Reply to: State of the Market

[Cookielove]

Similar age as me and same time contracting …it’s nigh on impossible to land a perm role now

[avonleigh]

How do you get perm work after contracting for decades???

Anyone has any success?

Applied for lots but nothing …they seem to not want contractors and want career perms.

any tips?

No, I have been applying for permie jobs for the last 5 years with no joy. Had the odd interview but 90% of the time don't get that far. Have been contracting 27 years and I am mid 50's. Pretty much gave up on it.

[Cookielove]

How do you get perm work after contracting for decades???

Anyone has any success?

Applied for lots but nothing …they seem to not want contractors and want career perms.

any tips?

[SchumiStars]

Isn't most / 100% of those tests things which have already done to death and there's an optimal algorithm out there to solve it? like the retarded list sorting etc. Especially now with AI you can probably solve most things without even googling and there's a pretty good chance it won't be a lot of garbage but the industry standard for solving a software task.

In short, no.

The questions are not easy to solve. They usually require some planning and investigation in order to solve the problem.

For example, please write a web service that will accept a JSON input comprising of apples and oranges. Return a JSON object comprising the total number of oranges squared and added to the total apples which are green.

Usually not something we're the entire test can be googled or ai.

This is were the freshies will work collectively and find a solution.

[dsc]

Does anyone still require home coding tests now that AI can so easily help candidates cheat?

Most coding challenges have simple elegant solutions if you can find them. Its interesting to see the over engineered solutions candidates often came up with.

Isn't most / 100% of those tests things which have already done to death and there's an optimal algorithm out there to solve it? like the retarded list sorting etc. Especially now with AI you can probably solve most things without even googling and there's a pretty good chance it won't be a lot of garbage but the industry standard for solving a software task.

[tjccjt01]

Does anyone still require home coding tests now that AI can so easily help candidates cheat?

It's not cheating if the client is using AI as part of their work process.

[SchumiStars]

Does anyone still require home coding tests now that AI can so easily help candidates cheat?

Most coding challenges have simple elegant solutions if you can find them. Its interesting to see the over engineered solutions candidates often came up with.

More often than not, I usually do put a good effort in. Ensuring all the requirements are met, the unit tests pass and the code is runable. These have ranged from 10-20hrs of development work.

I would say that 80-90% of the time, the tests are not even reviewed or then overlooked as there was an internal hire.

If they are reviewed, you are then subjected to the reviewers scurtienty which can go either way tbh. I have known some reviewers to turn down tests because they are too good and would have shown up the existing developers and lead. Yes this does happen.

When your battling with numerous other Devs for roles it's very difficult to find the right balance.

[Fraidycat]

If you write them poorly, then it's usually an immediate no. If I write them well, then they wonder why i put some effort in. And those are the ones which are reviewed. Many aren't.

Does anyone still require home coding tests now that AI can so easily help candidates cheat?

Most coding challenges have simple elegant solutions if you can find them. Its interesting to see the over engineered solutions candidates often came up with.

[SchumiStars]

Apparently the end vendor only wanted someone from a list of European countries. Comforting to see it isn't just the UK that has stopped knowing what it is doing

One of the Danish pharmaceutical firms.

It's up to the client who they get in, but I have a real problem wasting my time on contracts I am never going to get no matter how well I do.

Lol, what about the tech tests that require a full weekend of work to then not even be looked at!

Yes this is very common and one of the reasons why I refuse them unless I get a good sniff. Even then,.I know I am usually wasting my time.

If you write them poorly, then it's usually an immediate no. If I write them well, then they wonder why i put some effort in. And those are the ones which are reviewed. Many aren't.

Horrendous.

[SussexSeagull]

Any ideas who the client was? There's a few companies I can name which have offices in those three countries (typically also in NL) and I'm guessing this is why they wanted someone "local".

One of the Danish pharmaceutical firms.

It's up to the client who they get in, but I have a real problem wasting my time on contracts I am never going to get no matter how well I do.

[dsc]

This was a bit unusual in that they were only considering people from Denmark, Germany or Poland. Which, as I said elsewhere, I would have thought broke EU Freedom to Work rules but obviously not applicable to me.

Any ideas who the client was? There's a few companies I can name which have offices in those three countries (typically also in NL) and I'm guessing this is why they wanted someone "local".

[SussexSeagull]

EU companies often don't even want to deal with the UK at all, even when it's doable and workable, they just want less faff. A few years ago I worked for a Scandi client and this was after Brexit, the agency arranged stuff only because the rate was high, the skillset was niche and they couldn't find anyone else. They told me later that I was the last person they signed with in the UK, after that a ban went in and they stopped all dealings with the UK.

This was a bit unusual in that they were only considering people from Denmark, Germany or Poland. Which, as I said elsewhere, I would have thought broke EU Freedom to Work rules but obviously not applicable to me.

[SussexSeagull]

Annoying that they only tell you that after succesfully recruiting you, perhaps those Europeans are not so competent after all!

Seen a great contract I really want, doing some prototyping work. Smaller agency advertising it, and an agent that does not have a phone number. Frustrating, that kind of work is something I am really good at, and I just want to get the agent on the phone and have an opportunity to make my pitch. I did manage to get one of said agents colleagues on the phone though, and now torn between hassling them again to pass my number on and ask to set up a call with the agent I am chasing after.

I do sometimes wonder if smaller agencies put out fake ads to gather CVs and there is no actual job behind it?

I was only in the process but had dropped everything to have a Teams call and twiddled my thumbs for a couple of hours waiting for an e-mail.

[SussexSeagull]

So why did they interview from outside?

I have previously had the same.

Contract was offered in the interview for the agent to then allow enough time for a competitor to interview and secure the job. This happened twice, in 4 weeks for the same client and agent.

First time, I let him off, the second time I let him know how much of an incompetent idiot he was.

First thing this morning they seemed happy to get in a contractor from the UK working remotely. I had a Teams call with him and we agreed I was to write something resembling a covering letter for the end vendor ASAP.

Bearing in mind his urgency I got a bit nervous that he hadn't been in touch for a couple of hours but it turns out he had a meeting with the Vendor who only wanted to consider people from Denmark, Germany and Poland, not the rest of the EU (which I think is probably against EU freedom to work rules but obviously no help to me anymore). There ws no mention of language being a pre-requisite and the meeting was in English.

I really think the IT Industry has stopped attempting to be competent with regards to recruitment anymore.

[dsc]

[...] Anyway, had an initial conversation about a remote opportunity from a European company today so hopefully the rest of the world has retained some level of competency.

[...] Apparently the end vendor only wanted someone from a list of European countries.

EU companies often don't even want to deal with the UK at all, even when it's doable and workable, they just want less faff. A few years ago I worked for a Scandi client and this was after Brexit, the agency arranged stuff only because the rate was high, the skillset was niche and they couldn't find anyone else. They told me later that I was the last person they signed with in the UK, after that a ban went in and they stopped all dealings with the UK.