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Advice Needed: How to start a IT team to develop applications
| Posted by tokcok, 01-03-2010, 07:51 PM |
| Hi,
i am no programmer myself. But i have huge interest in IT stuff. I have a lot of ideas in mind which require me to form a IT team to develop them.
I am not looking for outsourcing as i have tried it many times and spend alot of money on them with not much results.
Now, i am thinking of having a team that i can meet face to face with a proper office and i will pay them fixed monthly pay.
How should i get this started?
Should i hire a project manager first or i get 1,2,3 programmer straightaway?
There is no financial constraints as i have other business which are bringing in the money.
Pls advice.
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| Posted by cselzer, 01-03-2010, 08:23 PM |
| Wrong forum. should be in Employment Offers (by employers)
And, you would be better off looking for someone locally. It would be easier with more details to point you in the right direction.
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| Posted by DevMonkey, 01-03-2010, 09:05 PM |
| cselzer, the guy is looking for advice not employees - the thread heading says it all!
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| Posted by vibrokatana, 01-04-2010, 03:20 AM |
| Honestly you need to get some things together before you go off hiring people:
#1) What platforms are you going to target? Strictly windows? Or do you want to support other platforms?
It is best to decide early on what framework you are going to use so you don't have a mass of spaghetti someone will eventually need to untangle. For instance you can target OSX, Linux and Windows with Qt but your going to need developers familiar with C++. If you go strictly windows you will probably want peeps familiar with WPF and C#. iPhone requires Objective C and android uses Java iirc, so it will be hit or miss if you want to focus on those.
Don't think you can hire a PHP programmer and expect them to spit out perfectly decent C the next day, it doesn't happen. Just like you wouldn't go from speaking English to Chinese overnight.
#2) Get a business plan together. Even though you have no budget constraints at the moment, will that hold true for 5 years? 15? If you don't have a plan you probably wont get anywhere. Keep your cycle well structured so you don't have a bunch of programmers running around confused about what they need to be doing.
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| Posted by MoneyBack, 01-04-2010, 05:50 AM |
| Can you please share your experience in outsourcing , I was thinking in this kind of business
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| Posted by tokcok, 01-04-2010, 08:25 AM |
| thanks for replies so far.
vibrokatana:
I will be targeting windows platform. About framework, i have no idea about this but my current development with outsourcing firm use zend framework.
My ideas are either web based or applications. Web based stuff is obviously the way to go as in asia, nobody like to install stuff in their computer.
I have ready customers who need the stuff that i want to create. Why do i need to have a business plan as i am not asking for investors. The way i see it is, once i get a project done, i will have revenue to expand on the team.
Moneyback:
After 2-3 years working with outsourcing firms, here my conclusion - if your project is very big or require constant modifications,upgrades - you are better off with in house team.
If your project is a website,outsourcing will be good.
All outsourcing firmes require you to write specs. This is very time consuming. And once specs is agreed, any change you want to make is chargable - this make outsourcing very inflexible.
I have work with swiss,indians and russians. All tend to underquote your projects and you will think that things are so cheap. But once you start paying the deposit, you are dead. It will come to a point that you will have to increase your budget.
Alternatively, i also have paid for fixed monthly price programmers in outsourcing firms which also come with a project manager. In long term ( i have them for more than 1 year @ ard 10k usd per month), you will realise that having in house team will be more worthwhile as obviously the company which give me the programmer take a cut of the price i pay. I feel that results are not good, especially in the speed part. They just take too long. I am comparing with chinese programmers in china who are so fast. But i do not want to use chinese programmers as there are just too many examples of them taking your stuff and selling them.
Last edited by tokcok; 01-04-2010 at 08:34 AM.
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| Posted by Xeentech, 01-04-2010, 01:03 PM |
| Since you've said your not a programmer your self I think you'd need to hire some one to manage the development that knows who to hire, skill set wise.
Personally I'd either hire a project manager that has been a developer and knows the tech stuff and can find competent devs. Or I'd look for a lead-developer that either has experience managing others or is looking to get that experience.
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| Posted by tim2718281, 01-04-2010, 05:03 PM |
| No, it's best to find a few competent programmers first, who really want to spend the next ten years growing your applications and business. They will be able to deal with whatever platforms and languages successive projects require.
I don't think hiring a project manager is a good idea for small projects. I think you need a lead programmer. It may be that if you have a very good team, each can be the lead on one project.
However, it may be a good idea to hire a technical author, maybe on a part-time basis. And because part of a technical author's skill is to find out exactly what the application is supposed to do, a good technical author is likely to have some good testing skills. A good tech author should also be good at web page design.
The translation of good ideas into working code is a fun process; and during the process, there is feedback - some aspects of the good ideas were maybe not so good, and other ideas crop up that did not occur at first.
So I think the OP is absolutely right to want to work with a team of dedicated people.
But it's the dedication that matters, not whether they have used Windows 2008 or Linux xyz.
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| Posted by tokcok, 01-04-2010, 05:44 PM |
| Hi,
For hiring of programmer, what should i look at?
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| Posted by stdunbar, 01-04-2010, 05:53 PM |
| Others have posted it earlier - you need a partner who has managed developers and projects. My personal preference would be for this person to have an extensive technical background too so that, as others have said, they can help you make the technical decisions. I say partner intentionally - this person must be vested in your endeavour. You have the business plan, now let this person handle the technology side of things. This person will be a technical manager who may develop code and can help you decide when and if you need more people. If you do then this person will know what to look for.
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| Posted by tokcok, 01-04-2010, 06:45 PM |
| I have come across such person. But i cant meet their demands as they are not happy with a salary, they want to have a share in the profits.
Well i am fine with sharing profits if the person can come up with some money - example each person contribute 100k each. This means all risk is with me. I see no point in such partnership
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| Posted by stdunbar, 01-04-2010, 06:59 PM |
| I'm not going to disagree that you are taking risk. However, the other party is taking on risk too. They risk potentially a good deal of time and/or money invested in the project. Look at it from an outsiders perspective - if you came to me and said "I have a great business idea. It will cost you 100K or 1 year with no salary" I'd have be very, very sure that it would be worth my investment. This isn't easy for alot of people. You're in a great situation - you've got some ideas that you are convinced that you can turn into cash and you don't have to turn them into cash - you've got other projects to bring in the money. Your partner may not have that luxury.
It sounds like your key will be to find some sort of balance. I've worked for many startup companies that pay a lower rate in exchange for equity. This distributes the overall risk between you (your money) and your partner (his/her time and lower pay). Having said that, I've never made a dime from these startups but that is a different story
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| Posted by tim2718281, 01-04-2010, 08:20 PM |
| Well, you can't look at anything, can you, as you're not a programmer yourself.
I suggest you pick one of your ideas, and take on two programmers on a short-term contract, and see what they can achieve in three months.
Where in the world are you? What's the local supply of programmers?
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| Posted by tokcok, 01-05-2010, 02:10 AM |
| in malaysia, local supply limited.
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| Posted by tokcok, 01-05-2010, 02:12 AM |
| I am not seeking to pay lower rate. I can pay standard rate. But when people know that you cant do much without them, they will squeeze you ...
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| Posted by MoneyBack, 01-05-2010, 10:24 AM |
| tokcok ;
Thank you for the detailed answer
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