Startups: Stop Trying To Hire Ninja-Rockstar Engineers

http://onstartups.com/tabid/3339/bid/87890/Startups-Stop-Trying-To-Hire-Ninja-Rockstar-Engineers.aspx?source=hn

by vrikhter • 14 years ago

66 81 14 years ago

untog2• 14 years ago

I don't disagree with a lot that's being said here, but:

At that rate, you can give a junior developer a 10% raise every year for 3 years at the end of which you'd have an experienced senior employee

This won't work, because of the "short-termism" that permeates through startup culture. A great many companies have no intention of still being a startup in three years time- they want to be acquired or be absolutely huge (at which point that individual programmer means less). There is a huge (and perhaps damaging) focus on early results, and in that environment waiting for a junior to get to grips with stuff will be seen as a weakness.

mindcrime7• 14 years ago

Personally, I think "short-term'ism" is a disease that plagues business (if not society as a whole) in America these days. I also think taking more a of a long-term view can be an advantage on many levels, and I have often said that - when we get to a point where we can hire employees - one thing we will do at Fogbeam Labs is focus on hiring younger, less experienced folks and provide training, education, and mentorship... and build a "promote from within" culture where we aim for long-term relationships. Some sort of profit-sharing plan would seem to be a good idea as well.

Then again, we have all sorts of radical "against the grain" ideas. Like, the idea that you don't need to recruit at Stanford and MIT and Harvard to get great people. We believe you can recruit at, say, NCCU[1], UNC-P[2], ECSU[3], etc., - or even WTCC[4] - and find talented people who will not demand the same salaries as the Ivy Leaguers, but will also be hungrier and have a something to prove.

Time will tell...

[1] http://www.nccu.edu/

[2] http://www.uncp.edu/

[3] http://www.ecsu.edu/

[4] http://www.waketech.edu

(disclaimer: by saying "younger" I don't mean to say that actual age will be a factor... it's just that less-experienced folks tend to be younger by nature. But we would hire a 65 year old who had just undergone some sort of career retraining program, for example, if he/she was qualified. Discriminating by age, color, religion, ethnicity, etc., isn't just illegal, it's bad business. Why narrow down the pool of quality people you're working with?)

codeonfire2• 14 years ago

It won't work. you won't do the promote from within step, or you will promote one guy, or you won't pay enough money with the promotions. It will take your employees 2-3 review cycles to learn what's up. At that point your (now experienced) people will leave for places that pay more for experience.

lsc2• 14 years ago

Eh, but there is a reason for this "short-termism" - people want to exit before the current favorable business cycle ends. Business cycles are famously quick and famously dramatic here in silicon valley.

untog2• 14 years ago

Sure. I wasn't blaming people for responding to the stimuli around them, but that it's still unhealthy all the same.

chime• 14 years ago

What he should be saying is don't hire pompous pretend-to-know-it-alls. That is something all of us can agree with. But if you've spent the better part of the last two decades learning how to be a good developer and have applied your skills across various technologies, projects, and industries, you deserve the six-figure salary. Why? Because ten mediocre singers cannot sing as well as Aretha Franklin.

Hire nice, competent, hard-working people with the requisite experience/knowledge and pay them what they deserve. If the project needs junior developers, hire junior developers. If it needs senior developers, then hire senior developers. Don't expect junior developers without any guidance to automatically turn into proficient veterans just because they've been doing it for five years. They could be doing the sub-optimal thing for a decade and not know it.

Stop making lists of who/what/why not to hire and just give the promising candidates a chance to prove themselves before/during/after the interviewing process. Also realize that if you make it a company policy to not hire anyone who is "senior", you could be violating federal laws against age-discrimination, depending on how senior is defined. It's no different than saying "must be a former Boy Scout", which immediately disqualifies all females and thus is discriminatory.

edwinnathaniel2• 14 years ago

... but Aretha Franklin only gets paid IF she performed, she doesn't have bi-weekly paycheck.

Apples vs Oranges...

