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As a professional software engineer, it's common for support staff at elite firms to number 1/10 or 1/100 compared to “productive” staff. Even including folks w

by lumost 4y ago

As a professional software engineer, it's common for support staff at elite firms to number 1/10 or 1/100 compared to “productive” staff. Even including folks who “support” the productive part of the business with tooling and infrastructure - you are usually looking at 1/3 at most.

vkou 4y ago
> As a professional software engineer, it's common for support staff at elite firms to number 1/10 or 1/100 compared to “productive” staff. Only if you close your eyes and shut your ears and not count any of the facilities, HR, finance, legal, admin, media, procurement, and janitorial staff. I personally haven't seen a lot of SWEs spending much of their time paying the power bill, laying out offices, cleaning toilets, or sending out W-2s.
- lumost 4y ago
  That was including those folks. HR departments are tiny, and increasingly automated. W2 is done by ADP or a similar system, same with billing alongside CFO oversight. My last group had one lawyer per 1000 engineers or so.
  - dragonwriter 4y ago
    > W2 is done by ADP or a similar system, same with billing alongside CFO oversight Outsourcing the tail doesn't mean it doesn't exist (it might make it slightly more efficient, or it might just be a convenience bevause it gives you someone else that is liable in the event of a mistake.)
    - theamk 4y ago
      Sure it does. ADP has about 60K people, and 620K _companies_ as customers. That's on average 0.1 ADP employee per entire client org.
- theamk 4y ago
  I once worked at small org with a dozen people, and one person was "support" role: she was finance, admin, facilities etc.. We did have cleaning services from our landlord and separate legal and tax, but they were nowhere close to full time. In another place we had maybe 30-40 two person offices, and 3 of them were occupied by HR/finance/admin/facilities etc... So 1/100 does not sound very realistic (maybe for all-remote orgs?), but 1/10 I can easily believe.
  - lumost 4y ago
    1/100 was at a firm with many thousands if employees. There is a good amount of cost efficiency that happens when companies get big.

by lumost 4y ago

vkou 4y ago

> As a professional software engineer, it's common for support staff at elite firms to number 1/10 or 1/100 compared to “productive” staff. Only if you close your eyes and shut your ears and not count any of the facilities, HR, finance, legal, admin, media, procurement, and janitorial staff. I personally haven't seen a lot of SWEs spending much of their time paying the power bill, laying out offices, cleaning toilets, or sending out W-2s.

lumost 4y ago
That was including those folks. HR departments are tiny, and increasingly automated. W2 is done by ADP or a similar system, same with billing alongside CFO oversight. My last group had one lawyer per 1000 engineers or so.
- dragonwriter 4y ago
  > W2 is done by ADP or a similar system, same with billing alongside CFO oversight Outsourcing the tail doesn't mean it doesn't exist (it might make it slightly more efficient, or it might just be a convenience bevause it gives you someone else that is liable in the event of a mistake.)
  - theamk 4y ago
    Sure it does. ADP has about 60K people, and 620K _companies_ as customers. That's on average 0.1 ADP employee per entire client org.
theamk 4y ago
I once worked at small org with a dozen people, and one person was "support" role: she was finance, admin, facilities etc.. We did have cleaning services from our landlord and separate legal and tax, but they were nowhere close to full time. In another place we had maybe 30-40 two person offices, and 3 of them were occupied by HR/finance/admin/facilities etc... So 1/100 does not sound very realistic (maybe for all-remote orgs?), but 1/10 I can easily believe.
- lumost 4y ago
  1/100 was at a firm with many thousands if employees. There is a good amount of cost efficiency that happens when companies get big.