I don't think I can generalize usefully about hiring. I can generally find Lispers to help me, but that's at least partly because I've been one for a long time

I don't think I can generalize usefully about hiring. I can generally find Lispers to help me, but that's at least partly because I've been one for a long time and as a consequence I have a handful of contacts I can turn to who will either sign up or help me find someone. (If you want me to see if I can help, send me mail at mikel@evins.net and we can talk it over.) In most of the cases on my list of past projects, the people who organized the projects were Lispers themselves or had contacts in the Lisp community, and recruiting from that community was part of the early project setup. The bad news is that the community of Lispers is small compared to those of more popular languages. The good news is that Lispers are generally eager to work in Lisp, which can be helpful in recruiting. For example, I prioritize Lisp opportunities over others, and I'll work for less money if I like the people and I get to work in Lisp. I have been part of hiring and mentoring some programmers that were not experienced with Lisp. In all but one case, they were interested in learning it, and made quick progress. I've worked on a few teams of mixed Lispers and non-Lispers, ranging in size from about three to about sixty. I've found that you want one or more experienced Lispers who are willing and able to take on a mentorship role. With mentors, good programmers can pick up Lisp and its style and idioms pretty quickly (assuming they want to). Without mentors it can be rough going.