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by dijksterhuis 477 days ago
> The cynic in me says that most likely Accenture wanted to double bill us so gave us one competent dev and a bad one, but basically forbade the bad one from speaking to us to not be found out and then charged us two heads for the value of one.

on the one hand, the brutal, cold and emotionless hard-arse in me agrees with the cynic in you and would send an email about your concerns to whoever's decision it was in your company to bring them in and see what happens. they're the ones responsible for this situation. it's their problem. you might even be doing the offshoring company a favour because they might not know how bad the person is at the job.

at the same time, your manager (or whoever) might not even think it is a problem. maybe "their problem" is the risk of your team's budget getting slashed next year? maybe they just don't care and just want offshored devs around because .... well, that's what some kinds of managers always want for some reason that escapes me.

she does sound terrified. and the human part of me would absolutely struggle with this. but you are not responsible for her or her livelihood. you're responsible for you and yours (and the people around you depending on your position/role).

really, it depends on your manager. are they going to care about this? they're the ones who hired them, it's their arse on the line for spending that money.

> a few months ago we got a pair of offshored Accenture devs join our team to help meet some deadlines

> I had finished all my tickets for this sprint and was looking for work to pick up

your company got offshored devs to help with deadlines, but you've finished all your work for the sprint...? that sounds ... incongruous.

edited -- sorry basically rewrote the damn thing.

2 comments

> your company got offshored devs to help with deadlines, but you've finished all your work for the sprint...? that sounds ... incongruous.

Yeah like I said, I wasn't really involved in the decision making here and was a bit surprised contractors were brought on as I didn't feel we were behind or anything. I'm inclined to agree with you that there is some hidden politics at play here that I am not witness to, e.g., to use their allocated budget that year or it might be slashed the next year.

> she does sound terrified. and the human part of me would absolutely struggle with this. but you are not responsible for her or her livelihood. you're responsible for you and yours (and the people around you depending on your position/role).

This is the part I'm struggling with. Her lack of performance doesn't impact me much for now (apart from when the good dev goes on holiday and I get pinged instead) so it feels like i'm needlessly risking someone's livelihood for little personal gain.

> Her lack of performance doesn't impact me much for now ... so it feels like i'm needlessly risking someone's livelihood for little personal gain.

you might have answered your own question there (as it currently stands anyway). Sometimes the best thing to do is ... nothing. there's no perfect/correct answer here. all you can do is what feels right to you.

@franktankbank might be right too. keep your wits about you.

Your company is replacing you. The justification will be that they can get 2 devs for the price of 1. I wouldn't help this person. Expect to get sidelined and laid off a little later.
> your company got offshored devs to help with deadlines, but you've finished all your work for the sprint...? that sounds ... incongruous.

OP getting replaced. I wouldn't trust a word this worthless "dev" says. Classic manipulation tactic. These worthless devs serve as rabble in the crowd when bad decisions need public shows of support.