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Comment by jakestl | Hacker News Reader

As a Midwesterner, I am slightly put off by the use of the term "outsourcing" in the title. Considering the term wasn't used in the article I feel it carries negative connotation. Maybe I am reading too deeply into this...

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I have to admit, as a fly-over stater (Colorado) I found the tone be pretty condescending. There's an air of "we're moving the stuff people in the valley are to smart to do" to it. I'm not sure if it's intended, but it seems like they think the midwest is only good for the entry level. That really amazing developers don't exist outside of the valley.

If that's true, I for one hope they don't change their position. We're building one hell of an engineering team and much of it is from the midwest. If other folks figure this out, I'd have to actually compete for the best developers!

Is it possible to get an entry-level engineering job in the Valley today? It doesn't seem like that's common at all. So if you're just starting out and particularly if you don't happen to have a boutique degree, where are you going to start at entry level as a developer? To me, it sounds like a great way to hire.

Yes, their are plenty of startups with less brand name recognition hiring. A friend of mine from a non technical background managed to get a decent PM job after finishing hackbrite.

Alternatively you can get in the door of a brand name company by doing QA for a year or so.I have multiple friends that transitioned from a liberals arts degree to being developers by first starting in QA. It's totally possible.

Internships are also a good way to get your foot in the door.

That's interesting; I never thought about the QA angle. Maybe you can say a little more about how that works and what companies?

Good QA people are incredibly hard to find, especially ones that can do automated testing. One of my old managers started at Apple in QA and then transitioned over to being a developer after a year or two. I’ve seen this pattern a number of times. The potential risk is that many organizations won’t allow you to leave QA. That may not be a problem if thats what you want to do. QA can pay quite well if you are doing the right thing.

The way to play this is to go into an organization with a good brand name, work hard, focus on automation as much as possible and if they won’t help you transition over to being a developer leave after two years for a place that will. Having a good brand on your resume will open a lot of doors. Also, if you are going down this road its a good idea to build a portfolio of software on github.

Devops is also a good option to consider. It really depends on what your background is and what skills you bring to the table.

That's what I did. I had a degree in Physics, and at the time, Microsoft had a small training program for test developers. I did that for a couple years, and through a pair of job hops, am now a developer at an established startup. I didn't try to switch internally at MS, but I believe it would have been possible.

The one thing I would note, is that QA generally has lower prestige/pay then dev, so if you want to move to dev, be careful about things. Make sure any QA job you take has a significant development component, ideally letting you design and implement decent-sized projects you can point to when interviewing for a dev role.

If you have more questions, email is in profile.

The company I work for hires at the entry-level pretty much constantly.

I think you are. This http://www.saturnsys.com/ "local" (as in ~200 miles away from me) Minnesota company has been using the tagline "Offshore to the North Shore" (...of Lake Superior) in their radio advertising for years. Their home page touts their "Rural outsourcing model."

Outsourcing is exactly what it is. Nothing to be offended about.

Someone put that in the HN title, the original article does not (for it's worth, I've flagged it thus).

Also, virtually every company in the world outsources. Do you use an external account for tax compliance? Outsourcing. Do you have a lawyer that's on a contract? Outsourcing. You got that advertisement created for your online ad campaign from a marketing company? Outsourcing.

Using the word outsourcing here is not correct. They are paying full-time employees and managing them as such.

If it had not been enclosed in quotation marks, maybe. But the presence of those signals that they don't mean strict outsourcing, but are using it with a touch of irony.

For the data entry jobs as a contract employee, I think it is actually the correct word. Outsourcing doesn't need to be on-shore, or even remote. IBM outsources its secretaries and maintenance who work in the same building as employees. This company wanted to outsource data entry and customer service.

If they are actually hiring the people (as it seems the author of the post had happen to him eventually), then it isn't outsourcing anymore.

Not too deeply, I think. Outsourcing implies the use of second-rate talent (and literally refers to sourcing cheaper talent outside of the company, which is not the case here). It's definitely condescending, and I understand why tech talent in the Midwest would take offense to this tone. There is definitely a large pool of top notch talent in the Midwest, and it's no secret at all that it's the most cost effective part of the country.

It's being used in a tounge-in-cheek manner here.

That's true, and I think jakestl understands that. But it's received with a tone of "look, what a surprise, those Midwestern folks are worth something," which definitely isn't a great way to make someone feel.

The buzzword term I've seen used is "Onshoring", also, fellow midwesterner here

One company in Duluth MN calls it "Offshore to the North Shore"

So what do you think about foreign developers who work for American companies (that are outsourced muscle)? That they are inferior? I feel like I'm being hostile now, but that is what seems to must follow, if you even accept the term outsourcing.

I think outsourcing is either motivated by 1. cost, which does not necessarily have anything to do with quality, might just be that the cost of living is very different, and the cost of living difference in this case seems to be non-negligible. 2. Expertise; we, as a company, don't want to/can't have an X department, so you guys can take care of it.

A possible barrier to productive outsourcing is a mismatch in cultures. In that case, you can't really blame the outsourced party for not being American/German/Austrian... This is a thing that can mask itself as incompetence.

Outsourcing usually means hiring cheap, low-quality third-party labor and firing/not hiring skilled, trained full-time employees. Whether this is from another country or not is unrelated.

The situation described in the article has nothing to do with outsourcing, but building a remote team, both foreign and domestic.

Using the term "outsourcing" does a disservice to those employees. Since the Midwest was mentioned specifically, I had a similar reaction to the one you had for my comment.

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