Welcome to the world of software engineering. Good programmers are rare. Even well-written software has bugs. One of the most important things in software is getting your ideas crystal clear. Make wireframes. Draw scenarios. Write out all the requirements. You’ll probably see that you have lot of blind spots.
this post was submitted on 09 Nov 2023
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you need a good product manager (or at least a project manager). A good product manager can get the best out of a dev.
It takes many, many, years to get good at managing devs. If you are managing your own project, I recommend taking some courses.
I’m a software engineer, hit me up I’m looking for a side project
Hey man, not the OP, but I'd be keen to have a chat I'd you're open to it? I may need an extra set of hands for a project we have coming up
Proper engagement, paid etc
I can help. What tech stack are you working on and what do you need from my side?
Shoot me a dm!
What’s your rate?
not OP but I am a web dev as well, and my rate is $3k/month. I can share more details if needed
Freelance sites are often for cheap-skates. The good reviews are often because they solved a lot of really simple problems. Like "I need a powerBI script" or something.
You get what you pay for. You probably do want to pay for it and get an NDA to protect your idea too, at least in the early stages.
It can be hard to find a programmer co-founder as an entrepreneur, because, all us programmers have heard about a billion pitches by non-technical entrepreneurs, and they're usually a really bad idea or not lucrative enough to bother.
Like no, you're not going to make a successful, breakthrough social media company anymore. Ship has sailed bro.
Like no, I won't accept 100 dollars for 40 hours of work that YOU OWN afterwards when I'm making 60+ an hour at my day job.
In any case, I don't have a lot of advice for you there other than you should try to befriend some programmers. You can keep trying some others on those freelance sites but you might want to contact the higher $ ones with lots of feedback because they'll take it more seriously.
Thank you for the advice. This isn't a billion dollar idea more niche specific. I have no dreams of lambos and all that but I am hoping to make 150k or more per year. It really depends on the number of subscribers and the monthly subscription cost the market is willing to pay for the service.
It's likely your fault as you didn't communicate properly or know what you're actually asking for. Happy to try and lend a hand
Yo! I'm not going to code for you, im too busy. But I can give offer you some advice for free. Hit me up if you are interested.
A word of advice
If you're going to outsource a programming project, then you have got to divorce yourself from what you think the coding should be like. Infact don't try to say what should be done and what should not be done.
All you should have is a barebone blueprint. I want this to do that...simple.
Your coder is the guy who brainstorms the solution. If you don't have coding skills, you shouldn't be conceptualizing.
That's the problem you're having.
You don't need a programmer you need a technical cofounder
Ideally that person should be experienced at creating startups and go from "0 to 1"
If you pick another programmer you will just get taken for a ride again
You need a technical cofounder who shares your vision and will create whatever it is you want either short term demo that will be scrapped later and remade (MVP) or something that will last a little longer (or a lot longer)
What’s to stop the technical cofounder from doing all the work, getting sick of the inequality in effort then usurp the whole idea?
That seems to happen a lot when one person is a programmer and one person isn’t because the programmer is the only one who can really execute the idea
With any product you have 2 parallel streams going on -
- Product Development
- Customer Development
Product Development doesn't just involve "building it", there is also tons of UI / UX work, and the most important job of a Product Owner of figuring out what features to prioritize and what is the go to market strategy.
Then there is Customer Development, where you actively talk to customers to figure out their pain points and try to deeply understand the problem, and how you could potentially solve it.
There is also marketing and sales, which is related to Customer Development but is it's own thing.
The idea is that everyone contributes to all these parts of the company, while the technical founder manages how to build it, and with what quality requirements. But the other founders are involved in every other part of the company.
There's more to just making it. There's knowing what to make (Product or Research), and designing what to make (UI/UX) and then selling or pushing what you make. You got the 3 H's (hacker, hustler, hipster) and each would bring unique skills. 99% of programmers cannot design or sell worth a cent.
You can use slicing pie model https://slicingpie.com/learn-slicing-pie-model/ to turn everything into a "slice" and calculate fair market value. Time, relationships, money even ideas all have fair market value. You can have real time calculation of equity. In most primitive way you have time based vesting but more advanced tracking like slicing pie has no fixed equity chunks. If someone was lazy and did nothing and got fired, the treatment of their "slices" would be different than if someone walked away for either bad or good reasons. When the startup gets funding, slicing pie model ends and you can accurately price and hire. People's "slices" (equity) is paid off then and you move into salaries and normal compensation.
The builder can try to "usurp" the whole idea but then they would need another person to do the selling and the designing. The sales guy can walk away too and so can the designer. The risk is the same.
In many startups, the early work can be heavily tilted towards the business side. You have to figure out what you're building before you want to actually start building. This means talking to customers, building a landing page, ad campaign, etc. Some companies may need more early technical development, but you've got problems if the business-side cofounder isn't doing this.
Rarely is what you ask for in the beginning what you will need in the end.
