State of the Market

[malvolio]

I also previously claimed that I was seeing more outside roles than inside, going by stats gathered from my RSS feeds. Good to see that backed up by this survey. There was a lot of fear around the time Labour got in that there would be a fresh IR35 clamp down and tax squeeze, but it does not seem to be happening and confidence in outside has come back a little, probably because they put NI up!

There has been a tightening on IR35. It's been aimed at ensuring the right assessments are made and the right people are paying the right taxes. That has led to greater certainty over outside roles.

Don't for a minute think that HMG are working in our favour.

[willendure]

There has been a tightening on IR35. It's been aimed at ensuring the right assessments are made and the right people are paying the right taxes. That has led to greater certainty over outside roles.

Don't for a minute think that HMG are working in our favour.

Ok fair point. I think there was a lot of fear caused by uncertainty at the time Labour got in as well as speculation on draconian action being taken. Clarification helps.

[WTFH]

Agent phoned me this morning about 2 roles. He's one who has got me work in the past and while I would never fully trust an agent, he is one of the better ones. His company had a quieter year last year and were placing more permanent than contractors. He's seeing an upturn already in the first week of this year with clients signing off on projects that they had delayed. Interesting comment from him was that the rates are going up.
One of the roles he had was almost written for me - I know the client and some of the team already assembled for it, but I'm currently on a good rate with a similar project. I suggested 4 other names, but this agent knew where 2 of them were (he had placed them last year), and one of the others got out of IT altogether to focus on his side business.

[ResistanceFighter]

Contract just ended abruptly, internal politics nothing to do with the product team, back looking again - guessing things haven't improved in the last 6 months?

[northernladuk]

Contract just ended abruptly, internal politics nothing to do with the product team, back looking again - guessing things haven't improved in the last 6 months?

IMO quite the opposite.

[sadkingbilly]

Contract just ended abruptly, internal politics nothing to do with the product team, back looking again - guessing things haven't improved in the last 6 months?

depends on your skillset.

[ladymuck]

depends on your skillset.

And your network!

[TheDude]

Final set of interviews tomorrow at a US financial information company.

Let's see what happens.

Didn't go well. After an hour they hit me with a Leetode Hard algorithm that required a topological sort.

These sort of coding challenges are so arbitrary. If I am unfamiliar with an algorithm you expect me to derive it in an interview quicker than the person it was named after?

[Dorkeaux]

Didn't go well. After an hour they hit me with a Leetode Hard algorithm that required a topological sort.

These sort of coding challenges are so arbitrary. If I am unfamiliar with an algorithm you expect me to derive it in an interview quicker than the person it was named after?

Don't take it too hard.
Unreasonable to ask interviewees to solve LeetCode 'hard' problems without reference material IMO.
I think they are testing the wrong skills.

I worked with Reuters for many years, I don't recall anyone being required to code a topological sort from memory.
The work was about getting regression-tested features into production as quickly as possible by whatever means.

[coolhandluke]

Didn't go well. After an hour they hit me with a Leetode Hard algorithm that required a topological sort.

These sort of coding challenges are so arbitrary. If I am unfamiliar with an algorithm you expect me to derive it in an interview quicker than the person it was named after?

These type of questions say more about the interviewer than the interviewee. When I get something like this I see it as a lucky escape as invariably the place is staffed by morons.