Co-founder · Former software developer
George
George spent years as a software developer before co-founding OpenSource. Having been the person on the other side of the technical interview, he runs the technical screening that means clients only meet engineers who can genuinely do the job. He writes our engineering-hiring and salary research from that first-hand perspective.
Areas of expertise
Written by George
What a Technical Recruiter Actually Does
What a technical recruiter does that a generalist cannot: the brief, the screen, the market read and the close, plus five questions to test yours.
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Software Engineer Salary London UK 2026: What to Pay
Software engineer salary in London 2026: our published bands from £55k mid-level to £150k staff, what moves pay, and how to benchmark before you hire.
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UK Data Scientist Salary: A Realistic Benchmarking Guide
A plain-English guide to UK data scientist salary levels, what drives pay, and how to benchmark roles properly.
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How Long Does It Take to Hire a Software Engineer?
A realistic breakdown of time to hire a software engineer in the UK, what causes delays, and how to run a faster, better process.
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What a CPO Really Costs in 2026
A CPO on £165k costs about £190k employed before equity. The 2026 arithmetic, how it compares with a Head of Product, and the title-inflation trap.
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How to Hire a Platform Engineer: A Practical Guide
How to hire a platform engineer: what the role means, how to screen candidates properly, and what pay to expect in the UK market.
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What an Engineering Manager Really Costs in 2026
An EM on £122.5k costs about £141k employed, and their real price is team output. The 2026 arithmetic, the payback maths and the ratio that matters.
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Head of Engineering vs CTO: Which Hire Fits Your Stage
Head of engineering vs CTO explained: what each role does, when to hire which, and how to run the search well.
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How to Assess Senior Engineers in Interviews
A practical guide to how to assess senior engineers: ownership signals, system design, and avoiding false negatives in interviews.
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How to Write a Technical Job Description That Converts
A practical guide to writing a technical job description that attracts strong engineers and survives a real technical screen.
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How to Hire Your First Product Designer
A practical guide to how to hire a product designer: judging judgement over portfolios, testing collaboration, and knowing when to hire.
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How to Reduce Engineering Recruitment Costs
A practical guide to reduce recruitment costs in engineering hiring, covering screening, speed, hiring model and retention.
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What a Staff Engineer Really Costs in 2026
A staff engineer on £135k costs closer to £156k once employer NI and pension land. The real 2026 employment cost, and what you are actually buying.
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Contingent vs Retained Recruitment: Which Should You Use?
Contingent vs retained recruitment compared: how each model works, the trade-offs, and how to pick the right fit for your next hire.
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How Much Does It Cost to Hire a Data Scientist in the UK?
A practical guide to the real cost to hire a data scientist in the UK, covering salary, agency fees, time, and the cost of getting it wrong.
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How to Hire a Product Manager for a Startup
A practical guide to how to hire a product manager for a startup, covering commercial judgement, technical fluency and assessment.
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How to Hire a DevOps Engineer
A practical guide to how to hire a DevOps engineer, covering screening, DevOps vs SRE, and what good candidates actually earn.
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How to Hire a Frontend Engineer
A practical guide on how to hire a frontend engineer, covering screening, role design, and moving fast without losing quality.
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When to Hire Your First Engineering Manager
How to know when your startup needs its first engineering manager, the signs, what to look for, and how to avoid promoting or hiring one too early.
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How to Write a Job Description That Attracts Senior Engineers
How to write an engineering job description that attracts strong, senior candidates, what to include, what to cut, and the mistakes that put people off.
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How to Hire a Data Engineer
A practical guide to hiring data engineers, what to screen for, how to write the role, what they earn, and how to move fast in a scarce market.
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How to Hire Machine Learning Engineers in 2026
How to hire ML and AI engineers in 2026's scarce market, what to screen for, how to spot production ability over demos, pay, and how to move fast.
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How Much Does It Cost to Hire a Software Engineer in the UK?
The real cost of hiring a software engineer in the UK, salary, recruitment fees, time-to-hire and the hidden costs of a bad hire, with how to reduce them.
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How to Write a Software Engineer CV That Wins Interviews
How to write a software engineer CV in 2026 that gets past AI screening and wins the human review, from a former engineer who screens them daily.
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How to Interview Backend Engineers
How to interview backend engineers well in 2026, what to test, how to score it, running system design as a conversation, and avoiding false negatives.
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How to Interview Data Engineers
How to interview data engineers in 2026, what to test in SQL and pipelines, running data system design well, and the batch-versus-streaming judgement.
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How to Interview Platform Engineers
How to interview platform engineers in 2026, why platform is a product, testing golden paths and reliability, and how the role differs from SRE.
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How to Interview Frontend Engineers
How to interview frontend engineers in 2026, what to test beyond a framework, running realistic UI exercises, and scoring depth over trivia.
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Senior Backend Engineer Salary UK 2026
What a senior backend engineer earns in the UK in 2026, London vs regional pay, contract day rates and what actually moves an offer.
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UK Tech Salary Report 2026
OpenSource's 2026 UK tech salary report, base pay for software, data and AI roles by seniority, city and industry, with what's moving offers this year.
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Tech Salaries by Industry 2026
How fintech, AI, SaaS and marketplace companies pay differently in 2026, with industry salary premiums mapped by role and seniority.
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Contract vs Permanent Tech Hiring
When contractors beat permanent hires (and vice versa) for startups and scale-ups, cost, speed, knowledge retention and how to mix both models well.
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Product Manager Salary Guide 2026
What product managers earn in 2026, indicative base salary ranges from mid-level PM to CPO across Europe's startup hubs, from OpenSource.
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Technical Interviews That Don't Lose Great Engineers
How to build a technical interview that predicts real performance without driving strong engineers away, from a developer turned recruiter.
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New York Tech Salary Guide 2026
What engineers, product managers and data specialists earn in New York in 2026, indicative USD base-salary ranges by role and seniority, from OpenSource.
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Amsterdam Tech Salary Guide 2026
What engineers, product managers and data specialists earn in Amsterdam in 2026, indicative euro salary ranges by role and seniority, from OpenSource.
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Berlin Tech Salary Guide 2026
What engineers, product managers and data specialists earn in Berlin in 2026, indicative euro salary ranges by role and seniority, from OpenSource.
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London Tech Salary Guide 2026
What software engineers, product managers and data specialists earn in London in 2026, indicative salary ranges by role and seniority, from OpenSource.
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