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I feel your pain. Trying to hire perm in London at the moment is a real challenge, even with a recruiter. Contractor rates are obscene (5-8x perm). Recruiting a

by bvm 8y ago

I feel your pain. Trying to hire perm in London at the moment is a real challenge, even with a recruiter. Contractor rates are obscene (5-8x perm). Recruiting and retaining is what keeps me awake at night over and above any tech issues that I'm working on.

ravenstine 8y ago
What tends to be lacking in potential candidates? Dunno if you can know this if you're using a recruiter, but I'd be curious.
- bvm 8y ago
  YMMV but numbers of them! we offer good salary/benefits etc, but on the whole senior and mid-level devs seem to be contracting for our tech stack (React/Node) and that's a path I'm not particularly keen on going down. edit: if anyone reads this and wants a job, I've put my email in my profile.
  - 666lumberjack 8y ago
    Are you open to Juniors?
    - bvm 8y ago
      Sure.
  - badpun 8y ago
    Hint: most of them are not contracting because they particularly like the contractor's life. They're contracting because they can be paid more. I think in London the reality is that, if your company is using a new and hot tech stack (say Spark or Kubernetes), then the contractor's rate IS the market salary, as most people how know this stuff are doing contracts. You can find them as full-timers with regular FT salary (60-90k GBP ?) too, but that's more of an exception and a lucky catch I guess. Also, once they figure out how easy it is for them to make more doing the same work, they might leave anyway.
user5994461 8y ago
How little are you paying your dev that it can be 1/8th of a contractor? Even the cheapest dev I have ever met in London wasn't as low as 1/5th of the most expensive contractor I have met.
- bvm 8y ago
  Ah yeh, sorry, my mental maths strayed a bit into hyperbole there, it's more like 4-5x
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - user5994461 8y ago
    How much are you trying to pay your dev that it can be 1/5th of a contractor? It's no wonder you're having trouble finding anyone.

by bvm 8y ago

ravenstine 8y ago

What tends to be lacking in potential candidates? Dunno if you can know this if you're using a recruiter, but I'd be curious.

bvm 8y ago
YMMV but numbers of them! we offer good salary/benefits etc, but on the whole senior and mid-level devs seem to be contracting for our tech stack (React/Node) and that's a path I'm not particularly keen on going down. edit: if anyone reads this and wants a job, I've put my email in my profile.
- 666lumberjack 8y ago
  Are you open to Juniors?
  - bvm 8y ago
    Sure.
- badpun 8y ago
  Hint: most of them are not contracting because they particularly like the contractor's life. They're contracting because they can be paid more. I think in London the reality is that, if your company is using a new and hot tech stack (say Spark or Kubernetes), then the contractor's rate IS the market salary, as most people how know this stuff are doing contracts. You can find them as full-timers with regular FT salary (60-90k GBP ?) too, but that's more of an exception and a lucky catch I guess. Also, once they figure out how easy it is for them to make more doing the same work, they might leave anyway.

user5994461 8y ago

How little are you paying your dev that it can be 1/8th of a contractor? Even the cheapest dev I have ever met in London wasn't as low as 1/5th of the most expensive contractor I have met.

bvm 8y ago
Ah yeh, sorry, my mental maths strayed a bit into hyperbole there, it's more like 4-5x
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- user5994461 8y ago
  How much are you trying to pay your dev that it can be 1/5th of a contractor? It's no wonder you're having trouble finding anyone.