Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

$30,000 For a Developer Referral?

Posted by Soulskill on from the i'll-send-you-a-dozen dept.

itwbennett writes "Are good developers really that hard to find? Cambridge, MA-based inbound marketing company HubSpot seems to think so. The company has upped its developer referral bonus from $10,000 to $30,000 — and you don't have to be an employee to get in on the deal. Beats a free puppy. What has your experience been with referral bonuses?"

5 of 189 comments (clear)

  1. Recruiter Commision by Frankie70 · · Score: 5, Informative

    If the company goes through a recruiter, they pay around 20-25% of the employee's annual salary to the recruiter (if the employee sticks around for 'x' months). So this may be reasonable for the company for a job which pays 100K to 150K annually.

    1. Re:Recruiter Commision by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      2-3 months salary is normal around here for recruiter pay (Holland). But recruiters are rather vilified and not trusted. Most companies, large and small, I know don't work with independent recruiters. Don't trust them further than you can throw them.

  2. Of course by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    The conclusion repeatedly reached by academic researchers in software engineering is that there is an 'order of magnitude' difference among good and mediocre developers, and good developers are perenially in short supply.

    So the answer is yes, it's absolutely worth the money.

  3. Great bonus... have fun collecting by gatkinso · · Score: 5, Informative

    I worked for a place that had a great referral bonus (cough cough... BAE Systems... cough). Operation Eagle Eye they called it.

    Well I found a developer that fit all the criteria. Filled out the paper work, got him interviewed and hired.... then all of a sudden email went quiet on the issue. Repeated emails to HR went unanswered. So finally I went down there in person to ask about the referral bonus. We'll get back to you. I got back to them (in person). Excuses: oh this facility doesn't participate in that program (so I went into the hall and pulled the poster off the wall and showed it to the HR rep). Oh your hire doesn't fulfill the requirements (so I got the requirements off the intranet site and checked them off). Oh that's right we didn't end up hiring him (he sits in the office next to mine). Finally I subtlety hinted that I would quit.

    They then sent me half the advertised bonus... four months after I was supposed to get it... and withheld over half of it in taxes AND deducted my 401K percentage contribution from it (oh sorry that was an error by finance we can cut you a new check on 60 days).

    So. Beware if this crap.

    --
    I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
  4. Re:If I refer myself by tgd · · Score: 3, Informative

    Can I get $30k *and* the job?

    While you may have been joking, that was not at all uncommon during the dot com boom. You'd basically negotiate the recruiter's fees into the signing bonus and grab $60-$80k in signing bonuses. If you were a particularly shrewd negotiator, you'd get 1/3 up front, the second 1/3 after 90 days or something and the rest at 6 months.

    Those were the days ...