[LRUG] Perm vs contract

[carlos]

Following on from the recent thread about perm salaries vs contract rates,
I thought I'd jot down some thoughts about what would convince me to go
perm after several years as a contractor. Here's a little list:

- MEANING. The opportunity to work on products that feel like they're
objectively worth building, as opposed to just being yet more busy-work.
It's very nice to feel that you're making somebody's life better (even just
*slightly* better) by doing what you're good at.

- LEARNING. A culture where the human instinct for learning and creativity
is respected and embedded, and considered as a basic need for all
employees.

- FLEXIBILITY (time and space). Some tasks lend themselves to collaboration
between multiple people in a shared space; others lend themselves to
focused, uninterrupted concentration. I'd like the flexibility to be in the
right place for the task at hand, as much as possible. And sometimes
(actually quite often), I'd like to be able to work "weird" hours in order
to do some or all of the following: pick up my kids from school, go for a
long run, practise guitar, fix my bike, read a book, write lengthy and
unsolicited rants to the LRUG mailing list.

- TRUST. As far as I can see, the main thing getting in the way of a lot of
employers offering flexility around hours and location is that they don't
trust their employees not to abuse their freedom. The thing is that most
good developers actually *want* to do good work, and the focus should
really be on facilitating that. If they also want to look at Facebook
sometimes, well, what of it? And at the end of the day, whether they're in
the office every day from 9 to 6 or not, it's pretty easy to work out if
the quality and quantity of someone's work is unsatisfactory. Github
doesn't lie ;-)

- PEOPLE. Inasmuch as you have to spend the bulk of your waking life
collaborating with other human beings, they should at least be awesome.
Y'know... smart, interesting, fun, kind, considerate, incredible taste in
music, that sort of thing. This isn't really much of a consideration as a
contractor, because in all likelihood you're not going to be working in the
same place for more than a few months; however for a perm job I think it's
pretty important.

- ENGAGEMENT. Roles vary, but in most contracts there's very little
opportunity to contribute to the growth of a product/team other than in a
fairly narrow technical way. You are there to churn out code, not offer
your opinions as to how to improve the process, better engage customers,
help provide leadership, drive out requirements, etc etc. A more rounded,
varied and interesting working life would be a decent reason to go perm.

- MONEY. I'm not going to lie, it's a major consideration. Typical perm
rates for senior Ruby devs in London seem to be around 60% of the
equivalent income for a contractor. If it were more like 75%, I think a lot
more contractors would go perm.

Do other contractors think similarly?

Cheers,
Carlos
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