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Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

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Re: Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

#51

Post by ryandrake »

chomp wrote: post #15

Ok yes this guide is fine, a lot of things are up for negotiation, and I think it’s a lot more widely known these days to negotiate for stuff. But man, a lot of the people out there absolutely still do not grok negotiating. They know it’s something you’re supposed to do, but they will try and negotiate things that are not negotiable (like making it a hard ask for extra contributions per paycheck for healthcare to mat…

> But man, a lot of the people out there absolutely still do not grok negotiating.

Unless you have some kind of very unique skill or you have other offers and the company really, really wants you, how exactly are you supposed to negotiate?

Every comp negotiation I've ever had with a company has gone kind of like this:

    [Company]: Here's your offer for $X.

    [Me]: I'd like $Y.

    [Company]: Your offer is for $X.

    [Me]: Well, I think I bring skill A, B, and C to the table, and here is some data showing someone with my experience tends to make $Y.

    [Company]: We don't care. Your offer is for $X. Are you interested or not?

    [Me]: How about vacation time or benefits? Or maybe salary vs. equity? Can these be adjusted?

    [Company]:  if you don't want $X, there's the door. We have 35 other candidates in the hiring pipeline.
What magical incantations are you guys speaking that allow you to make any progress against these brick walls? I've never once, in my 25 year career history, ever gotten a company to offer more than their initial offer.

Re: Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

#52

Post by bradfa »

joezydeco wrote: post #14
bluSCALE4 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the past I would have said "this" but I've seen a lot of people declining good offers for better ones that never materialized. Be careful playing chicken if you can't afford to.

With the amount of scatterbrained recruiters out there these days, what kind of magic does one pull to get multiple offers to appear so close together?

College recruiting can make this happen. Granted really only for new grads but it is totally normal in that setting to get multiple offers within a week or two of each other.

Re: Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

#53

Post by jnwatson »

credit_guy wrote: post #42

Just today a recruiter called me and told me about a job that I think could be a good fit for me, and I do intend to interview for that. I hate negotiations. So I'll be frank. I was already frank with the recruiter today: I love my current job, on Mondays I can't wait to get to work. Moving to another company entails risk. I need to be compensated for that risk, so I don't intend to even interview if they can't offer…

HR really likes folks like you, because you're selling your services at a discount.

I got one FAANG to increase their offer to 2.5 times the original amount. I'm fine with taking a bit of heat from the team if I get paid that much.

Re: Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

#54

Post by 4b11b4 »

motohagiography wrote: post #9

It's long for today's attention, but negotiation guides are fairly consistent maps of a territory. They teach you it is a way to relate and a perspective to start from. It's a way to protagonize yourself instead of competing to debase yourself more than the next person. Focus on a high quality agreement and a process that feels good independent of the numbers and you will be happy with the result. My confidence comes…

I found this quite resonates with my approach for a meeting tomorrow

Re: Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

#55

Post by jnwatson »

joezydeco wrote: post #14
bluSCALE4 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the past I would have said "this" but I've seen a lot of people declining good offers for better ones that never materialized. Be careful playing chicken if you can't afford to.

With the amount of scatterbrained recruiters out there these days, what kind of magic does one pull to get multiple offers to appear so close together?

I got three FAANG offers at once 3 years ago. I stalled the first one and used it as leverage to speed up the laggards.

Re: Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

#56

Post by yladiz »

ryandrake wrote: post #51
chomp wrote: post #15

Ok yes this guide is fine, a lot of things are up for negotiation, and I think it’s a lot more widely known these days to negotiate for stuff. But man, a lot of the people out there absolutely still do not grok negotiating. They know it’s something you’re supposed to do, but they will try and negotiate things that are not negotiable (like making it a hard ask for extra contributions per paycheck for healthcare to mat…

> But man, a lot of the people out there absolutely still do not grok negotiating. Unless you have some kind of very unique skill or you have other offers and the company really, really wants you, how exactly are you supposed to negotiate? Every comp negotiation I've ever had with a company has gone kind of like this: [Company]: Here's your offer for $X. [Me]: I'd like $Y. [Company]: Your offer is for $X. [Me]: Well,…

The crass answer is maybe you’re not able to negotiate well enough to get more than the initial offer.

