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Software Developers Are Now More Valuable To Companies Than Money, Says Survey (cnbc.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNBC: As our global economy increasingly comes to run on technology-enabled rails and every company becomes a tech company, demand for high-quality software engineers is at an all-time high. A recent study from Stripe and Harris Poll found that 61 percent of C-suite executives believe access to developer talent is a threat to the success of their business. Perhaps more surprisingly -- as we mark a decade after the financial crisis -- this threat was even ranked above capital constraints. And yet, despite being many corporations' most precious resource, developer talents are all too often squandered. Collectively, companies today lose upward of $300 billion a year paying down "technical debt," as developers pour time into maintaining legacy systems or dealing with the ramifications of bad software. This is especially worrisome, given the outsized impact developers have on companies' chances of success. Software developers don't have a monopoly on good ideas, but their skill set makes them a uniquely deep source of innovation, productivity and new economic connections. When deployed correctly, developers can be economic multipliers -- coefficients that dramatically ratchet up the output of the teams and companies of which they're a part.

12 of 168 comments (clear)

  1. So why not treat them well? by gweihir · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Naa, that would be un-capitalist. Developers must be cheap wage-slaves that do not have a real career-path and are unable to find a job once they hit 50. That will surely not have any impact on whether smart people go into software writing or not, right?

    --
    Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    1. Re:So why not treat them well? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Insightful

      But even so, I hear these horror stories about how software developers are treated and I just have not seen it.

      Me neither. I have worked for companies that had catered meals, free soda, laundry service, sky diving bonding trips, etc. I have had plenty of opportunities to travel. I have worked some late nights, and done a few death marches, but those only lasted a few weeks, out of a career lasting decades.

      Software developers are likely the most spoiled employees in the history of the world.

      People will alway whine.

    2. Re:So why not treat them well? by spagthorpe · · Score: 4, Interesting

      It won't really have any impact, because young people don't think they'll ever get old. Or it will be different for them.

      Had a 20-something at my last job make a number of comments about some of the older developers there, saying they'd hate to still be working at that age, and that they are probably stuck doing the same work because they can't learn anything new. I don't know why he was telling me this, as I was twice his age at the time, but it's obvious that he doesn't think he'll be in the same position.

      They ultimately did lay off a lot of their senior engineers and replace a lot of the position with 20-somethings, including in project management positions. A number of those projects never saw the light of day after years of re-writes into new frameworks.

      --

      WWJD -- What Would Jimi Do?
      (Smash amp, burn guitar, take home the groupies)

  2. And yet there's agile by xxxJonBoyxxx · · Score: 4, Insightful

    And open concept offices.

    1. Re:And yet there's agile by Seven+Spirals · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I've quit one job and refused two others because of open offices. The two I refused were absolutely flabbergasted by my refusal. They literally could not understand why anyone wouldn't want to be in an open office space surrounded on 3.8 sides by glass-walled manager offices, loud ugly marketing girls, and a bunch of H1B dudes who couldn't be bothered to wear deodorant. That place (MX Logic) had the worst looking office I've ever seen. One of them offered me the job on the spot after the interview and I was already shutting them down and refusing it before they even got started. I told them there is about a zero percent chance of getting anyone really talented to take the gig, because they had this ridiculous noisy slave pit thing going. I nearly left before I even *did* the interview I was so disgusted with the place. The hiring manager was (of course) offended, but he was also clueless. About a year after that interview I had a guy come up to me at the local Maker Space who was one of the "technical resources" for the company during the interview (quiet guy in the back of the room). He told me "My god was I cheering when you refused them over the goddamn open workspace idiocy. My boss was upset over that for weeks. They still talk about it during the hiring process and argue about it."

  3. Yeah, right by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If they considered developers more important than money, they'd pay the developers more to keep the skilled ones. Every time a developer leaves a company, a hunk of business knowledge walks out the door with him.

    Companies care about that quarter's finance report, and the C-level execs care only about fleecing the company for all they can stuff into their own pockets. Look at what they do, not what some survey says.

  4. Yeah haven't heard that one before by Crashmarik · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Maybe it just sounds too much like 40 years of businesses claiming there was a shortage of engineers in the U.S. when what they meant was there was a shortage of engineers that could be treated really badly.

    Or maybe it's the fact that companies only seem to be willing to hire H1Bs that will do anything not to go back to their shitholes, or young kids who are stupid enough to believe managements promises and have no family or social life to distract from putting in 80+ hour weeks ?

  5. FTFY by thevirtualcat · · Score: 4, Funny

    Software Developers Who Are Willing To Work For Uncompetitive Wages And No Benefits Are Now More Valuable To Companies Than Money, Says Survey

  6. .ORG by fluffernutter · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This just tells me that developers need to get organized and start saying no to 80+ work weeks collectively. Otherwise it will be divided they fall, forever.

    --
    Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
  7. Yet us 50+ folks are unemployed by Snotnose · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Forget how long I've been out of work, it's been 2-3 years now since I quit looking.

    1. Re:Yet us 50+ folks are unemployed by Locke2005 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I'm 57 and got at least 3 calls TODAY offering to submit me for contract software positions. Granted, a lot of recruiters try to low-ball me on the hourly rate, but they change their tune as soon as you call their bluff and tell them you're not interested at that low rate.

      --
      I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
  8. Talk about not understanding an article / Poll by Harlequin80 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    No where does it say that companies think developers are more important than money.

    The results state that the companies perceive the risk of not being able to find skills as higher than the risks of not being able to access capital.

    This is especially true if you're a cash rich organisation.

    In the current financial climate finding returns on your investments is hard. Interest rates are at historically low levels, bond returns are zero, and so that leaves higher risk investments to get returns. That effectively translates into money moving into the stock market and VC type investments which pushes money further and further up the risk tree making funding generally easy to find.