[LRUG] [JOBS] Ruby market rates.

Louis Goff-Beardsley louis at infinitiumglobal.com
Tue Jun 24 14:14:13 PDT 2014


> Found that really interesting. I wonder what kind of rates part-time remote or full-time remote staff can expect?



Remote positions are in massive flux at the moment, it really depends on who’s in the market place at the time. Sometimes I have a few remote positions, other times I don’t have many. There's a three tier system which seems to be developing. Also its almost more based on personality & if the company feels they can trust the developer to work effectively remotely.



Based on placements I’ve made in the last few months.



In UK, remote but can come into London when needed:



Senior: £50k-70k

Mid: £30-50k

Junior: £20-30k (tbh, haven’t made a remote Junior placement this year so this is a bit of an estimate)



EU based, can come to the UK occasionally (1 week every couple of months):



Senior: £40-60k.

Mid: £25-40k



Outside of the EU (can’t really come to the UK accept on a business or holiday visa once or twice a year):



Senior: £30k-50k.

Mid: £20-30k



> Would you also expect smaller and "more ethical" companies to offer less than the £55K mark (which various stats claim is the average Senior Ruby developer rates)?



The stats which claim average salaries in tech are pretty much always wrong. They are based on aggregates of roles being advertised, not filled. There are plenty of wishful adverts placed online on the off chance they get a response skewing the stats.



For a senior developer to accept £55k in a new role right now, I’d imagine there would have to be something really special, other than the money going for the role.





-----Original Message-----
From: James Pike [mailto:lrug at chilon.net]
Sent: 24 June 2014 20:48
To: Louis Goff-Beardsley
Cc: chat at lists.lrug.org<mailto:chat at lists.lrug.org>
Subject: Re: [LRUG] [JOBS] Ruby market rates.



Found that really interesting. I wonder what kind of rates part-time remote or full-time remote staff can expect?



Would you also expect smaller and "more ethical" companies to offer less than the £55K mark (which various stats claim is the average Senior Ruby developer rates)?



Best, James



On Tue, Jun 24, 2014 at 05:03:04pm +0000, Louis Goff-Beardsley wrote:

>    [I wrote this for a client, might be of relevance here.]

>

>

>    Hi x,

>

>

>    Hope this makes sense and doesn’t come out as some stream of

>    consciousness waffle.

>

>

>    Basically what you’ll find is that if you did a survey of all the Ruby

>    teams in London which have perm Senior developers you’ll find they will

>    be on anywhere between £55 & £80k. The average will probably be £65k.

>    So everyone then makes the assumption that they should be paying £65k

>    for an onsite perm developer. The problem is that they don’t come onto

>    the market (and most of the time when they do it’s to switch to going

>    contracting) so if you have an open vacancy for a Senior Ruby developer

>    @ £65k it will likely remain open for many months. What teams then do

>    from there is:

>

>    ·         Drop their expectations and hire a Mid-level developer into a

>    senior position at senior money. The mid-level takes the role as its

>    more than the £45-55k that they are getting offered from other

>    companies.

>

>    ·         Hire Mid-level developers @ Mid-level money. While it’s still

>    a tough market, mid-level perm isn’t as tough as senior perm.

>

>    ·         Hire onsite contractors @ £400-600 /day as a stop-gap until

>    the perfect developer for them comes onto the market; will take a

>    while.

>

>    ·         Accept remote/semi remote developers as they are more

>    plentiful, affordable and loyal (they don’t move jobs anywhere near as

>    often as onsite do as there aren’t as many opportunities constantly

>    being presented to them. Generally if a company offers them what they

>    want to fit in with their life style of why they want remote in the

>    first place they are content)

>

>    ·         Offer above market rates: (i.e. £80k for a senior developer,

>    somewhere towards what they could make as contractors.). Interestingly

>    enough companies most of the time refuse to take this option as they

>    don’t want to feel like they are over paying, however they then go on

>    to take onsite contractors and it ends up costing them even more.

>

>    ·         Wait and let it impact development, stressing out the

>    developers they have, in turn making them want to leave.

>

>

>    My opinion of why the market is like this is: when development is

>    business critical companies will pay whatever the market rate is for

>    contract developers to do the work until the point where they

>    physically can’t afford it. Whereas there is a collective consensus on

>    what Permanent salaries should be based on what they have been

>    historically, what other technologies are at, what a lot of permanent

>    developers who have not had a salary rise are at. The problem lies in

>    the collective consensus of what a permanent salary should be is so out

>    of whack with what the market rate for contract rates is (which is

>    closer to developers true value) that it’s got to the point where by

>    being perm developers are essentially walking away from £20k (perhaps

>    more if you consider that contractors can pay close to 20% tax).

>

>

>    If you look at SF, you’ll see that the contract rates and perm salaries

>    are much closer and thus there isn’t such a draw towards contract work.

>

>

>    I personally think the new developers coming onto the market will

>    cancel out the mass adoption of Ruby in start-ups and established

>    companies, and that on the whole, permeant salaries will go up as the

>    consensus of what permanent developers salaries should be becomes more

>    in line with their what true value is. This will happen to the point

>    where contract & permanent developers will separate into distinct

>    groups based on individuals personalities better suiting contract or

>    permanent work. Right now I think there are a lot of developers who

>    would be happier in a permanent job more than in a contract role but

>    economically it doesn’t make sense for them to be perm.

>

>

>    That being said, the above only takes into account the economics of

>    salaries. Relationships, buzz/hype surrounding the company, other perks

>    etc play some role in attracting developers to perm.

>

>

>    Best, Louis.

>

>    -

>    Louis Goff-Beardsley

>

>    Ultra-specialised Independent Ruby Recruìtment

>    [1]https://www.linkedin.com/in/louisbeardsley

>

>    "I just can’t stop thinking about Ruby on Rails"

>

>    Mobile: 07449 324 851 BBS: 0118 327 1821

>

>    Skype/Googletalk: LouisGB1/[2]LouisRoR at gmail.com<mailto:LouisRoR at gmail.com>

>

>    [3]@LouisRoR

>

>    irc.freenode.org - LouisRoR - #Ruby #LRUG #NWRUG #Pokemonchat

>

> References

>

>    1. https://www.linkedin.com/in/louisbeardsley

>    2. mailto:LouisRoR at gmail.com

>    3. https://twitter.com/LouisRoR



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