I think I deserve for my services. Nah, I don't need a lecture from you on why I should find this generous. Nope, I don't care why you make me such a low offer. What does it matter if I can actually find people who pay the rates I charge? The market will balance this out. Thanks for your time, have a nice day.
tribaal 10y ago
As a developer in Switzerland, I'm unfortunately not surprised. Maybe Swiss firms have a real arrogance problem (not all, but many). If it makes you feel any "better", your country of origin is not the reason (I get comments like that while living in Switerland too). They are mostly just clueless. Large Swiss firms even more so (Swisscom being the main offender). EDIT: To clarify, I got lowball offers with some other bullshit reason like "but it'll help bootstrap your career". As if my multiple years (15+) of career in international companies doing a good job (as developer/architect/senior) was not enough for their position, somehow.
- Create 10y ago
  Precarity at CERN, aka cheap disposable temp labour w/o healthcare: http://www.tdg.ch/geneve/actu-genevoise/suisse-prete-aider-employes-detaches-cern/story/15383927 http://www.tdg.ch/geneve/actu-genevoise/suisse-prete-aider-e... And a warning to non-western members: "The cost [...] has been evaluated, taking into account realistic labor prices in different countries. The total cost is X (with a western equivalent value of Y) [where Y>X] source: LHCb calorimeters : Technical Design Report ISBN: 9290831693 cdsweb.cern.ch/record/494264 On top of the above, the usual package for prospective employees: Resolution of the CERN Staff Council - the Management does not propose to align the level of basic CERN salaries with those chosen as the basis for comparison; - in the new career system a large fraction of the staff will have their advancement prospects, and consequently the level of their pension, reduced with respect to the current MARS system; - the overall reduction of the advancement budget will have a negative impact on the contributions to the CERN Health Insurance System (CHIS); http://cds.cern.ch/journal/CERNBulletin/2015/46/Staff%20Association/2063669?ln=en http://cds.cern.ch/journal/CERNBulletin/2015/46/Staff%20Asso... Pensions which will be applicable to new recruits as of 1 January 2012; the Management and CERN Council adopted without any concertation and decided in June 2011 to adopt very unfavourable mesures for new recruits. http://www.gac-epa.org/History/Bulletins/42-2012-04/Bulletin42-en.html http://www.gac-epa.org/History/Bulletins/42-2012-04/Bulletin... Given that cheap and disposable trainees — PhD students and postdocs — fuel the entire scientific research enterprise, it is not surprising that few inside the system seem interested in change. A system complicit in this sort of exploitation is at best indifferent and at worst cruel.
YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago
Yeah, that's supposed to be good business sense: you pay less money for the same amount of work. In truth though, you get what you pay for, always. Software works the same regardless of who writes it, where they live, or how much you pay them, so if you pay less for a piece of software you'll just get a piece of software that's worth less money. It's exactly for this reason that big corporate software is generally shite: because they try to get it at a discount by paying low wages to consultants whom they think they can afford to underpay because they live in a poor part of the world (hint: India). Then they end up with horrible messes of software that nobody wants to work with, at which point they have to pay more money anyway to convince anyone to fix the mess. It's just people thinking they're so smart when in fact they're short-termist and dumb.
- MrBuddyCasino 10y ago
  If what you were saying was true, you'd be getting better quality developers if you only hired guys that were born in your high-wage country. Thats not how it works. I've met a lot of very bad german developers that command a decent wage, simply because there is a scarcity of talent, and I've seen lots of eastern european guys do a fantastic job earning much less, because thats how their local market is like. I agree that it is never a good idea to pay less than the local average, though.
  - shrewduser 10y ago
    except for the most part the market for talent is an international one and the good engineers wil move to the high paying jobs. you find exceptions and cost of living in different places creates some disparity but as a rule "you get what you pay for" still holds water
    - plinkplonk 10y ago
      "t the market for talent is an international one and the good engineers wil move to the high paying jobs." you assume that getting a visa is easy. Often impossible or insanely difficult.
bwanab 10y ago
The Swiss also have a real ageism issue. When I worked there, I had a good friend who was Swiss that got fired. He was in his 50s at the time and the attitude was that nobody that age should be coding. He was a very good developer, but couldn't get hired because of his age. He started a web development company. The key to his success was that when he met with clients he presented himself as "the boss" with his crew of young developers. Back at the office, he was that crew of young developers. He told me that if his clients thought he was the one developing the code, they'd never have hired him.
- justinlardinois 10y ago
  As an American I've heard this is a major issue in our software industry as well. But I'm young and I don't know any significantly older developers so I can't really verify.
  - ryandvm 10y ago
    0_o I think you are verifying it.
    - justinlardinois 10y ago
      My point is that I'm only passing on hearsay.
- beachstartup 10y ago
  as you get older, looking for a job isn't called "looking for a job", it's called "sales". and you can "look for a job" for other people, too.

