How to hire engineering talent in LA?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8309447

by elikami • 12 years ago

10 19 12 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

My partner and I founded our startup in June. Since launch, we've already been through outsourced labor in India, and localized contractors through oDesk, and it's just not meeting our expectations. We realize to grow successfully we need to get some real amazing engineering talent as full time & offer equity and potential co-founder status. The struggle is we're based in LA, and talent is hard to come-by. Most candidates are either working for the Snapchats and Factuals of the world, or they're doing their own thing & just freelancing.

Any tips / tricks on how to attract and find good engineers & developers? We really need to move on this as we're hindering our development.

paf313• 12 years ago

My approach is to try to attract strong developers by using the best languages and tools. What technology stack do you use?

paf313• 12 years ago

Also why not consider remote employees?

elikami4• 12 years ago

We currently employe a remote developer. Good talent, its a bit hard to manage when you're not in the same room. We're strong believers in remote workstations. My #1 priority is getting the work done. I don't care where or how you do it, as long as it gets completed in a timely and efficient manner.

qodeninja4• 12 years ago

Stack and tools dont attract strong developers. Salary and work-life balance does.

paf313• 12 years ago

You couldn't pay me enough to work on some stacks.

Also, certain technologies do a good job of convincing potential employees that you know what you're doing and committed to using the best tools available IMO.

aespinoza• 12 years ago

Have you ventured into Orange County ? Not everybody that works or is willing to work in LA lives in LA. Try looking a little more south, specially Irvine.

From what I have seen there are a LOT of .Net developers in LA and Orange County, if your stack is .Net you should not have a problem finding good people.

Ruby and Python developers are a pain to find. A lot of the "Good" developers are not even proficient in the language/tools.

There are good java developers here, but not as much as .Net developers.

Tips:

* Use LinkedIn to find people in LA, Orange County and even San Diego.

* Target user groups. There are a lot of good developers in the UG and they usually have friends that are developers as well.

* Always get recommendations from people that know the developer you are interested. I have even seen some startups that only hire people that have been recommended from someone they know.

elikami4• 12 years ago

I've scowered linkedin and it's not as easy as you say. Any suggestions on how to utilize the tool in a more efficient way?

I haven't tried to search by groups, so we'll see what I come up with.

rubiquity• 12 years ago

Ruby and Python developers are a pain to find. A lot of the "Good" developers are not even proficient in the language/tools.

Care to elaborate on this? I used to live in San Diego and didn't experience this. Is it that much different in OC/LA?

lscore720• 12 years ago

Good question - LA is indeed a challenging town for recruiting engineers. A few thoughts:

1. Meetups; i.e. if it's a Ruby shop, you could sponsor, participate, or simply attend Ruby meetups. Creating awareness of your company and meeting people/making a positive impression could only help spread the word.

2. Industry events; i.e., a founder of an EdTech start-up could meet some helpful contacts or even directly connect with engineers passionate about your specific field of work/product/mission.

3. Your existing network: mentors, accelerator partners, CS professors, old colleagues on LinkedIn, etc. It never hurts to ask :)

3. Unique perks; first one that comes to mind is potential for remote work. Given the adventure (read: nightmare) that is LA traffic, this could draw lots of attention. I understand it's difficult as a small start-up, as cohesiveness and face time is important, but even one to two days/week (or the potential for more once the employee's established) could set you apart.

FWIW: I run a tech recruiting agency with a distributed team around the country - LA is one of our cities. Feel free to shoot me a message if you have any Q's or if you're curious about using a recruiter: [redacted].

Good luck!

elikami4• 12 years ago

great insights, much appreciated.

We're happy to talk to your recruitment team. My email is eli(at)arbibo.com

cbames89• 12 years ago

You should talk to the guys at Originate. They know how to grab talent. Also, they're pretty open to talking to people and are at quite a few events throughout the nation.

Full disclosure: I used to work at Originate.

qodeninja4• 12 years ago

Pay them a Silicon Valley salary, or you can hire someone from SF that loves LA, like me.

I wish there were better paying tech jobs in LA. I'd go in a heartbeat.

The biggest problem with wanna-be LA tech companies is that they havent figured out that the engineers are the rock stars and try to undercut them on salaries and perks. Good luck with that.

Maybe I'm generalizing.

Anyway, as a startup your challenge is immensely larger, not to say its impossible, but consider that all the talent is concentrated in the Bay for a reason -- then refactor your expectations.

I would suggest you develop your own prototype, pitch to investors and then move your office to San Jose, it'll at least be cheaper and youll have better access to engineers.

Excellent well-established engineers cost money, inexperienced and undiscovered ones can be lured if you are in the right location.

elikami4• 12 years ago

Definitely take your point to heart. We've bootstrapped this thing so far, but have recently started seed rounds to find money to pay the talent.

What's the going SV rate? including some equity/title included?

Phlarp2• 12 years ago

For co-founder caliber talent? $100/hr or equivalent. Minimum.

qodeninja4• 12 years ago

Engineering, depending on the discipline, is on the scale of 140-200k right now, which translates to $80-$100/hr

Also don't try to force traditional business rules like 9a-5pm hours, most engineers tend to have flexible hours, be more focused on outcomes than hours.

panorama• 12 years ago

Agreed 100% - I work in SF but I'm not a fan of the city. Even after considering the higher cost of living, I'm pretty sure I make substantially more here than I would in LA. I'd love to move back to Southern California, though.

It's not just salary, but the types of companies in SF/SV just seem a lot more compelling, and are more often than not founded by people who 'bleed' tech. This might be a gross assumption but my feeling after being involved in the OC startups scene and talking/interviewing with LA startups is that the companies there are started by business guys looking to strike it rich with marginal tech DNA.

Consider these points and try to figure out how to differentiate from the typical LA wannabe-entrepreneur. Work on compelling problems (e.g. Oculus Rift, in Irvine), or just have an established culture of putting the tech first and don't be stingy. Good luck!

How to hire engineering talent in LA?

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