[Sigia-l] is it just me, or is it really hard to find IAs right now?

[Livia Labate]

: i would also suggest that you're hiring the wrong freelancers. i make a
: herculean effort to document all of my work, write specs, save files in
: an organized fashion and share my project knowledge with all the team
: members so that they can continue to work on the project after i'm
: gone or hire someone to pick up where i left off.

To Dave's point, freelancers are knowledge unretained, but not just on a 
project level, but on a 'corporate culture' level. The learning curve 
every new team member goes through to get acquainted both with the 
business and the project is really expensive. (And despite what views 
others may have, to me IA is strategic and you need to understand the 
business model).

When making a decisions about hiring freelancers or creating a new 
position, I consider different things [*], but  a major player is cost. 
Hiring freelancers is expensive. For every new project I user a 
freelancer for, I am spending at least 30% of it with the time it takes 
in acquiring knowledge - knowledge that won't be reused once they leave. 
That to me is the downside of using freelancers.

By the way, if the freelancer doesn't document properly (in reference to 
the preceding comment), I really won't even bother. That's not a 
qualified IA to me. Documentation is part of the IA practice, not a 
"desirable" item. As Dave mentioned, thereis a great thread going on 
here about this topic: 
http://louisrosenfeld.com/home/bloug_archive/000351.html

[*] things to consider when deciding between creating long-term versus 
contract positions:

1. Is there enough work beyond this project?
2. Does my company have a budget for a new position this year?
3. Are there qualified candidates for long-term position?

If you answer yes to all, go long-term.
If you answered no to 2-3, contract
If you answered no to 3, contract

Obviously this is not comprehensive, there are many other things 
involved in this decision and they are also very context-sensitive. But 
these are good steps to get started.