naivepiano 10y ago

Sad as it may be your being based on a low income country was probably one of the main reasons they approached you. And it is quite universal so I wouldn't attribute it to unprofessionalism. From company's point of view it makes perfect sense to outsource to the best quality/price ratio.

collyw 10y ago
Maybe at double the price he would still be the best quality /price ratio.
- toddkazakov 10y ago
  And still, I was probably 30% cheaper than a local consultant. Anyway, if a relationship starts in this way I cannot image what working with the client would be, so I did myself a favor.
toddkazakov 10y ago
Actually, this wasn't the reason. I already knew the guy who approached me. They were developing a data analytics solution quite similar to others I have worked on/built in the past. They needed a developer with a real-world product experience in their domain. Unfortunately, it wasn't my acquaintance who was responsible for the hiring. Luckily, the software development market is global and there are some really sane people out there.

eps 10y ago

The manager's rant part aside, the reason to outsource to the Eastern Europe, Ukraine and Russia is and has always been the rates.

qaq 10y ago
That's one part of the equation the other is availability of qualified people.
tribaal 10y ago
That's very much untrue. EDIT: I stand corrected - this misses the point. Sure, wages are lower than elsewhere (especially Switzerland), but the quality of engineers in eastern europe is very high. Case in point: Google Switzerland employs lots of eastern europeans with Swiss-level wages. That wouldn't make any sense if the only reason was money. EDIT: My math and electronics teachers (both women, data point) in my Swiss engineering school were Russian and Romanian. Their shared theory was that during communism teaching material was not written by teachers, but was written by topic experts (expert mathematicians were forced to write teaching books). It sucked for the experts (they were forced), but was great for students to have a book written by a master to study. Their point, not mine.
- huhtenberg 10y ago
  > Google Switzerland employs remotely?
  - tribaal 10y ago
    No. On-site, in Zurich. They have arrangements with authorities to get work permits more easily (it made a lot of debate in the press). They "import" qualified workers, paid Swiss salaries. If price was the only matter, that wouldn't happen - Google would open a development office there instead (they have smaller ones, but the Zurich office is the largest that is not in Mountain View).
    - huhtenberg 10y ago

tudorw 10y ago

Do not be surprised, I've interacted with hundreds of companies, many are run incompetently by people unqualified for the position and who have no integrity or morals. Maintain your composure and move on, if you're not being turned down now and again for being too expensive, you're too cheap...

greenspot 10y ago

Saying 'you will live like a king' is not the smartest thing. He should have said: 'Please consider that your local living costs are much lower than in Switzerland. We incorporate those differences in our offered rate like every other company does. Thanks for your understanding.' So the tone was—yes—unprofessional, the attitude not. And even if this attitude is debatable, you have to allow the other party to express reasons for a lower offer in a negotiation.

moron4hire 10y ago
No, that would be just as bad. You pay for results, not for where the person lives.
- _Wintermute 10y ago
  No, you pay the minimum amount you can to get the job done to a satisfactory standard.
  - moron4hire 10y ago
    That's the same thing. But we are apparently only capitalists when it means keeping the minimum wage down.
- Taek 10y ago
  I don't understand the downvotes here. Results are results. I can understand paying a person more if you are worried about providing a living wage, but really you are paying them to do a service for the company. If you are looking at two remote candidates offering to do the same work, the fact that one lives in India and the other in Paris should not make a difference in what you pay them (well, timezone difficulties aside). You should pay well for good work, and if it's not going to be good work you shouldn't pay at all. 'Pay well' is not relative to where a person lives, it's relative to the market value of that work.
rantanplan 10y ago
Both phrases are quite presumptuous. As if I don't know what my cost of living is. This is how much I charge. Thanks for your offer, it's way below of what I think I deserve for my services. Nah, I don't need a lecture from you on why I should find this generous. Nope, I don't care why you make me such a low offer. What does it matter if I can actually find people who pay the rates I charge? The market will balance this out. Thanks for your time, have a nice day.

tribaal 10y ago

As a developer in Switzerland, I'm unfortunately not surprised. Maybe Swiss firms have a real arrogance problem (not all, but many). If it makes you feel any "better", your country of origin is not the reason (I get comments like that while living in Switerland too). They are mostly just clueless. Large Swiss firms even more so (Swisscom being the main offender). EDIT: To clarify, I got lowball offers with some other bullshit reason like "but it'll help bootstrap your career". As if my multiple years (15+) of career in international companies doing a good job (as developer/architect/senior) was not enough for their position, somehow.