The less crass answer: In almost every company, you’re being hired on a salary band, so unless you’re at the top of that band in the initial offer there is room to go up, so you can typically push a bit higher. The trick is to make a request that’s higher than what they initially offer but not so high that they outright reject it without additional conversation, and if they are play hardball, and don’t budge on anything, you just reject their offer. It does mean you have to be comfortable rejecting an otherwise decent or good offer, but presumably most companies are willing to negotiate with a good candidate so this shouldn’t be a problem in practice if the negotiation is done in a considered way.

Re: Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

#57

Post by yladiz »

derefr wrote: post #41
nemomarx wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

more money solves that in the end doesn't it? Just ask for enough to cover the tax burden

The problem comes with progressive taxation, especially in vaguely-socialist countries. When you're in a high-enough tax bracket (in taxation regimes where such high tax-brackets exist), adding a marginal dollar to your net income becomes impractically expensive for the company, compared to basically anything else the company could offer you. For some people, in some places, getting an extra $20k/yr tacked onto your…

I’m not sure I follow. In a progressive tax system you pay in brackets, so that extra $20k doesn’t mean the rest of the salary is entirely in the new bracket, so why would it cost an exorbitant amount?

Re: Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

#58

Post by medvezhenok »

ryandrake wrote: post #51
chomp wrote: post #15

Ok yes this guide is fine, a lot of things are up for negotiation, and I think it’s a lot more widely known these days to negotiate for stuff. But man, a lot of the people out there absolutely still do not grok negotiating. They know it’s something you’re supposed to do, but they will try and negotiate things that are not negotiable (like making it a hard ask for extra contributions per paycheck for healthcare to mat…

> But man, a lot of the people out there absolutely still do not grok negotiating. Unless you have some kind of very unique skill or you have other offers and the company really, really wants you, how exactly are you supposed to negotiate? Every comp negotiation I've ever had with a company has gone kind of like this: [Company]: Here's your offer for $X. [Me]: I'd like $Y. [Company]: Your offer is for $X. [Me]: Well,…

The magic incantation is competing offer.

If they know you have alternatives, they are much more likely to negotiate. In fact the modern version of this guide is try to get several offers and negotiate them against each other (not you versus the company). Might be more difficult in the current market.

Re: Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

#59

Post by coreyp_1 »

q7xvh97o2pDhNrh wrote: post #47
coreyp_1 wrote: post #23

The most important part of negotiation: Having an offer in the first place. Unfortunately, I and a dozen other software devs (all of whom I know personally, and all of whom are amazing) are not getting any interviews, much less offers. None of us have ever experienced a drought like this before, either. So... ??? Thankfully, we're all still currently employed.

Any thoughts on root cause from your perspective? I've been on the other side of the table recently, and I agree it feels like a buyer's market. But it still took a while to find good candidates, and a lot of candidates showed up to interviews weirdly unprepared on even the basics. If it's a drought for you, then I'd have to add: It seems like an especially weird drought, as well. Supply and demand seem to be doing o…

I'm not sure on the root cause. Like I said, there's several people that I know who are all experiencing the same things. I have 20 years experience and a phd. Others in my friend group have no degree whatsoever, but have a decade of experience. Several years ago, we were all offered multiple jobs at a time. Now, we are not even getting requests for interviews.

EDIT: adding that, because we all live in a non-metropolitan area, we all have been remote, and are continuing to look for remote work.

Re: Ask HN: Is patio11's salary negotiation guide relevant in today's market?

#60

Post by coreyp_1 »

eastbound wrote: post #43
coreyp_1 wrote: post #23

The most important part of negotiation: Having an offer in the first place. Unfortunately, I and a dozen other software devs (all of whom I know personally, and all of whom are amazing) are not getting any interviews, much less offers. None of us have ever experienced a drought like this before, either. So... ??? Thankfully, we're all still currently employed.

I’m from France where the market is still tense, so I have hard times understanding whether it’s a general trend or a local problem: - How do you know it’s not just your surroundings (technologies, skills, area) which are dry? - Are you maybe getting aged? (The programmer market is very ageist, hopefully I’m not turning the knife into the wound, but I’m not young either) and maybe you are experiencing the dry part of…

Well I would love to have found a $500k job, that's definitely not my point of reference.

The problem is that I'm not even getting to the stage of asking about salary, because I'm not getting any interviews in the first place. Neither is anyone else in my friend group.

I am probably overqualified for a lot of jobs, but my friend group, which has a lot of variance in age and experience, would definitely not fall into that classification.

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