[LRUG] OT: Programming services for businesses in mid-sized towns

[Jon Wood]

In my experience the businesses you describe need developers for a one off
project, rather than as a full time member of staff, and go to an agency to
get that project completed. Mid-sized, non-technology, businesses usually
won't have anyone in house with any real experience of managing a software
project, or working out what it is they need - that's why they go to
external agencies who will help with everything from working out what the
customer actually needs, through to developing and supporting the software.

Unfortunately that means most of the work for developers outside of large
cities is for those sort of agencies. I say unfortunately because you're
unlikely to see many genuinely interesting projects working for one -
you'll get a lot of cookie cutter e-commerce sites, and the odd internal
CRUD app. You're also unlikely to see that application developing over time
as small businesses buying software think of it in those terms - that
they're buying a piece of software, rather than taking on something that
will evolve over time.

My approach to that is to work remotely for a company in London, so I get
to work on an interesting long-term project, and mostly avoid having to
commute in. I'm in the office twice a month for meetings, and working from
home and coffee shops the rest of the time. The other option is to find a
business in the area you like the look of, and then persuade them that you
can improve how they run by building software for them. It would be a tough
sell in most cases, but if you can find somewhere that bites and then start
delivering value to them then you've probably got a job for life!

Jon

On Wed, 22 Jun 2016 at 11:46 gvim <gvimrc at gmail.com> wrote:

> Given that programming is a skill which is relevant to businesses of any
> size regardless of location why is it that programming vacancies are
> almost exclusively concentrated in the major cities? What do mid-sized
> business in, say, Ipswich do when they need a programmer?
>
> I ask because I plan to leave London in the next few years and live more
> in a more rural area but the prospects of finding work look bleak unless
> you're prepared to commute to the nearest city.
>
> This phenomenon also extends to the choice of programming language.
> According to job postings by title at www.indeed.co.uk once you look
> outside London the relative dominance of Java, PHP and JS is much more
> pronounced.
>
> gvim
>
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