Is The Silicon Valley Talent Shortage Getting Worse?

Running Hackers and Founders Silicon Valley, I get asked all the time if I know of people who are looking for work, and startups are having to work increasingly hard to hire. A few months ago, I was offered a $5k referral bonus for a Python/Django engineer. ( That's not the business I want to be in, btw. And it's not why I do H&#38;F. )<p>There's easily been 100 startups getting angel money in the Valley in the last 5 months. And, if all of those are looking for 2-3 RoR/PyDjango/JQuery/iOS devs, that means startups alone are competing for 300 engineers. And, that's not mentioning Yelp, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Zynga, Google. The Valley could easily accomodate 1000 new engineers in the next 6 months.<p>From what I've seen of the Hackers and Founders NYC scene, the situation is similar, except startups have to compete for engineering talent with finance companies, which pay a lot better than your average startup.<p>What does that mean? Founders, always be hiring. Devs, our value as an engineer is going up. Founders, build on more productive languages/platforms. Dev, consider joining a startup as an angel investment where you're pouring in time and effort instead of cash. So, interview a lot, and join carefully.

I have a theory that the dot-com bust in 2000 and the outsourcing/offshoring hype in 2004ish basically wiped out two generations of computer science students. I graduated in 2004 and I remember the number of students in my major decreased dramatically between my freshman and sophomore year (some of that is the usual engineering major attrition, but I didn't see nearly the same decline as my friends in electrical/mechanical/etc). A coworker who graduated in 2007 told me his friends kept telling him to change his major "because all the jobs are going to India anyway." Meanwhile, the exact opposite thing happened. Growth on the web continues to explode and the demand for skill workers to support that growth continues to climb. Could this by why the shortage seems especially pronounced?

The valley?? The real story of talent drought is in New York City. Recently there has been a gigantic explosion of startups with lots of funding, but _very_ few great engineers available.<p>As CEO of a just-funded tech startup, I am budgeting ~70% of my time to personally recruit a Lead Developer and Senior Software Engineer (despite having a technical background myself).

The national unemployment rate is over 9% while Silicon Valley is fighting tooth-and-claw to hire. What's wrong with this picture?<p>Software engineering is technical, sure, but it's not <i>that</i> hard -- if some of the idiots I've worked with in the past could hold down jobs, then anyone can. Which dying industries should we be looking at to fill the gaps in the software industry?

As someone who has been an early engineer (sixth employee at two and ninth at most current) at a couple of startups, watching the current talent situation is interesting. Companies are definitely hiring with smaller or more agile companies being more proactive about the diversity of people the bring in. Some of the larger networking/software firms are continuing to stick to their laundry lists.<p>I enjoy seeing the plethora of dmaller startups and the ideas and enthusiasm they bring. Things definitely have a different feel than dotcom bubble one. I hope that this job recovery is longer and more sustained.<p>For me, it is an interesting crossroad - having a house and marital responsibilities, do I jump on someone else's startup bandwagon again, try and get an idea funded (knowing angels, etc) or go the big company route to give personal time to flesh out ideas.<p>There certainly are options out there.

As a programmer it's always fun to be in a good job market. However, I do get a bit concerned about bubbles when things get overheated like this. I suppose the best one can do is save for the downturn and build up some great experience for when the market inevitably gets tougher and the rounds of layoffs start.

Companies need to start taking on the virtual office model and start hiring developers from remote cities and even countries, you miss out on the social interaction of an office but good developers tend to get more done quicker when they can work from home and with flexible hours.

If startups branched out from Silicon Valley more often, new technological epicenters would form, alleviating the shortage.

So how do I benefit back from Europe?

Is it time for this soon-to-be computer science grad to move to the Valley? Is this a good or a bad thing for new grads?

Looking for a developer with startup exp?<p>I am a developer with startup experience and skill in Ruby, JS, and frontend technologies. I have 6+ years experience and a BA from UC Berkeley. I created a post related to this: <a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1786901" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1786901</a>

I had emails from 7 different recruiters today so people are definitely hiring experienced developers right now.

I've noticed a surge in contacts from recruiters, almost daily now from linkedin asking if I'm looking. Last year was a very different story.

This article seems to imply that "acqui-hires" are a tool to bring in great engineers, but I feel like Facebook and others are after great entrepreneurs.<p>Perhaps the final sentence should be changed to: "Now might be a good time to leave school and start a company."

I was contemplating moving to the US to join a startup, but getting a visa is pretty hard, isn't it? I can get a 3 month traveler's/business visa. Then there are work permits, etc, right?<p>So currently, I'm just working on my own project.

There is no pipeline. I see lots of comments about how entry level developers are useless. No one wants to train the next gen of developers, so companies are fighting over a smaller and smaller pool of people.<p>The only way to get any experience seems to be to start your own company. Which is great for the person who goes off and does it, but not smart for the company trying to hire them.<p>If employers don't want to waste money investing in entry-level positions, why waste it investing in someone who has made it clear they want to work for themselves?<p>Pay less, train more.

The developers I know are mostly trying to be founder level at a startup. I actually feel sorry every time I run into a company trying to hire a Rails developer because I feel their pain.<p>What's the solution for you companies desperate to hire? In my opinion, your outlook on equity needs to change. It's regular practice to offer a "rock star" developer 0.25% of your pre-diluted shares when you have $2M dollars in the bank. I've had this debate a number of times with arrogant founders and been told how that's just the way it is - investors this, B round that, $1B exit blah. Fine - but your offer is not appealing to me. I can make $100K+/year consulting part time, usually with a small equity stake, plus have a founder share of my own startup. Why would I take $100k plus 0.1% to work 12 hours a day at your startup?<p>Offer several percent, maybe 10% if you don't have a product yet. Get a few good people committed to your company on the inside. This is particularly true if you are very early or have a less "cool" startup. You are going to wallow in crappy developer misery and your product will fail if you don't have awesome techs who are TRULY dedicated to your vision.

I'm an RoR/Java/etc developer/entrepreneur. I get recruited heavily 2-3 times a week, and yet half my non-tech friends (which comprises most of my friends) are under-employed or jobless. That dichotomy is disturbing and very difficult personally to deal with. Here I am making 10 times what the employed ones make hourly, while talking about making millions on a startup. I try to encourage them to get some product or internet marketing skills, generally to no avail.<p>Even so, I feel that web development is a commodity and that to stay ahead I need to develop a better design and product background.

Definitely been seeing a serious uptick in hiring around here -- and I've been on and off the job market for over a year. Things were looking up last Spring (around the time I picked up my current consulting gig) but things are noticeably better now.<p>I should point out that in normal, 'healthy' years, November is a time of declining job openings. Companies generally wait until January for budgets to turn around, etc. Not this year, though.