But I agree with the rest :)

notatoad• 14 years ago

Have you seen the job postings here on HN? They all use that exact language - rock star or ninja or some other silly adjective. It sounds like they're specifically looking for pompous know-it-alls. I think what he says is exactly what he should be saying (and for the most part, exactly the same thing you're saying).

lsc2• 14 years ago

hm. From what I've seen? senior salaries are rather higher than the article mentions, and Jr. salaries are rather lower. (in Silicon Valley) - Junior types are still having a hard time finding work at all, as far as I can tell.

That said, I think that the key is "what skills do you have?" If you are (or have) someone good already, hiring on a apprentice can be a great thing. But you need someone at the company that is good at what you are doing. That could be you, and that could be an employee. But, for instance, I am not going to train up a new accountant. (or for that matter, a new webapp developer.)

SomeCallMeTim4• 14 years ago

Are they really talking about Ninja-Rockstar engineers, or "only" developers at the 10x end of the Mythical Man Month spectrum?

Because you can hire a junior engineer close to that end of the spectrum. It's just harder to know whether they are really that good without seeing a track record.

From the article:

>The rationale you'll typically hear is along the lines of "a great developer is 10x as productive as a mediocre one." That might be true, but it is an impractical startup hiring strategy.

So...they grant that "it might be true," but recommend that, instead of hiring someone on the 10x end of the productivity spectrum, you should instead hire ten "cheaper" developers? At the bargain of $70k/year each instead of an expensive $107k per year for one of them?

Oh, and don't forget to throw in the cost of a more experienced lead to manage those 10 junior programmers, because they won't manage themselves.

Someone isn't really thinking about the math here. Or they like to spend their Series-A funding like it's going out of style.

Don't get me wrong; there's a place for junior programmers in a start-up, after you've gotten enough 10x programmers. There are lots of programming tasks that don't need the 10x programmer and frankly are a waste of his or her time.

But there are also a lot of tasks (depending on the start-up) that require a 10x programmer (or better). Past a certain level of complexity, 1x programmers will never be able to solve a problem well. Even if you had ten of them. [1]

What people don't realize is that the 10x programmer isn't a rock star/ninja -- as Joel said a while agao, you're not actually hiring the top 1%. [2] The best developers all just have jobs and aren't looking most of the time.

[1] http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/HighNotes.html

[2] http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2005/01/27.html

mindcrime7• 14 years ago

The best developers all just have jobs and aren't looking most of the time.

Sounds like another good reason to focus on hiring recent grads, career changers, etc., to me. You just have to figure out a way to predict - better than chance - which ones will become great developers. Whether or not that's doable is, I suppose, an open question.

enko3• 14 years ago

I guess the question is whether startups, who are usually in intense competition and working against the clock, have the time and energy spare to lead people through that process. I wouldn't have thought so.

A good place for juniors to start would be in normal web shops, not high-pressure startups.

Do you think Tesla Motors grabbed a few engineering grads and shop floor assistants, chucked them in a room and hoped they'd "grow into" knowing how to make an electric car? Of course not - for a startup like that, timely and accurate execution is absolutely critical and they would have hired the best, most experienced people they could get. I don't see why software startups are any different.

SomeCallMeTim4• 14 years ago

I agree -- as I said above, you can get close to the 10x end of the spectrum from a recent grad.

In fact, I don't know that productivity goes up a lot after that point. Experience does, which certainly improves your OVERALL productivity, but I know that I was much faster at cranking out code as a new college graduate than I am now, so it might balance out.

Or maybe I'm just too old to be in the trenches, but too stubborn to leave them. ;)

slurgfest2• 14 years ago

You don't actually know that the developers you want are all people employed somewhere else, that is just a heuristic you use to make recruitment easier.

doktrin6• 14 years ago

There are certainly some important take-aways in this article.

What certainly hit home was the reference to high turnover. In my experience, attracting and retaining (perceived) top 1% developers is no small feat. It's damaging to a project when a "rockstar" developer builds out a product set in her chosen (often bleeding edge) framework / language, and then departs at the sign of another "fun" opportunity elsewhere. No one needs to sign an oath of loyalty in blood or commit to a project for life, but fickle engineers - no matter how talented - can be a net loss to a team.

