"We have 100 vacancies, but we’ll be fortunate if we can fill half with hires in the UK,” says Errol Damelin, the boss of Wonga. Often talent has to be imported from America or elsewhere, but immigration rules for hires from outside the European Union are still “extremely cumbersome”, he complains
Another reason is that Wonga is morally bankrupt as it takes advantage of the desperate and the ill-informed. It's harder for them to hire as they want good engineers but need them to be unconcerned with what their skills are being used for.
Spot on. If I could upvote this a hundred times I would.
I had a certain well know recruitment agent basically begging for me to go and work for them a couple of years ago. The agent was completely incapable of understanding why I "would turn away such a great opportunity" and just kept pushing so I told her to fuck off.
Absolute arsehole recruiters and companies.
for ref, I refuse to work for gambling and gaming outfits as well as they're just as bad
I don't necessarily see anything unethical about offering short term, quick turnaround loans. Or is there some part of their business practise that makes them shady?
Which has some excellent insights into this sort of behavior. Basically if you don't have enough money you are willing to borrow against a future payout for an extortionate rate (say 5% if you pay it back in a month which is an annualized rate of 60% interest). But what it really means it that the 5% you paid to get early access to money is a huge chunk of your future income. Lets say you make $1000/month and you're always behind so you're always getting a payday loan with a 5% rate which you pay back when you get paid. Over 12 months you've paid 12 * $50 or $600 for that privileged which is nearly an entire month's pay. Great for the lender, sucks for you.
Not surprisingly the principle is pretty general. I found when reading it that I could exchange "time" for "money" (which is to say making poor time choices when I felt time was scarce which would only cause me to have even less time in the future)
But the question is, what happens if such loans are unavailable? Late charges on bills or missed opportunities (like can't get a new suit for a job interview).
If you did short term high risk loans with standard loan rate APR like you would get from a bank it would be impossible to get any margin at all.
That is a really excellent question. I don't know.
In one universe people feel the pain of the scarcity and make better choices, in another they fall off of 'barely subsisting' into abject poverty. Either outcome is possible.
In a third, less likely :-), universe we put together a basic income program and keep people out of the mental trap.
London is peculiar compared to Silicon Valley or Silicon Allee(Berlin), in that it is the hub for Finance, Retail and Media,Politics and Advertising and it is also the political capital in the UK. Talent is expensive here and scarce. Compare this to Berlin, which doesn't have the banking industry to compete with, makes it a much better startup hub than London and it also has a thriving startup community and plenty of talented hard-working programmers. There isn't enough money to go around here (in London), the VC firms here are terribly myopic and often don't understand the technology (this is probably true of all VC firms). A lot of the talent is tied up in Canary Wharf and the Square Mile. My experience with startup culture in London is not as optimistic as the article paints, seems half-arsed. But that's been my experience. I'd be interested to know if others have had a different experience.
I work near London's Silicon Roundabout and like the article said, there is no money. Growth is the biggest hurdle and there is little financial support. Many of the VC firms, I hate to say it, don't understand the technology well enough.
There isn't enough talent to go around either, since it is mostly tied up in the banking and retail sector.
Most of the money here is going towardsand I find this a bit surprising. The sense of community that I'd expect from a startup hub isn't there and most of the talent are tied up in the banking and retail sector. It all feels a bit underground.
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[ 3.7 ms ] story [ 48.5 ms ] threadAnother reason is that Wonga is morally bankrupt as it takes advantage of the desperate and the ill-informed. It's harder for them to hire as they want good engineers but need them to be unconcerned with what their skills are being used for.
Absolute arsehole recruiters and companies.
for ref, I refuse to work for gambling and gaming outfits as well as they're just as bad
Pretty much market average according to this: http://www.totaljobs.com/salary-checker/average-sql-develope...
Which has some excellent insights into this sort of behavior. Basically if you don't have enough money you are willing to borrow against a future payout for an extortionate rate (say 5% if you pay it back in a month which is an annualized rate of 60% interest). But what it really means it that the 5% you paid to get early access to money is a huge chunk of your future income. Lets say you make $1000/month and you're always behind so you're always getting a payday loan with a 5% rate which you pay back when you get paid. Over 12 months you've paid 12 * $50 or $600 for that privileged which is nearly an entire month's pay. Great for the lender, sucks for you.
Not surprisingly the principle is pretty general. I found when reading it that I could exchange "time" for "money" (which is to say making poor time choices when I felt time was scarce which would only cause me to have even less time in the future)
If you did short term high risk loans with standard loan rate APR like you would get from a bank it would be impossible to get any margin at all.
In one universe people feel the pain of the scarcity and make better choices, in another they fall off of 'barely subsisting' into abject poverty. Either outcome is possible.
In a third, less likely :-), universe we put together a basic income program and keep people out of the mental trap.
I work near London's Silicon Roundabout and like the article said, there is no money. Growth is the biggest hurdle and there is little financial support. Many of the VC firms, I hate to say it, don't understand the technology well enough.
There isn't enough talent to go around either, since it is mostly tied up in the banking and retail sector. Most of the money here is going towardsand I find this a bit surprising. The sense of community that I'd expect from a startup hub isn't there and most of the talent are tied up in the banking and retail sector. It all feels a bit underground.
Please edit and elaborate because my observations of London aren't dissimilar. London just isn't a technology place. It's all about business.