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Devs should keep their team when changing jobs(blog.goelevator.com)

almost 8 years ago from Mike Anderson

  • Jonathan CutrellJonathan Cutrell, almost 8 years ago

    This is weird to me. It feels totally wrong for a lot of reasons.

    1. I would literally never hire a full team of developers with this kind of blood pact. If I lose one, I lose all? This is like a very specific kind of union that as an employer, the costs and risks FAR outweigh the potential benefits.
    2. Part of the value of going to a new job is being exposed to new people. If you lock in your "team" early and decide that that's all you want to work with, and that your social capital is worth hanging on to - isn't that kind of like investing in a bunch of decent stock and being afraid to trade up to better stock? Social capital doesn't disappear when you move to new places. It multiplies, in many ways.
    3. It seems like this is heavily soaked in entitlement, with these kinds of things: "Anyone should be able to be ‘acqui-hired’". The truth is, this kind of hiring is usually strategic, and it happens in a subset of companies that are willing to take on risk. The truth is, for every 1300 people Google hires, even decent-sized small businesses hire 1. So if you want to follow this strategy, you're almost only guaranteed to get bites from big fish. Like, major fish - more like sharks or whales.
    7 points
    • Mike AndersonMike Anderson, almost 8 years ago

      Hey Jonathan, Did you see the examples in the article? They weren't negative at all—exactly the opposite. There are tons of reasons for a team to move on at once—for example in Seattle this week Porch.com is downsizing same thing happens at Microsoft and Amazon all the time. It would make a ton of sense for those folks to put themselves on the market together.

      2 points
      • Jonathan CutrellJonathan Cutrell, almost 8 years ago

        I did see the examples, and by no means do I think this is a bad ideal. I just don't think many people (other than large companies) will want to hire these kinds of teams - it's too risky. You lose one and you lose them all? I guess retention could see positive gains, but as a person looking to hire in the agency world, at least, this is never feasible for us. Too much investment up front, too much risk.

        But, this is ultimately what you do when you hire a consulting firm. The difference is, you aren't bringing a consulting firm on full time - you are setting a contractual limit (and contractual requirement) to the engagement.

        0 points