Insofar as the salary requirements are concerned, the numbers are a little off. Top developers in this area (DC) command north of $120k, with junior developers starting at anywhere from $50-60. Regardless, however, I tend to regard salary (within reason) as an appropriate investment.

Lastly, as he mentioned - not all teams are equipped to handle & mentor junior engineers. This requires a formalized and real commitment, which unless executed properly - will result in un-productive junior hires. Like the author, I believe that mentoring and training junior staff (and interns) is a fully achievable goal, but one that requires planning and forethought.

dsolomon10• 14 years ago

Personnel retention is easy - just demonstrate on any level that the contributions of the workforce is appreciated.

Since I'm in the DC area too, with clearance, the number you're throwing around are a bit of a stretch. We've got junior developers in the high $30K range and senior in the mid $60K range.

freyr2• 14 years ago

> We've got junior developers in the high $30K range

That seems incredibly low, especially for a major metropolitan area. You must give great benefits.

vbtemp7• 14 years ago

Since I'm in the DC area too, without clearance, the numbers you're throwing around are not realistic. Junior developers will start in the 50's-60's (with BS), usually 70-80 with MS, and seniors will generally be 110+... In the contractor sphere with clearances, it will be correspondingly higher.

I do know that some agencies tried to give peanut wages to certain fresh-out-of-college students, but everyone I knew scoffed at it and found positions that paid twice as much elsewhere.

ericb• 14 years ago

Are these junior developers actually interns?

doktrin6• 14 years ago

Personnel retention is easy - just demonstrate on any level that the contributions of the workforce is appreciated.

I think you may be painting a simplistic picture, and are making an implicit statement about my experience.

I have never worked for a software company that didn't value it's developers or their contributions. Quite the contrary, in fact. Benefits, high salaries, flexible hours, work from home all on top of routine praise and a very supportive work environment. None of these will guarantee that a top employee won't be attracted to possibilities and challenges elsewhere.

We've got junior developers in the high $30K range and senior in the mid $60K range.

It is frankly unimaginable that a highly qualified developer would be paid $60k in the DC metro. The cost of living is easily on par with many parts of the SF Bay Area. It's quite possible that our standards for "senior developers" are different, but I'm quite confident my numbers are correct.

As far as $30k for junior engineers - frankly I know data entry technicians in Virginia who are paid that much or more.

rdl3• 14 years ago

Either you are in a particularly underpaid/oversupplied field, or DC is the solution to startup hiring. If there are a substantial number of available "senior developers" in anything useful to Silicon Valley in DC for <$75k/yr, it would be worthwhile to set up a Northern Virginia tech center.

The only tech company I know which has a substantial number of cleared people, a presence in DC, and is a startup, is Palantir, and there's no appreciable pay difference between Palo Alto and DC. New grads are effectively capped around $127k, but most take around $80k and more equity. It's also an excellent place to work.

shin_lao2• 14 years ago

True ninja-rockstar engineers are professionals that don't exhibit the traits described.

The senior engineer described resembles more of the diva who is actually rarely that good, because he cares too much about his ego to question himself and progress.

michaelt• 14 years ago

Does "ninja-rockstar engineer" sound modest to you, like someone who doesn't care about their ego?

SomeCallMeTim4• 14 years ago

Doesn't someone who can do 10x-20x the work of an average employee deserve a bit of an ego boost from time to time?

And that's if the "average" employee can do the work at all.

I've pulled so many "average" developers' nether regions out of the fire when they've gotten stuck that I've lost count. I don't care what term is used, but it's nice when the term actually describes the discrepancy between my performance and most developers.

Ninja-rockstar will do nicely, thank you. ;p

Seriously, though, MANY high-end developers in the start-up space are probably on the 10x-20x end of the spectrum. At least at the successful start-ups.

I'm sure there are exceptions for when the start-up is more about pushing data around in a mundane but novel way, and where the primary business value is NOT technically challenging. But even in those cases when the company scales it often has a problem, because the developers haven't done things optimally, and once you're already having scaling issues it's really hard to rearchitect everything to work better without messing up the existing site. YMMV.

shin_lao2• 14 years ago

There is a mandatory amount of self-derision to be used with that kind of term, I agree.

