>>hat’s not the impression I have had of most Indians I have met in the US, most of whom seem pretty smart — but that might have something to do with the problem.<<
You only meet the upper caste.
The problem I have found with Indian coders is their culture screws up their intelligence. For example, they slavishly follow the chain of command and require specifications so detailed it is frequently faster to do the coding yourself.
They also don’t think about the future, For example if they are asked to make 3 versions of a report, they will copy the original program 3 times and work on each copy instead of just making the variations a run option. So if there is a bug in the original program it has to be fixed in 4 places.
That kind of thing.
And their “English” is usually so bad I insist on using IM since I get tired of repeating “can you say that again?” 20 times per call.
“The problem I have found with Indian coders is their culture screws up their intelligence. “
Not so much anymore. Our Indian programmers are top notch but they are heavily Americanized. In the old days, it was almost all men and image was important to them. There were sometimes problems with egos and you sure didn’t want one for a boss. They put Southern cotton mill supervisors to shame. Now we have more women and they are very focused on work.
The language issue is still a problem because they know English very well and so they speak very fast. I stay about 6 words behind the whole time.