Create 10y ago
Precarity at CERN, aka cheap disposable temp labour w/o healthcare: http://www.tdg.ch/geneve/actu-genevoise/suisse-prete-aider-employes-detaches-cern/story/15383927 http://www.tdg.ch/geneve/actu-genevoise/suisse-prete-aider-e... And a warning to non-western members: "The cost [...] has been evaluated, taking into account realistic labor prices in different countries. The total cost is X (with a western equivalent value of Y) [where Y>X] source: LHCb calorimeters : Technical Design Report ISBN: 9290831693 cdsweb.cern.ch/record/494264 On top of the above, the usual package for prospective employees: Resolution of the CERN Staff Council - the Management does not propose to align the level of basic CERN salaries with those chosen as the basis for comparison; - in the new career system a large fraction of the staff will have their advancement prospects, and consequently the level of their pension, reduced with respect to the current MARS system; - the overall reduction of the advancement budget will have a negative impact on the contributions to the CERN Health Insurance System (CHIS); http://cds.cern.ch/journal/CERNBulletin/2015/46/Staff%20Association/2063669?ln=en http://cds.cern.ch/journal/CERNBulletin/2015/46/Staff%20Asso... Pensions which will be applicable to new recruits as of 1 January 2012; the Management and CERN Council adopted without any concertation and decided in June 2011 to adopt very unfavourable mesures for new recruits. http://www.gac-epa.org/History/Bulletins/42-2012-04/Bulletin42-en.html http://www.gac-epa.org/History/Bulletins/42-2012-04/Bulletin... Given that cheap and disposable trainees — PhD students and postdocs — fuel the entire scientific research enterprise, it is not surprising that few inside the system seem interested in change. A system complicit in this sort of exploitation is at best indifferent and at worst cruel.

YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago

Yeah, that's supposed to be good business sense: you pay less money for the same amount of work. In truth though, you get what you pay for, always. Software works the same regardless of who writes it, where they live, or how much you pay them, so if you pay less for a piece of software you'll just get a piece of software that's worth less money. It's exactly for this reason that big corporate software is generally shite: because they try to get it at a discount by paying low wages to consultants whom they think they can afford to underpay because they live in a poor part of the world (hint: India). Then they end up with horrible messes of software that nobody wants to work with, at which point they have to pay more money anyway to convince anyone to fix the mess. It's just people thinking they're so smart when in fact they're short-termist and dumb.

MrBuddyCasino 10y ago
If what you were saying was true, you'd be getting better quality developers if you only hired guys that were born in your high-wage country. Thats not how it works. I've met a lot of very bad german developers that command a decent wage, simply because there is a scarcity of talent, and I've seen lots of eastern european guys do a fantastic job earning much less, because thats how their local market is like. I agree that it is never a good idea to pay less than the local average, though.
- shrewduser 10y ago
  except for the most part the market for talent is an international one and the good engineers wil move to the high paying jobs. you find exceptions and cost of living in different places creates some disparity but as a rule "you get what you pay for" still holds water
  - plinkplonk 10y ago
    "t the market for talent is an international one and the good engineers wil move to the high paying jobs." you assume that getting a visa is easy. Often impossible or insanely difficult.

bwanab 10y ago

The Swiss also have a real ageism issue. When I worked there, I had a good friend who was Swiss that got fired. He was in his 50s at the time and the attitude was that nobody that age should be coding. He was a very good developer, but couldn't get hired because of his age. He started a web development company. The key to his success was that when he met with clients he presented himself as "the boss" with his crew of young developers. Back at the office, he was that crew of young developers. He told me that if his clients thought he was the one developing the code, they'd never have hired him.

justinlardinois 10y ago
As an American I've heard this is a major issue in our software industry as well. But I'm young and I don't know any significantly older developers so I can't really verify.
- ryandvm 10y ago
  0_o I think you are verifying it.
  - justinlardinois 10y ago
    My point is that I'm only passing on hearsay.
beachstartup 10y ago
as you get older, looking for a job isn't called "looking for a job", it's called "sales". and you can "look for a job" for other people, too.