{"id":163,"date":"2010-11-08T17:02:53","date_gmt":"2010-11-09T00:02:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/journeyman.ivystreetinc.com\/?p=163"},"modified":"2010-11-08T17:02:53","modified_gmt":"2010-11-09T00:02:53","slug":"how-i-yearn-for-the-good-old-days","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/?p=163","title":{"rendered":"How I Yearn For The Good Old Days"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;ve been talking with recruiters as the economy has picked up a bit and there&#8217;s something different that has happened in the last few years.\u00a0\u00a0 Notably, its the treatment that we the developers get when trying to do business with these salespeople.\u00a0 The treatment has become very much more poor, almost abusive, in many ways.\u00a0 I talked with several of my developer colleagues and here&#8217;s what we&#8217;ve been seeing:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Immediately we are asked for our rate &#8212; without even knowing the person.\u00a0 If we refuse we are run through the mill and treated poorly.<\/li>\n<li>We are asked for all of our contacts &#8212; our developer friends &#8212; so they can be helped.\u00a0 if we don&#8217;t capitulate again, the conversations with the recruiter and company take a turn for the worst.<\/li>\n<li>A few years ago we would agree to meet a recruiter for the first time on neutral ground, like a coffee shop, splitting the distance.\u00a0 These days the staffing companies are expecting us to drop everything we are doing at our existing job (with raises flags) to go to their site to meet them on un-neutral ground.<\/li>\n<li>We are never, ever thanked for our time or, if naive enough, the information we have given them.\u00a0 Ever.<\/li>\n<li>It seems to me that the actual knowledge the newer companies have about actual technology is very low compared to that of 10 years ago.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It&#8217;s interesting, this kind of treatment.\u00a0 It&#8217;s interesting because it implies that the day of the turn and burn recruiter is here forever, and gone are the relationships and the long term vision of partnership and future business.\u00a0 I haven&#8217;t formulated any response to this.<\/p>\n<p>For instance, a few days ago I was berated for my rate &#8212; I just said, it depends on the job.\u00a0 Why isn&#8217;t that good enough?\u00a0 But when I ask an accounts manager for transparency into their margin percentage, some of these new types of recruiters and companies will very simply hang up on you.\u00a0 If you call out that they are in fact selling you a job &#8212; that you are a buyer, not someone they are doing a favor for &#8212; they get very upset.<\/p>\n<p>By no means do I suggest being belligerant, but lets face it: the idea of &#8220;employer&#8221; in today&#8217;s world is very temporary.\u00a0\u00a0 Do you seriously think you&#8217;d get paid these days to sit on the bench while they look for another contract placement?\u00a0 Does anyone think their FTE-ship is beyond an episode of layoffs?\u00a0 Seriously?\u00a0 And add to that that we the developers are doing a different profession that they the sales.\u00a0 We don&#8217;t even understand each other&#8217;s worlds.\u00a0 Its all too often I see developers, not companies, putting up with these blocks of productivity and disrespect.<\/p>\n<p>It doesn&#8217;t have to be like that.\u00a0 As developers we have to realize that our peers are other developers.\u00a0 They are our people.\u00a0 We spend our daily lives with each other, not with sales or management.\u00a0 To our people we owe our allegiance and to watch each others backs.\u00a0 I have yet to see the promise of &#8220;if things get bad I&#8217;ll pull you right out&#8221; from a consulting company; not while there is money to be made.\u00a0 YOU ARE JUST FODDER.<\/p>\n<p>Now not every place is like the cold heartless consulting firm or company so let us be mindful and not participate in those horrid places.\u00a0 It starts with you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;ve been talking with recruiters as the economy has picked up a bit and there&#8217;s something different that has happened in the last few years.\u00a0\u00a0 Notably, its the treatment that we the developers get when trying to do business with these salespeople.\u00a0 The treatment has become very much more poor, almost abusive, in many ways.\u00a0 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=163"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":164,"href":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163\/revisions\/164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/10kdev.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}