These two modes of operation in working with overseas software engineers
(1) contracting the work with outsource consulting companies
(2) opening a overseas office and hiring locally.
Here are two challenges with the current predicament…
(1)Outsourcing work to contracting companies is not cheap anymore (2) turnover rate is horrendous, which is an issue if you hire contractors OR open a overseas office.
(1)The going rate for good contractors in India can be as much as $75/hr. While that’s not that much for a us contractor, it’s not exactly 1/10 of a cost that many people make it out to be.
(2)Turnover is a huge problem in india. Part of this problem is because the software business in india is still doing well and there are a lot of companies chasing fewer employees. Part of the problem is the huge discrepancy between what companies are getting and what employees of that company are getting. Folks gripe about the disparity of pay between CEOs and worker bees here…It’s much worse overseas……As such, some of these engineers are doing exactly what software enginerds here did during the dot com boom…They are jumping ship from one company to another, and getting raises each time, with the average stay at each employer less than 1 year (sound familiar?). What does this mean for american companies that hire such contract work or opening an remote office without oversight in the U.S.? Simple…One big hairball of a mess…because these engineers know that since they aren’t going to be working there in 1 year, there’s 0 accountability. All too much in the past, projects were sent overseas, with specifications that weren’t exactly 100% spelled out and with little oversight…What was returned was a bunch of spaghetti wired software slapped together which cost a fortune to untangle.
To solve this issue you could
(1) throw away the work and start over and when done, throw that back over the fence overseas….
(2) Or pay your remote offices salaries above market rates for the best people so that they won’t leave…And when that happens, it’s not 1/10 of the cost of an american enginerd as some claim it to be.
Long winded answer for…this isn’t the end of american software enginerds in the near future…Until someone creates robots that can write software.
