The Most Expensive Mistake I Ever Made Was Hiring a Cheap Engineer

As I am sure you know, FinishLinePDS only develops products for small companies. Just because you’re a small company does not mean you should hire a cheap engineer. In fact, doing so will likely end up costing you more.

To be clear, I am not advocating you hire an expensive engineer either, or that you necessarily hire FinishLinePDS. I am advocating that you hire the right engineer — or engineering team — for you, and the price is only one and a relatively minor factor in deciding who to hire. The mistake to avoid here is choosing the engineer or firm purely on price. Proper fit will have a much bigger impact on ROI than price ever will.

First, let me state the price for engineering services (per hour) is virtually the same wherever you go — even overseas (we are a hybrid firm, so we use both). We make a lot of price comparisons, and it has always surprised me how close in price these services can be when you compare “apples to apples.” Given that it is a very competitive business, the law of economics would dictate such an outcome.

However, that does not mean that your cost to develop a product will be the same. The cost for any specific project can vary widely from “how did you do that” to “wow, that’s a lot of money.” This difference will be largely based on who you hire.

So if the price is not a way to choose product development services, then what is?

Here’s a good place to start .