How to correctly calculate the salary of programmers?

Question

Project management

I have a small studio with 3 programmers.
Wondering how to calculate salary?
For example, initially you agree on a salary of $ 1,500
And there are situations when someone did not come, someone came for half a day, it was agreed with someone that they would do the amount of work in 2 weeks, but stretched it out for 4, who On the contrary, he manages to do it faster and goes out on Saturday to do everything early.
I would like to come up with some kind of system that would motivate to do more, while not affecting the quality and initiative in the project, and would affect the salary of those who are lagging behind, there were some days.
Of the project management systems, we have been using only Megaplan for the last year. Maybe it makes sense to switch to another project management system that would solve these problems

Answer 1

I use the scheme: fix + flex
Fix - a constant agreed part of the salary. In general and in general (with the exception of real jambs) everyone gets it.
Flex is the variable part. something like an award. Some have more, some have less. To make the flex part bigger, you need to work faster, better.

Answer 2

Accounting for working time will lead to the fact that people will sit from 9 to 5 and run away exactly at 5 without finishing the line.
Accounting for lines of code per month will inflate the source code by 10 times.
The only way to really take into account the work done is by the implemented functionality. But here, either you need to give programmers the freedom to set deadlines, or set deadlines yourself (requires experience and a little foresight). And somehow deal with situations when Vasya made a tyaplyap and quickly, and then Petya cleaned up after him for 2 weeks.
In general, create a team where everyone feels responsible for the project. Even if you take students.

Answer 3

At a minimum, you need to take into account the hours and already calculate the salary from them, if you didn’t come to work for half a month, you get half the salary. Well, the price per hour should depend on the productivity of the person.

Answer 4

Everyone has their own motivation and this will always have to be reckoned with. And money by itself does not motivate. They can demotivate if they are not enough. But if the work is boring, the projects are monotonous, there are no clear prospects for growth, then only very responsible and not ambitious people will work well.
Those. there is no universal scheme, there are general schemes of influence like: a person does not work well > talking with a person > a person does not work well again > dismissal. How these schemes are applied depends on the context.

Answer 5

if there is a clear understanding of who works better, more, and who works worse, less, then what prevents at least every month to vary the salary and argue?
if there is no understanding, then no time tracking systems and / or tasks will help, guys will find an opportunity to cheat
IMHO

Answer 6

Salary + bonus + bonus. Salary 40%, bonus 60%, raise 30%. The salary is always paid (even if he was sick all the time, but was on the staff). An increase if you worked overtime and did everything ahead of schedule. All bonus deductions. The deductions are stipulated in the employment contract. When you give a task, then ask how much the programmer will do it. If it takes a long time, then say that you need it faster and the delay will reduce the premium.

Answer 7

It completely agrees with FoxInSox
But I will try to offer a variant.
Agile (scrum, but kanban video for you) - I think it will help.
Fix + flex
Flex into two more parts - we subtract penalties from one. In another, we throw motivation for tasks closed on time.
Get a board (kanban), behind each card there is an artist and the weight of the task. Based on the result of the iteration, we count storypoints and pay out.
We agreed on $1500.
Say, now to earn you need to work.
"You can get $1,000 anyway if you don't get fined
. And you can get another $1,000 if you're really cool."
Calculate that there is a plan of 500 points per month and this is 100%.
If he does 250 points, he will get his salary, if he doesn't he will get less.
But still, the tasks will have to be evaluated and keep records of the work performed.
And since you are making websites, you can, in principle, calculate everything for the deal.
Ps Redmine is free :)

Answer 8

Coefficients and metrics for labor costs per week-month.
Your developer works ~160 hours per month. If you entered him $1500, then 1 hour of his work costs you $9.3. As far as I know, in order for your business to be profitable, you must earn 60-80% more per employee to pay bills, offices, meals, and more. It turns out that in your case, relatively speaking, he should bring you $ 30 per hour in order to recoup his salary. Otherwise, he turns into a "keeper".
I hope the logic is clear.