Eventually, it will need to be changed to increase traffic or as you find out you need more things.
If its just you and them, they should be able to do it for you without the need to write out complex requirements, just send an email, they'll implement, you look, point out what you want changed, they change it and the process continues.
I’m a software dev. Let me know if you still need help
You may want to consider a no-code solution like Bubble (web) or Adalo (mobile + web) for an MVP. Gives you a lot of flexibility in terms of costs and bug-hunting and could help you launch much faster and more efficiently than traditional dev. Ping me if this sounds interesting, I'm a product design engineer with loads of experience launching MVPs via these platforms
Steal a guy from a small company like me lol. Guys who work with huge teams rarely know wtf they are doing. Meanwhile, I work with a team of 4 other dudes, we all do the work of like 30 guys no problem. We get paid accordingly though.
Likewise, I’d ask: how do you find a serious entrepreneur?
I’m an Embedded Software Engineer. Few years back I’ve been approached by a wannabe entrepreneur, with a great plan to build a product. Everything started with a discussion on LinkedIn, then some Zoom, then a word document, 9-10 pages long, containing a set of system requirements. The guy had worked in the same field as myself (automotive) and he knew at least how to write down such requirements. That was a big plus. Nonetheless, that was the only input.
I’ve spent a lot of time to setup a complete project structure, laid down proper software requirements, created some initial design documents, set up Bitbucket/JIRA/Confluence ecosystem, created first demo software, prepared the deliverables and then…he said that plans are changed indefinitely as he got a nice offer from a big company and he’ll get back into full time employment 😐 That was it. He did pay something for my work, but an infinitesimal value, compared to what I’ve done.
Now, you’d say that I was naive not to charge per hour, but bear in mind that I wasn’t a freelancer and I wanted to literally join in as a “partner” on the embedded software side with a hope to achieve something greater on the long run. I basically ended up doing some 4-5 weeks of evening/weekend work, almost for free. That work was done on my spare time.
Since then, I’ve stayed away of such “promises” 🤭
Run the business yourself then 👀👀
I’m a software engineer now entrepreneur.
I noticed this issue right away when I first started, many freelancers still think “9-5” and I don’t think they really understand how to do business.
They lack communication skills and don’t really know how to ask the right questions. I know because I struggled with this myself.
A good engineer should be able to troubleshoot all the problems themselves, the whole experience should feel like a “white glove” service.
My biggest advice is to network with other engineers that either run an agency/firm delivering “dev as a service”. Shop around a bit before you make any final decisions.
A place to find them is here on Reddit or Twitter, also LinkedIn is growing so I think that’s another great place. I’m personally on all 3.
The white glove service is what I expected, what I got was riding shotgun in a car with 3 wheels and the check engine light is on. I really have no network and not even sure how to get one started since I work full time and I really have nothing to bring to the table in a networking group other than my ideas.
I will look for the dev as a service. Thank you
That’s kind of the hard part about this stuff. Your best best is to spend as little money as possible to get an MVP that you can demo to customers and investors, and either get capital from revenue for a better product or capital from investors.
You post a detailed job description with a high salary and they'll come find you. You hire the top 5 applicants to work on your project. In 6 months do 360 reviews of their work. Cut the non-performers and replace them with new programmers. Eventually you'll have a good team of programmers so long as the salary remains high and the benefits remain great.
Or you can do what you're doing now which is hunting and pecking and hoping and begging and praying that you'll find some nibwit to do a half-assed job.
As a developer/project manager this is a problem I've seen a lot of clients face.
There are two problems here. Rather than getting a programmer who just codes you need someone who'd take the time to understand what your business model is, what you're trying to do, what your use cases are and then works accordingly. For this you'd need to be deeply integrated with the development process otherwise it just doesn't work.
Secondly, freelancing websites are cheaper but more often than not you'd end up with useless and non functional websites so it's better to stay away from them.
As I mentioned, I am product manager as well and I, can have a look at what you have.
You can view some of recent projects we have done for our clients by visiting the following links: wheretocop.shop, flashserp.com, fulltimewin.live, retailed.io, proselfies.com
I love how on every one of your sites, you immediately tell the visitor what the site can do for him.
You don't know how many times I land on a site, and it takes me 15 minutes to figure out what they do. On some, I give up because I can never get a clear message of what they can do for me.
Good work.
Money
i can give you some advice if you want around the software, for free. However, remember don't outsource business critical stuff. In your case it should be much more beneficial and safe to find a technical co founder or fractional CTO (CTO as a service)
I am also a developer and i do product development as well. I am based in the states. I am honest and can work with you from ideation phase. DM me if interested.
Some people have said you need a technical cofounder, others said an experienced engineer, others a product manager. They’re all right. Not to be rude, but it sounds like you don’t know what you’re doing. Just the way you are phrasing your questions. Hiring a freelancer from one of those sites is going to be a waste of money. The no-node option is viable. Or you need real technical guidance.
