Re: [Iasa20] 6635bis

[Brian E Carpenter <[e-mail]>]

Hi Eric,

On 26-Apr-19 16:06, Eric Rescorla wrote:
> n Thu, Apr 25, 2019 at 8:41 PM Brian E Carpenter <[e-mail] <mailto:[e-mail]>> wrote:, that is clearly stated as a "paid contractor", as is the "RFC Publisher contractor".
> 
> 
>     To me it would make no sense to have *individuals* employed by the LLC who are part of either of those teams. So it's all or nothing: the Production Center and the Publisher would have to be either 100% in-house employees or 100% contracted out. But why we'd want the LLC, which we were promised would be lightweight and cheap, to starting hiring software and operations staff and buying or renting servers, is a bit beyond me.
> 
> 
> Hi Brian,
> 
> I'd like to dig into a few of the operational concerns you raise here.
> 
> First, you say that you think that the RPC and the Publisher should be either 100% in house or 100% contracted. In my experience, both as someone on the employer and employed side, it's quite common to have a mix of employees and consultants. For instance, you might have a staff of people who do the regular work and then occasionally hire specialists to do some work that you don't need a FTE for. Another example is when you have a temporary increase in load so you hire extra contract staff to fill in the gaps during the heavy period under the assumption that you'll let them go when the load decreases. It's also not uncommon to have some FTEs who manage a contract with a company which does most of the work. Can you say more on why you think this is unworkable?

If the team is *managed* within the LLC, but brings in contractors when it needs to, sure, that can be made to work, of course. With the usual potential for misunderstandings, of course. Managerially, I'd prefer to avoid it.

> Second, you contrast the idea of hiring staff to do these jobs with a "lightewight and cheap" LLC that contracts these functions out. Lightweight is kind of subjective, but as a practical matter, it's often more expensive to contract out tasks than it is to have them done by FTEs because you pay a premium for a short term engagement and/or one which is easier to terminate. Of course, if you want that flexibility then this is advisable, but in cases where you have a relatively steady base of work, then it's often cheaper to have FTEs (and, as above, fill in gaps with contractors).

That's true enough. But again, you have the LLC managing and doing the work. 
 
> Or am I misunderstanding you?

No. It's just that an LLC that performs and manages such work itself is very different from what I thought we'd agreed to do, which I understood to be an administrative entity. Definitely creeping featurism IMHO.

    Brian