[BangPypers] [chennaipy 1126] [XPost][Slightly OT] Could you share your experiences about Python Freelance programming, from a programmer's perspective

Sidu Ponnappa lorddaemon at gmail.com
Wed Nov 2 18:35:12 CET 2011


> Do you do your tests in Python, or whatever language the fresher
> knows? So far, we have not received a single resume mentioning Python.
Any object oriented language the candidate is comfortable with is fine
by us. Unit tests are, however, mandatory. TDD is a huge plus.

> Question is, how much to pay?
Figure out who your competition in the hiring space is (this could be
very very different from your business competitors). Find out how much
they pay. Then do your best to pay more. For us, this means companies
like ThoughtWorks, Amazon and co. We try to pay salaries that are
close to these firms (though matching Amazon is still slightly beyond
us for now).

> From the freshers point of view though, their friends making insane
> salaries at MNCs always make them dissatisfied. Any recommendations?
Yes - pay more than the MNCs or at least get close and compensate for
the delta with a brilliant work environment. Unfortunately, I have no
better answer than this. Folks typically evaluate a prospective
employer on salary, work environment (including how awesome
prospective colleagues are, how much they can learn, and how
transparent and honest the organisations is) and the work itself.

There is no magic formula that allows you to hire better people while
paying significantly less than your competitors, but you can usually
swing it by being somewhere close on salary and doing better than them
on the last two parameters. Honestly, a small company that can't
trounce an MNC on work environment is doing something seriously wrong.

> There is also the tug of "Bangalore".
Identify why this is the case and look to plug the gaps. If the
attractiveness lies in the lifestyle, then you may wish to open up a
branch in Bangalore. I should warn you though that on the hiring
front, things are no better here :)

Best,
Sidu Ponnappa.
http://c42.in
http://rubymonk.com

On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 10:47 PM, Rajeev J Sebastian
<rajeev.sebastian at gmail.com> wrote:
> Thanks Sidu and Senthil for your recommendations, which were very
> helpful. As you suggested, the most important change we can make is to
> test directly with code.
>
> Do you do your tests in Python, or whatever language the fresher
> knows? So far, we have not received a single resume mentioning Python.
>
> As for pay, we are willing to pay in return for exceptional work. We
> outsource a LOT and pay well for absorbing the responsibility and
> risk. But we have so far been unsuccessful in finding talented people,
> to whom we could pay equivalent to what we outsource.
>
> Question is, how much to pay? I guess this is not really an
> "answerable" question. Looking around at the "sweat factories" that
> surround us, we pay very well. There is also the tug of "Bangalore".
> >From the freshers point of view though, their friends making insane
> salaries at MNCs always make them dissatisfied. Any recommendations?
>
> Regards
> Rajeev J Sebastian
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