I am a software engineer, and building a useless project is unfortunately easy. For a medium or large project, I recommend implementing a workflow process to create a valuable product.
- Document all the features you envision for the product during a brainstorming session.
- Subsequently, prioritize and select the most crucial features to build an MVP of the product.
- Register all MVP features in a task management application, providing title, description, and acceptance criteria.
- If possible, request an UI/UX designer to create a Figma project encompassing all MVP features.
- Align the Figma project with the developer, and be the tester for each feature delivered.
You need to know exactly what you want from start to finish conceptually, and the funds to incentivize the programmer to see it through. If you catch someone between jobs but offer them a fraction of their earning potential they are going to probably leave your project before its finished.
As has been mentioned here (and only to reiterate it) this is why 'Product Manager' is a role. We are employed to take the business requirements, understand what you're actually trying to achieve with the product (in complete non-technical terms), then put into action a 'project' for the engineers to work with. This includes requirements gathering (which is what you did, but in far more detail so there is no ambiguity, but should also be done as you go in an agile way such there isnt resource wastage on things you dont want/need), project management, customer profiling and research, and prioritisation of what should be done vs what could be done.
There are many options for early stage entrepreneurs to create an MVP, such as no code solutions and also having a technical co-founder, but hiring a freelancer is risk laden, as you've found out.
Hopefully I am allowed to plug here (won't post a link, message me if you're interested), but my company offers just this solution. You sit down with me (a product manager) to truly understand what it is you want to achieve, and then we work with our experienced engineers, using industry best practice to achieve the product you're looking for, within your allocated budget.
I have a candidate name Alok Singh.. Manage Social Media Account/ social media, whole digital marketer, app development including your query. If you are interested then call me at my number : +91-8920830198
Also you can whatsapp me
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Engineers will under estimate to have the lowest quote and get the contract. Once the entrepreneur is sucked in, it becomes a sunken cost fallacy.
Entrepreneurs often don’t know about the tech, and underestimate significantly the scope of the project. They ask a bunch of features that are supposedly critical, and they can’t prioritize ruthlessly nor extract the key components needed. They often pick an eng that will low ball their quote, which often means the less professional engs.
In these cases, you are better of having a tech project manager, even part time, a few hours here and there to cut the bullshit, pick the right engs, and have a clear list of deliverables. Paid by the hour.
And sometimes it means that the PM tells the entrepreneur that their project will cost 2x to 5x what they expect (they want a Twitter competitor for $5k). Once you convinced them that their money would get nowhere close to what they want, good luck getting paid for the several hours that you helped them (crickets usually), even if you saved them $10k by avoiding a costly mistake. Entrepreneurs are more unprofessional than Eng. at least Eng can make a living.
Now as a project manager I am getting paid upfront. 😅 I don’t need to work with cheap amateurs. 😂
I am an experienced software engineer looking for work! Maybe you just have to come complain about bad programmers to get the good ones lol
If what you want is relevant to an iOS app I can make it
You pay :) You don’t find them on UpWork that’s for sure.
Software Engineer here. You don’t need to know programming to explain how you want the software to function—BUT knowing programming does help in terms of scoping work.
P.S. I’d be down to take on paid side work if it sounds cool enough.
This is exactly the issue of missing IT/business analysis skills. You can put together some requirements, but usually they are inconsistent, incomplete and looked at only from “happy path scenario”.
This is exactly why someone with solid IT/business analytical skills (requirement engineering, software modeling, communication, etc.) is crucial for developing useful, working software according to the real business needs.
I understand you already might have a clear vision for the project. However, I'll mention this as a step as well.
-
You need to define what you want as a client. Communicate clearly with the developer and convey what you want. Don't leave anything for assumption.
-
Convert the problems you have encountered so far in this journey into questions that can be used while interviewing candidates.
For example: Convert the coding-related problems that you have encountered into questions that can be used during the interview process. This can help you to find the right people.
- Ask candidates about problems that they have encountered on their previous projects and how they solved them.
As a developer myself, my first concern is to build something according to my client's vision. I always make sure to ask questions and leave nothing to my assumption.
If you send me a DM I can share some example documents of how to prepare the document for your project so that you can convey your idea clearly.
Well you can try to find a local programing company/agency with good reviews as they usually do not bail out and are quite legit. keap in mind the will be more expensive.
You absolutely shouldn't have to brainstorm how to fix your programmer's bugs.
It sounds like you two weren't a good fit. Maybe he was unethical, or maybe there were other issues. You wrote that you were eventually telling him "how" to do things; that's not a level of interaction you should have to take or that most programmers I know would be comfortable with. A non-technical boss should just be telling developers the requirements and ideally the "why", not the "how".
You might want a technical cofounder, or an engineer who'd be willing to walk you through best practices in working with them. This will help you learn and set expectations for leading programming teams in the future.