Re: Retaining Top Developers

[lin0]

Hi samizdat,

What kind of answers are you expecting: economic impact studies, team morale impact studies, productivity impact studies, ...?

In any case, here are some links that might help you in your quest:

• Turnover (employment) at Wikipedia
• Turnover Is Expensive at CIO
• Software Team Turnover: Why Developers Leave (And What You Can Do About It) at developer.*
• Dealing with the Realities of Turnover at IT BUSINESS EDGE

You should also have a look (if you haven't done so already) at On Finding, Hiring, Inspiring and Keeping

Cheers,

lin0

[samizdat]

Thanks, lin0!

I'm mostly concerned with the business costs associated with defects that would not have happened, schedules that would not have slipped, and late hours that would not have happened to make up for the loss. Standard HR metrics for "hiring replacement costs" exist, but they do not tell a fraction of the whole story, espeically in terms of senior software and firmware developers. The developer.* story was very insightful, and in words, it said what needs to be said. I've added it to my list, but some more numbers would be helpful.

[lin0]

Hi samizdat,

I was going to reply here to Re^2: Retaining Top Developers but my answer got too long that I decided to create a new thread. In Assessing the cost of losing good developers, you can find the code for estimating the cost of letting good developers walk away

I hope it helps

Cheers,

lin0