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Sure, these exist, but that's not really the same line of business. You have your technical consulting firm and general IT contractors that sell services to co

Sure, these exist, but that's not really the same line of business. You have your technical consulting firm and general IT contractors that sell services to companies whose main competence is not software developers. Then you have contractors go on-site, develop some software, and go back once the project is over. But those aren't red badges in the sense we're talking about. We're talking about a company whose core competence is software development taking on contractors as members in existing software dev teams. The companies employing these contractors tend to be more like shell companies then technical consulting firms, and most of the training given to the contractor is the same as that given to FTEs, by the host company, since they have to work on the same code base and contractors and FTEs need to be in lock-step.

tptacek 8y ago
I ran a firm like this, and we had vendor badges. We weren't a "shell company", but even if we had been, the underlying idea would be the same: we W2'd our employees and invoiced our clients. We were on the hook for paying for employee downtime. I'm responding to the claim above, about "that never being a thing they've seen", which seems silly to me because it's the basic way every staff-aug firm works.
- chaosite 8y ago
  Were your clients software (or software-adjacent) companies like Google, Intel, Facebook, etc., or companies who usually do not employ software development teams? Also, since I know who you are, did your firm supply highly specialized engineers in fields such as security or cryptography? Or were you involved in general software development?
- lovich 8y ago
  How many of these contractors are software engineers who do get W-2d jobs? My understanding was that the majority were non software roles like cleaning staff, physical security guards, cafeteria workers, etc. I've worked in temp agencies for that type of work and you stop getting paid when the temp agency does. Its all hourly paid work with the contracting firm only acting as a legal shield for the hiring company to be able to add/remove what are effectively their employees, without being beholden to the political or legal ramifications of layoffs
  - tptacek 8y ago
    Since the instructions quoted refer to rewarding team members on projects with things like t-shirts, the impression I got from the article is: most of them. Regardless: I was responding to a point upthread about the supposed rarity of these arrangements. I'm less interested in litigating other things.
    - lovich 8y ago
      I think the point is, firms like yours may exist. But they are in the minority at large tech firms who have software development as their core competency
      - tptacek 8y ago
        I think I'm maybe not being clear. I'm saying: body shop or not, the core feature of a staff-aug firm --- the entire reason they exist at all --- is so that the staff-aug firm owns the W2 downtime risk, and the client can retain or release augmented staff at will. The question from the top of the thread is whether staff-aug firm employees get paid even when Google doesn't need them. And the answer to that question, in general, is yes: they're W2 employees, not 1099s. I'm sure Matasano did a number of things better than a large body shop firm. But paying for bench time is a norm, not an exception.
        lovich 8y ago
        I agree with the rest of your post except for >But paying for bench time is a norm, not an exception Having worked at a temp firm for a low skilled job, call center and data entry, you don't get paid for downtime. They have you on an agreement where you get paid hourly and just aren't scheduled. Or they let you go and call you back if there's more work later. The negotiating power isn't there for employees to have the companies shoulder that risk
- bsimpson 8y ago
  As a counterpoint, I was a TVC in an engineering role at a large tech company. I had interviewed with the company for a full-time role, and was invited to TVC due to a companywide hiring freeze. I negotiated my pay directly with the company. They basically told me "we can only hire TVCs now, and the vetting process for new vendors is exhausting. If you want to start right away, join this agency." The client was the agency's primary (or maybe only) customer. I was paid an hourly rate and expected to fill out a timesheet. If I wasn't working (e.g. if I was at the end of the client's max 1 year TVC policy), I wouldn't be paid. The agency took some commission on top of my hourly rate, but I never knew what it was. The whole thing was a very thin veil to dissuade TVCs from going for back benefits like the famous Microsoft case. Both companies were upfront about that.

tptacek 8y ago

I ran a firm like this, and we had vendor badges. We weren't a "shell company", but even if we had been, the underlying idea would be the same: we W2'd our employees and invoiced our clients. We were on the hook for paying for employee downtime. I'm responding to the claim above, about "that never being a thing they've seen", which seems silly to me because it's the basic way every staff-aug firm works.

chaosite 8y ago
Were your clients software (or software-adjacent) companies like Google, Intel, Facebook, etc., or companies who usually do not employ software development teams? Also, since I know who you are, did your firm supply highly specialized engineers in fields such as security or cryptography? Or were you involved in general software development?
lovich 8y ago
How many of these contractors are software engineers who do get W-2d jobs? My understanding was that the majority were non software roles like cleaning staff, physical security guards, cafeteria workers, etc. I've worked in temp agencies for that type of work and you stop getting paid when the temp agency does. Its all hourly paid work with the contracting firm only acting as a legal shield for the hiring company to be able to add/remove what are effectively their employees, without being beholden to the political or legal ramifications of layoffs
- tptacek 8y ago
  Since the instructions quoted refer to rewarding team members on projects with things like t-shirts, the impression I got from the article is: most of them. Regardless: I was responding to a point upthread about the supposed rarity of these arrangements. I'm less interested in litigating other things.
  - lovich 8y ago
    I think the point is, firms like yours may exist. But they are in the minority at large tech firms who have software development as their core competency
    - tptacek 8y ago
      I think I'm maybe not being clear. I'm saying: body shop or not, the core feature of a staff-aug firm --- the entire reason they exist at all --- is so that the staff-aug firm owns the W2 downtime risk, and the client can retain or release augmented staff at will. The question from the top of the thread is whether staff-aug firm employees get paid even when Google doesn't need them. And the answer to that question, in general, is yes: they're W2 employees, not 1099s. I'm sure Matasano did a number of things better than a large body shop firm. But paying for bench time is a norm, not an exception.
      - lovich 8y ago
        I agree with the rest of your post except for >But paying for bench time is a norm, not an exception Having worked at a temp firm for a low skilled job, call center and data entry, you don't get paid for downtime. They have you on an agreement where you get paid hourly and just aren't scheduled. Or they let you go and call you back if there's more work later. The negotiating power isn't there for employees to have the companies shoulder that risk
bsimpson 8y ago
As a counterpoint, I was a TVC in an engineering role at a large tech company. I had interviewed with the company for a full-time role, and was invited to TVC due to a companywide hiring freeze. I negotiated my pay directly with the company. They basically told me "we can only hire TVCs now, and the vetting process for new vendors is exhausting. If you want to start right away, join this agency." The client was the agency's primary (or maybe only) customer. I was paid an hourly rate and expected to fill out a timesheet. If I wasn't working (e.g. if I was at the end of the client's max 1 year TVC policy), I wouldn't be paid. The agency took some commission on top of my hourly rate, but I never knew what it was. The whole thing was a very thin veil to dissuade TVCs from going for back benefits like the famous Microsoft case. Both companies were upfront about that.