Re: Joint Strike Fighter

["Marin David Condic" <dont.bother.mcondic.auntie.spam@[acm.org>]

If you presume that you're going to need people for more than a year, then
the training cost is negligable. Hire smart people and then train them in
the specifics of your tasks. Its nice to get people who are instant-experts
in whatever your problem-space is, but the only people who *really* are, are
the ones already at your desks.

Beware of contractors claiming to be experts in your domain. :-)

Another thing you need to consider is just how creative you can get with
solving your personel problems. For reasons that are convoluted, arcane and
probably more FUD than reality, companies are *very* reluctant to outsource
custom software development. They will "outsource" it to the extent that it
is a) a COTS product like MS-Word or b) it is part of some hardware
deliverable (a test computer, an embedded system, etc.) You almost never
hear of companies willing to go to an outside firm, spec out some software
and then pay them to build it for them. (If you were willing to do that, I'd
be able to find you a dozen or so Ada pros down here in Florida and form up
a company just to do that work! :-)

Some companies will "outsource" custom software to the extent that they hire
"Consultants" to come into their office and write it for them. But basically
when you strip away the BS, its essentially "Employees" that you don't give
benefits and don't feel guilty about firing. So maybe you have to get
creative in what you do with "Consultants" - redefine them to be "Employees"
that you not only don't pay benefits and can fire easily, but they also
don't have to be "on site" to do their job. Software can be done anywhere -
maybe that's something to exploit? (Never understood why it all had to be
done in Sillycon Valley - is that the only place in the country where the
soil is right for growing Bits?)

There is lots of Ada talent out there - just maybe not centered in the
precise location one might want. Home-grow it, import it or take the work to
where they are.

MDC
--
Marin David Condic
Senior Software Engineer
Pace Micro Technology Americas    www.pacemicro.com
Enabling the digital revolution
e-Mail:    marin.condic@pacemicro.com
Web:      http://www.mcondic.com/


"Rex Reges" <Rex.R.Reges@boeing.com> wrote in message
news:3BE813E4.C4797DDE@reges.org...
>
> I doubt that one could get several hundred Ada programmers
> in a pinch.  I couldn't hire six experienced Ada
> contractors in six months! And try to get them to move
> to some tornado infested place like Oklahoma City (who knows
> what Fort Worth holds). Of course we could train C++
> programmers. So we pay $75/hour for their time and send them
> to training too! And if you do, then you have inexperienced
> Ada programmers. It's not like Ada inhibits people from
> doing stupid things (like creating a C interpreter in
> Ada to get out of writing everything in Ada).
>