Stars can really boost a team morale if they have the right amount of ego.

enko3• 14 years ago

> By hiring junior engineers, and giving them the training and development they need to flourish

If you don't have battle-hardened, experienced, senior programmers around, who's going to train them? Who's going to answer questions about design? Who's going to come over to their desk and teach them how to test X?

Actually, I somehow think I know who the author wants to train all these juniors:

> Avi is the Dean of The Flatiron School, an intensive program to learn Ruby on Rails in New York

edwinnathaniel2• 14 years ago

Before the discussion goes too far, do keep in mind that the author of the article runs a school/e-Learning company that teaches Web Development to its students.

It is, definitely, in their best interest to have their graduates being hired by popular startups.

The content of the article seems to argue with that goal in mind. Whether the content is true or not, it is yet to be proven: I have not seen a modern statistical data of every single argument in both the article and the discussion here in HN.

Especially when it comes to "10x more productive engineer" since in our field, we haven't done a good job measuring anything at all except some data of failed software projects and how bad workers negatively influence the company (just like any other sector...).

andrewjshults• 14 years ago

As a side note to the article, it's interesting to contrast the author's RoR school ( http://flatironschool.com/ ) where the goal is to get people from zero to junior level with that of Hacker School ( https://www.hackerschool.com/ ) that wants to take people from average to "ninja-rockstar" level (or at least a better engineer). I don't think that the goal of having more junior level engineers out there is a bad one, but in terms of what the market is currently looking for, I see the advantages of a program like Hacker School in the social proof of being one of the "ninja-rockstars."

I also personally agree with having one strong senior engineering being more advantageous to an early stage startup than a handful of junior ones (but not just from the programming side of things). A good senior engineer is easily worth double the salary of a junior one if they can provide both overall technical direction as well as general team direction and mentorship. Otherwise, a team composed and lead by only junior level people can quickly feel like the inmates are running the asylum for any one you're trying to bring in (junior or senior). The examples given in the article are all of places that have a strong, established tech team. If you're early stage and don't have a strong foundation to build your tech team on top of, getting three junior engineers for the price of one good senior one might not be the deal you think it is.

jfb• 14 years ago

Too, the whole puerile "ninja badass" nomenclature is a social signalling device that will turn off many excellent hackers. Stop it immediately.

sulife• 14 years ago

Then how do you expect YC companies to write a job ad on HN???

patio112• 14 years ago

The average starting salary for a senior Ruby developer has climbed to $94,000 ($107,000 in Silicon Valley). Compare that with the average salary for a junior Ruby developer, $70,000, ($80,000 in Silicone Valley).

These numbers strike me as wildly below current market rates in the Valley, based on my discussions with people in it trying to hire. I'm willing to be wrong on that.

dsolomon10• 14 years ago

Here in the DC area tech talent is cheap. You can get senior developers for around $60K.

vbtemp7• 14 years ago

Huh? Where on earth do you get that number?

SomeCallMeTim4• 14 years ago

Seriously? Why wouldn't they move somewhere else then? They LIKE living in DC?

dadkins• 14 years ago

Would you mind being a little more specific? It's hard to get any solid numbers out of anyone, and the article provides some. If those are off, what do you think the current market rates are?

patio112• 14 years ago

North of $100k for someone so recently out of undergrad that touching their degree would smudge the ink -- more for a good school or a candidate who looks particularly qualified. (i.e. Has done anything in life other than gotten good grades.) $120k+ for 3 years of professional experience with Ruby. I don't know what you'd define expert as but no plausible definition makes $107k sound reasonable.

rmc• 14 years ago

Technically the market rate is what you can get, not what you'd like to get/give. If a company has a budget of $80k and goes out to the market and tries to get a developer, and fails, then the market has decided that $80k is too low. Otherwise you'd be able to buy the labour at that rate. If companies cannot hire at a rate, then that is by definition below the market rate.

