As a single developer there isn't much of a reason. For a development team - needing to coordinate activities and debate designs on whiteboards - on site presence is required. Unless I were to spend lots of money on collaboration and video environments to facilitate a home-based workplace.
Personally, I'd rather allocate the money I would need to spend on such a setup back into developer salaries, call me crazy. Not to mention that some of the more socially capable developers actually enjoy getting out of the house :-) And just to keep the "how behind the times are you" comments at bay, every time I've visited Google in Mountainview, Cisco in San Jose, Citrix in Ft Lauderdale, or Microsoft in Redmond, the offices were packed with staff. Cavemen, huh? -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Tim Lieberman Sent: Thursday, April 17, 2008 3:47 PM To: NYPHP Talk Subject: Re: [nyphp-talk] Why IT Sucks Jerry B. Altzman wrote: > on 2008-04-17 09:18 [EMAIL PROTECTED] said the following: >> This may have been mentioned already, but maybe the best people out >> there are independent? > > From just coming off of (and still trying to) hire PHP programmers, I > have to say that a great many resumes and interviews I've had are with > people who aren't willing to work on-site; they want to telecommute > 80-90% and work from their apartments in their jammies and slippers. > Best, worst, in-between-est, I can't find someone who wants to work > full-time. I'm certainly one of those people, though not in New York. At the end of the day, I just can't justify spending time on-site very often. I do a lot of work for a boutique development shop, and have a desk at the office. Recently, I've tried to go in at least twice a week -- but it gets difficult. I can do more, better quality, work if I'm in a comfortable place with all my toys. It's only about a 20 minute drive to the office, and a pleasant one at that -- but between getting in/out of the car and drive time, that's an hour of billable time. I've often fantasized about charging for travel time when someone has demanded on-site work when I thought it was not necessary. Why people insist on on-site work is a bit beyond me. If you're willing to pay well, you should be able to attract capable developers who can be trusted to work remotely. If you want to hire a bunch of juniors to churn out hacks all day, and have someone supervise them, then it's probably worth it to have them on-site. But anyone with 5+ years solid development experience should be allowed to work how they work best. That way, you get the best bang for you buck, IMO. -Tim _______________________________________________ New York PHP Community Talk Mailing List http://lists.nyphp.org/mailman/listinfo/talk NYPHPCon 2006 Presentations Online http://www.nyphpcon.com Show Your Participation in New York PHP http://www.nyphp.org/show_participation.php No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG. Version: 7.5.524 / Virus Database: 269.23.0/1382 - Release Date: 4/16/2008 5:34 PM No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG. Version: 7.5.524 / Virus Database: 269.23.0/1382 - Release Date: 4/16/2008 5:34 PM _______________________________________________ New York PHP Community Talk Mailing List http://lists.nyphp.org/mailman/listinfo/talk NYPHPCon 2006 Presentations Online http://www.nyphpcon.com Show Your Participation in New York PHP http://www.nyphp.org/show_participation.php
