[LA.pm] contrasting London and LA

[Nicholas Clark]

I read this:

> On 8/15/06, Eric Gradman <ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com> wrote:

> > that he was learning Java.  I asked him why, and he explained that
> > former colleagues at Idealab had complained that due to the extreme
> > difficulty of finding competent Perl programmers, they were
> > increasingly starting new development projects in Java.  My jaw
> > dropped, and I spent the rest of the interview in shock.

And was about to write this very reply:

On Tue, Aug 15, 2006 at 10:32:53AM -0700, Duong Vu wrote:
> One of the things I've observe in our industry, and not just the Perl
> market, is that everyone wants seasoned veterans. No one seems to be
> willing to hire junior anything in IT anymore.
> 
> In order for there more competent Perl developers with experience,
> Perl companies need to be willing to hire and train young undeveloped
> talents. Young kids out of college will commit themselves to what ever
> pays the bills more often than what suites their personal interests or
> likes. And very often, these kids won't know what they like yet.
> Java/.Net with its many more  jobs will be much more attractive to
> them.
> 
> In order for there to be more Perl shops, there need to be more Perl
> developers. And if we want more Perl developers, we need to recruit,
> train, and give them enough experiences so they are desirable.

(So now I'm guilty of the Usenet sin not trimming any of it)

The only thing I can add is that nowhere I've worked has had any sort of
process of mentoring junior perl programmers into competent, senior perl
programmers. Every firm seems to expect to hire senior people straight out,
which isn't sustainable, as it gives no consideration to who is going to
train the next iteration.

This sort of naive policy *does* work with C, C++ or Java programmers (for
example, and for accountants, for that matter), because there are degree
courses churning them out, and there are large consulting firms that recruit
smart young things straight out of university and indoctrinate them into
their way of doing things. Although based on a straw poll of one at a
previous job, whilst the C++ programmer we hired ex-Logica was competent, he
didn't have anywhere near the breadth of knowledge that the self taught open
source hacking C++ programmer knew. So I'm not convinced that these mass
production factories are the answer either.

So, next question, how many recruiters/hiring managers on this list are
looking to recruit smart juniors and mentor them up?

Nicholas Clark