If you can get a job at a rate that seems "too high", then that's the market rate.

alinajaf• 14 years ago

May be true of the valley, but the numbers here are about right for full-time work in London. If you want cheap tech talent, come to the UK!

modoc2• 14 years ago

Are we really STILL talking about those terms? I don't mind those terms myself, because what I think everyone ACTUALLY means is they want a A++ player, someone who's deeply involved in the specific tech, a cut above your average senior dev cube dweller. These are the best sort of people for startups where your small size and large goals mean you can't afford any dead weight. Who cares what term you're using?

slurgfest2• 14 years ago

'A player' is another one of those obnoxious, means-nothing words like 'ninja' and 'rockstar'. In practice it means 'my kind of guy' - and someone acculturated to the same self-promotion ideology - more than it means anything about qualifications.

It's funny that EVERY company says it will be crippled unless it hires only people who are far above average. Because if developer quality is even close to normally distributed, about half of the actually employed population is below average (let alone top 1%).

Big companies, of course, need people with years of deep specialization. So if you aren't deemed to be "crushing it" in the top 1% and you don't have 10 years of experience in some extreme specialization - regardless of what you can actually do - you are COMPLETELY useless to the industry and will save your time if you just start mowing lawns and waiting tables.

modoc2• 14 years ago

Okay so what term(s) are acceptable to you?

I've worked at many large F500 companies, and trust me they can and do employ a much larger group of average and below average people, including developers. There are tons of people at F500s that if I brought them into a small startup, would KILL the startup because they simply can't produce.

Not sure what you actual work experience is but there are absolutely a range of skills/productivity/involvement. If you don't call them A/B/C or Ninjas or whatever, you have to call them something. Having worked with a wide range of folks, I have my preferences:)

trebor• 14 years ago

I'm no ninja-rockstar! I'm a cybernetic Viking berzerker, battling each and every bug and feature to the death. I might have scars from my many encounters, but I won... eventually. My software is a well honed and polished, though sometimes nicked, piece of work.

Seriously guys, ninjas were criminals! They were outlaws that killed mainly via indirect confrontation, OCD-like planning, and typically poison. They deserve no praise or idolization for that. Just like I wouldn't hire a diplomat-rockstar programmer either...

pbiggar• 14 years ago

What's wrong with diplomats?

vtry• 14 years ago

Sure, and hire a bunch of people who don't know what they are doing.

Do remember that Google has hired away pretty much all the top engineers already. You won't be able to get good people for cheap prices anymore.

mattieuga• 14 years ago

"Silicone" valley? Really?

jakejake• 14 years ago

I think a good team has a balance of rock stars and junior devs. I don't find it usually the case that a rock star will do 10x the work of a junior dev. In fact they will often do less work - however the work they do is easily 10x or 100x smarter and better for the company long-term. Junior devs tend to work very hard but also can cause a lot of havoc if a someone is not helping to guide them. Many times in fact the work that junior devs do winds up being a mess that the senior has to fix or re-do entirely. Junior devs can also suck up a lot of time from the senior devs, so in fact they may at times be reducing productivity. On the positive side the junior guys tend to bring a lot of enthusiasm and fresh ideas. They keep the senior guys on their toes. And they will grow into senior devs, hopefully giving you a few years of solid work when they reach that point.

"rock star" status to me is somewhat based on age and experience. But in fact some rock stars are young and some mediocre devs are older. I think it has to do more with personality and motivation on the part of each individual.

rdl3• 14 years ago

This article seems like an excellent example of "understand the biases of the author to understand why he wrote what he did."

He runs a ruby on rails cram school and some kind of non-infrastructure e-commerce site. From the first, he has an obvious incentive to talk up the market for his graduating junior developers, both to increase demand for the classes and to get them jobs when they graduate.

Designer Pages doesn't look like it has any particularly unique or difficult technical challenges -- it's not Facebook scale (highly interconnected large userbase), it's not super high availability, it's not computationally intensive, etc. That's the kind of thing where a couple of senior developer+ founders plus some junior developers might be useful.

Startups: Stop Trying To Hire Ninja-Rockstar Engineers

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