4 ms·

I've recently been solicited by a couple of recruiters, on behalf of contractors who've got some of that work. One of them in particular amused me by trying to

by aaronem 12y ago

I've recently been solicited by a couple of recruiters, on behalf of contractors who've got some of that work. One of them in particular amused me by trying to hard-sell a six-month contract job with a firm which organized a "career fair" an hour south of here on two days' notice. When I showed disinterest, he "sweetened the pot" with an offer of a $25 gift card. That was when I told him not to bother contacting me again. (It's not even so much that he tried to bribe me, as that he tried to bribe me so low. I mean, really -- $25? What kind of naïf does this jackass usually deal with?) If that's the at all representative of recruitment efforts around healthcare.gov, then I'm not sure exactly what it says about the quality of the staff working on the project, but I can't imagine it saying anything good; the best of them are probably quite bright, painfully inexperienced, and not yet equipped to understand how awful this project is going to look good on their résumés -- and I'd tend to suspect that the best of them are a small fraction of the whole. Between that, and the inevitable bloat and quality issues of any federal technology project with this many fingers in the pie, I'm really not surprised the whole thing has turned out to be such a rolling catastrophe.

us0r 12y ago
Based on the last notice they sent out - around 400 people are working on this mess. I got a feeling they are more concerned with just filling the positions then hiring (and paying) experienced developers.
- watwut 12y ago
  Based on what I seen in hacker news few month ago, a guy trying to hire people on healthcare.gov described it somewhat like this: we are saving the project and are looking for people. We hire them for few months stints (3-6 months), they work super hard that time and then leave. He mentioned occasional sleeping under desk, it did not sounded like a joke. If true, they have perpetual death march with constantly changing workforce and everyone being essentially newbies on the project. How many experienced people can you get with that sell?
  - Crito 12y ago
    "Saving the project" has become a massive red flag for me. In my experience, when anything about "saving" is mentioned, it means a handful of people started the project, made a hash of it, then after a few short weeks passed it off to another team who were tasked with "saving it". This second team blames all their failures on the first, thinks that they are making the best of a bad situation, then after a few months passes it off again. The new people comfort themselves with the same "saving the project" narrative for a while more until it again comes time for somebody else to save it. Each team after the first lasts only as long as they can plausibly believe that everything is the fault of the people that came before them. As soon as they realize that their shit stinks too, they bounce. In the end, 90%+ of the man hours in a project were put in by people who thought they were saving it.

by aaronem 12y ago

us0r 12y ago

Based on the last notice they sent out - around 400 people are working on this mess. I got a feeling they are more concerned with just filling the positions then hiring (and paying) experienced developers.

watwut 12y ago
Based on what I seen in hacker news few month ago, a guy trying to hire people on healthcare.gov described it somewhat like this: we are saving the project and are looking for people. We hire them for few months stints (3-6 months), they work super hard that time and then leave. He mentioned occasional sleeping under desk, it did not sounded like a joke. If true, they have perpetual death march with constantly changing workforce and everyone being essentially newbies on the project. How many experienced people can you get with that sell?
- Crito 12y ago
  "Saving the project" has become a massive red flag for me. In my experience, when anything about "saving" is mentioned, it means a handful of people started the project, made a hash of it, then after a few short weeks passed it off to another team who were tasked with "saving it". This second team blames all their failures on the first, thinks that they are making the best of a bad situation, then after a few months passes it off again. The new people comfort themselves with the same "saving the project" narrative for a while more until it again comes time for somebody else to save it. Each team after the first lasts only as long as they can plausibly believe that everything is the fault of the people that came before them. As soon as they realize that their shit stinks too, they bounce. In the end, 90%+ of the man hours in a project were put in by people who thought they were saving it.