5 ms·

Here's something I wrote on a different discussion about hiring: Imagine I cost my company $50 an hour in salary, and earn them $150 an hour (revenue of 3-5x s

Here's something I wrote on a different discussion about hiring: Imagine I cost my company $50 an hour in salary, and earn them $150 an hour (revenue of 3-5x salary is ballpark for most companies, we'll go for the low end for some perspective). As a senior dev, I have to sit in all the interviews of people potentially joining my team. Imagine we have 10 people that make it through the HR round. I have to participate in 10 interviews, and then likely 3 more for the final round. My cost for round 2 is: 10 people x 2 hours x (150 lost revenue + 50 salary paid) = $4k My cost for round 3 is: 3 x 8 x (150 + 50) = $4.8k My company has already dropped $8.8k on my involvement solely in the interview room for your typical entry level position. This doesn't even include my involvement in onboarding, training, pre-interview prep, post-interview review, etc. This is also JUST ME, and a very lowball figure at that. Now factor in the cost of the HR round, recruiters, background checks, the other devs in the interviews with me, etc. It adds up very, very quickly. The "costs of doing business" can easily be reduced by not interviewing for shits and giggles.

WalterSear 9y ago
I think the problem is that the company's budget and the hiring managers are different things - both in terms of resources and how people are willing to think about them.
flachsechs 9y ago
smaller companies avoid interviewing like this out of pure practicality, it's only the larger ones that can afford to waste $100k filling a position.
Danihan 9y ago
I don't get why companies can't just hire a bunch of more "questionable" applicants at a lower rate, say $45k - $60k or so for junior devs in most cities. No need to spend much effort on the interview process, just make sure they can solve a couple standardized problems, and then "hire" them as contractors for a 90-day trial. Put them onto teams and throw them in the deep end, then get rid of all the ones who can't swim, which will probably be like 75%. But you'll also find quite a few unexpected gems that way. I mean, that's exactly what we did in Call Center management and it worked great. Hired people at $10 / hour for the first 90 days, then a $2 raise up to $12. We did have super high attrition for brand new employees (since we didn't technically do a contracting period,) but who really cares. We just kept on filtering and eventually had dozens of shockingly intelligent and competent call center employees for like, $13 / hour. (This was in the Midwest.)
- HeroOfAges 9y ago
  Quite a few companies are doing exactly what you describe to fill dev positions. The real cost comes when the systems designed and built by those junior devs are so brittle it becomes very time consuming and expensive to add new features. Most of the time, however, those systems built by the junior devs are so buggy there's no time to build new features in any case because everyone is too busy dealing with issues in prod.
  - notyourday 9y ago
    That's because these companies management loves to develop by committee that comes with agilie, points, IPMs and standups. When a voice of expert is assigned the same weight as the voice of a Joe Random Developer and there are more Joe Random Developers than experts, you end up with garbage fire of systems.
  - sidlls 9y ago
    It isn't just junior devs. It's also senior ones with a sophisticated grasp of CS trivia and little expertise outside of it.
- ethan_g 9y ago
  I think a lot of firms already do something like that through internship programs.
- EliRivers 9y ago
  I don't know how it is in your business, but if I was given a new batch of team members every 90 days in the expectation that 75% of them would be gone in three months, I would also be gone in three months.

WalterSear 9y ago

I think the problem is that the company's budget and the hiring managers are different things - both in terms of resources and how people are willing to think about them.

flachsechs 9y ago

smaller companies avoid interviewing like this out of pure practicality, it's only the larger ones that can afford to waste $100k filling a position.

Danihan 9y ago

I don't get why companies can't just hire a bunch of more "questionable" applicants at a lower rate, say $45k - $60k or so for junior devs in most cities. No need to spend much effort on the interview process, just make sure they can solve a couple standardized problems, and then "hire" them as contractors for a 90-day trial. Put them onto teams and throw them in the deep end, then get rid of all the ones who can't swim, which will probably be like 75%. But you'll also find quite a few unexpected gems that way. I mean, that's exactly what we did in Call Center management and it worked great. Hired people at $10 / hour for the first 90 days, then a $2 raise up to $12. We did have super high attrition for brand new employees (since we didn't technically do a contracting period,) but who really cares. We just kept on filtering and eventually had dozens of shockingly intelligent and competent call center employees for like, $13 / hour. (This was in the Midwest.)

HeroOfAges 9y ago
Quite a few companies are doing exactly what you describe to fill dev positions. The real cost comes when the systems designed and built by those junior devs are so brittle it becomes very time consuming and expensive to add new features. Most of the time, however, those systems built by the junior devs are so buggy there's no time to build new features in any case because everyone is too busy dealing with issues in prod.
- notyourday 9y ago
  That's because these companies management loves to develop by committee that comes with agilie, points, IPMs and standups. When a voice of expert is assigned the same weight as the voice of a Joe Random Developer and there are more Joe Random Developers than experts, you end up with garbage fire of systems.
- sidlls 9y ago
  It isn't just junior devs. It's also senior ones with a sophisticated grasp of CS trivia and little expertise outside of it.
ethan_g 9y ago
I think a lot of firms already do something like that through internship programs.
EliRivers 9y ago
I don't know how it is in your business, but if I was given a new batch of team members every 90 days in the expectation that 75% of them would be gone in three months, I would also be gone in three months.