

Hiring Programmers In Tough Markets Like SF or NY - shanedanger
http://www.fastcompany.com/1810918/3-secrets-to-recruiting-tech-talent-in-tough-markets

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kls
_Money and free Cheetos are great, but they come last_

I disagree with this conventional wisdom and think it stems from wishful
thinking on the part of hiring companies. With all things equal money becomes
a secondary concern, but few developer are going to take significantly less
for a position. Conversely if a company where to place an ad stating that they
are paying 120% of the best market rate available, they would have quality
developers lined up around the block. If money where the last concern then
every developer would be working on their own problems, because they would
find them far more interesting than what most companies have to offer. When I
see this kind of advice, I cannot help but suspect the rest of the advice.
More honest advice would be don't be cheap more than any other hire (with
maybe the exception of sales) a good developer can earn his keep 10 fold, as
such expect to compensate them well.

The other issue I see is there is no mention of finding remote developers. For
the last few years I have assembled several all remote teams with members in
Louisiana, Florida, NY, the valley, Australia and so on. With all the SaaS and
Skype there is little need for a development team to be collocated. Finding
talent is much easier when you are drawing on a global pool of talent. When we
hire, we never hire based on compensation and always hire based on the best
talent we can find wherever they are, unless their rate is astronomical we pay
above market rate if they request it.

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soonisnow
"The bottom line is this: Not every talented programmer in the world is from a
city with “Silicon” in its nickname. But many of those programmers would love
to live in one."

This makes tons of sense. Apart from Forrst and GitHub (and Dribble), good old
fashioned 1st or 2nd degree connections can be gold in non-coastal centers for
tech and design talent. My co-founder is located in Pittsburgh and has begun
to see lots of interest from other founders who want to key into the scene
there (CMU, etc) and he is very happy to help, because well, it's cool to help
startups, but also it's a forcing function for him to engage with top talent
in his own backyard.

I'm willing to bet if most of us went into our contacts we would find a "hub"
like my co-founder in cities like Pittsburgh, Austin, places in upstate NY,
etc, who would be keen to help out.

PS: Do people find the job board at Dribbble useful?

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zdmc
I've been working remotely for the past 2.5 yrs, and our Team is globally
distributed (Chennai, US East Coast, and I am in Hawai'i)... Multiple time-
zones, multiple languages, no issues.

I do not understand why so many companies are still stuck in the "stone ages"
(perhaps "factory ages" is more apropos) when it comes to sitting everyone
down in the same physical location. Communication is relatively simple
nowadays, so you can still "see" the person if need be (e.g., Skype). Our Team
has been successful with email and a few tele-conferences. I recently traveled
to one of our regional offices (unfortunately most ppl in the company still
work at these), and sat in some cubicle wondering "aren't we more civilized
than this?"

End rant. If you want good ppl, then PLEASE consider hiring remote workers.

