Programmer for a living, in Spain

If you look for a programmer job in Spain, chances are you’ll think about it twice.

Everyday you’ll find many jobs offered in any of the available job posting sites, the most known of which is infojobs.net.

The first problem is that the vast majority are “body shopping” offerings, where a small hhrr company hires a programmer to work for a renowned consulting company, which wants her to work for an important customer, which pays a salary back to the consulting company, which pays a salary back to the hhrr company, which pays a salary back to the poor programmer. The corollary is that the poor programmer gets 3 sets of responsibilities, and 3 sets of benefits, but while the former mix up as a union, the latter mix up as a difference.

The second problem is the contract. The most used pattern is 6 + 6 + indefinite, which means that if you’re lucky, you’ll get fired at most one year later. The open-ended contract (indefinite) promise will go unfulfilled, unless the project you are working on requires you as a fundamental piece. This is very rare, because when a six months period is approaching the end, you’ll experiment a sudden workload reduction. Why is it not “+ 6” indefinitely? Because there is a law that forbids the practice.

The third problem is that rich job requirements (many different skills, a lot of experience, enthusiastic hard worker, proactive problem solver, excellent English command), go hand in hand with ridiculous salaries. But yes, we have sunny days, all year round.