Developer Shortage

Over the years in Melbourne Australia its been getting harder to get good developers. I spent over 10 years doing pure development, worked hard earned my promotions.

I always tried to do more or better than the guy at the next desk, while I was never worried about job security as I've never been unemployed, I wanted to prove my self to both management and peers. The situation is much different these days, there are more positions than developers, so developers are getting cold called for positions, can land a different job with more money often quite easily.

Advertising positions often finds a poor range of people / skills, a lot of people who have little or no work experience in Australia and looking for an opportunity, people from different states, long term out of work, and other various combinations of unsuitable people. There are good people out there, but how do you attract them?

Traditionally I've been a fan of getting young smart people and training them, I've had great success with this method for a long time, and will do it again, but it comes with a penalty of time and investment, this method isn't suitable if you want to replace a senior experienced person quickly.

I was wondering if less people look to move during difficult financial times as any move is risky and also subject to a probation, any new job you take may or may not be suitable, so perhaps less people are looking. I was also wondering has Seek had its day, are people sick of the volume of positions / emails that come through daily, they stop looking at them.

So perhaps its time to revisit recruitment agencies, which I am generally loathed to use due to an experience I had as an employee. An agency asked me how much I wanted, and when I told them, they said they could get me more, and they did. I of course was very happy with this at the time, but later reflected they are working for and paid by the employer, yet they are working against them, costing the employer more in salaries and in turn fees.

So what's the solution? More networking, more tweeting, more advertising, more time? There is no clear obvious solution, I think its going to be a combination of many things. I currently have 4 positions advertised received 40+ applications, and while there are some worthy of consideration, there are no stand out people. So I've spent $1,000 on seek, and while its not a lot of money in comparison to an agency, its not value for money.

I'm interested in what others are doing to find people, more so the good solid proven developers, how do you find them, how do you lure them away from the comfort of their existing positions.