You can not earn more then someone else is willing to pay .
Software Developers: how to get a raise without changing jobs
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Re: Software Developers: how to get a raise without changing jobs
#92Re: Software Developers: how to get a raise without changing jobs
#93It really does depend on the organizational structure of the company, and whether they appreciate how difficult it is to replace programmers with an equally competent one. Most non-tech managers don't understand the intangible costs of replacing programmers, but that's never stopped them treating programmers like interchangeable cogs. If you work for a Fortune 500 non-technical company, I don't believe this strategy works to well.
Re: Software Developers: how to get a raise without changing jobs
#94Earlier quoted context omitted.
That surely sounds like a negotiation tactic was played on you. "I cant give you a raise without taking it from someone else" or "It's out of my hands" are cut and dry sales tactics. I am a bit pejorative to that tactic because if answered correctly, it actually harms the salesman: proclaiming you cant give X salaries means that they dont respect market rates and thus an employee is incentivized to leave to someone t…
> Manager: "I cant give you a raise [...]" The employee got an offer the next week somewhere else for +30%. He gave his resignation letter to the manager right away. It didn't even occur to him to ask the company to make a counter offer (even though they may have). [Just to say that sometimes, negotiation strategies can backfire, but managers don't seem to realize (or care about) that.]
Being in that situation is so satisfying.
Boss: HR won't give me the money for your raise.
Employee: I quit. I've been offered more money elsewhere.
Boss: No wait actually I can get that extra money
Employee: Too late, kthxbaiRe: Software Developers: how to get a raise without changing jobs
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
Quite a while. There were no negative consequences.
Wow, I can't imagine a place where playing the "I got an offer somewhere else" card wouldn't start a countdown clock on your career there.
Have you ever seen that happen? I find it hard to believe that it would start a countdown clock.
Re: Software Developers: how to get a raise without changing jobs
#96Earlier quoted context omitted.
Honest question, did that affect your working relationship with your manager / their manager, or did it work out well long term for everyone? It worked out well for all parties, depending on how you look at it. Management was a little out of touch with market rate salaries, since they weren't tech guys (once the CEO referred to engineering as "black magic" since he didn't understand it). So while they were shocked at…
Thank you for including real numbers. Helps understand what's possible or realistic. "During the time after I pulled my stunt I expanded on a pet project using sentiment analysis and that became the core of a new product that is now 40% of their revenue." This is the most important number you give! Very important to understand the need to point to concrete revenue generated (or costs cut) when negotiating a raise. Ot…
> management will probably just call your bluff.
You don't need some enormous revenue or productivity win on the board to ask for a raise (although it helps). It just needs to be less hassle for them to pay you a raise than to replace you. In most cases it's really that simple.
Re: Software Developers: how to get a raise without changing jobs
#97I've got raises as high as 206% by switching jobs. Most recent switch a little over 2 years ago resulted in a 20% raise which is much more typical. Never had more than a cost of living increase otherwise (2-3%), My strategy is to move when I stop learning. It maximizes both my enjoyment (learning challenges me and gives me motivation beyond a paycheck which is good for me and my employer.) and my potential earnings.
> 206% So it proves that it's possible to get decent people at 206% under the market :D
Yes, but it's more like getting a ticking time bomb. Eventually, they will find out the market rate.
Re: Software Developers: how to get a raise without changing jobs
#98Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wow, I can't imagine a place where playing the "I got an offer somewhere else" card wouldn't start a countdown clock on your career there.
Do you just think it's that way or do you have experience? I used to imagine management would take this personally but they generally don't. I wouldn't recommend doing this every few months though.
Admittedly no, I've never known anyone to do it but people tend to be pretty cagey about talking about salary and job hunting and that kind of stuff, so who knows? I also have never seen anyone poop on their manager's desk but can speculate about what would happen thereafter :-)
Re: Software Developers: how to get a raise without changing jobs
#99I often see articles like this talking about getting a "raise," but the steps they talk about seem more in line what I'd think of as getting a "promotion" (along a technical track). Is "getting a raise" the same thing as "getting a promotion" for the purposes of this discussion? If I get a promotion every two or three years, am I also supposed to be trying to negotiate a non-promotion raise every 12 months?
General case (if you are at a startup this doesn't apply):
Getting a raise and promotion are different things, though sometimes promotions happen at "raise time" (yearly review cycle). There are also "out-of-cycle" raises but those are generally for special cases where you need market adjustments or are a star performer.
You _need_ to be getting a raise every 12 months just to keep up with inflation. If the company is doing fine and you are a top-50% performing employee you should be getting inflation+extra - if not, that is a bad sign. The 'extra' seems to vary a lot by industry, I've seen 1-10% from friends in other industries.
We're talking about yearly review cycles here, so when it's approaching that time you need to be noting all the concrete work you've done, why it was great, and why you need to be in the "above/way-above average" raise bucket. You need to be managing your manager ahead of time so they think well of you and have already allotted a nice raise to you in the spreadsheet. Your negotiation is in the prep work with your manager: generally once the review happens things are already in motion and not much will change course.
Re: Software Developers: how to get a raise without changing jobs
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
That surely sounds like a negotiation tactic was played on you. "I cant give you a raise without taking it from someone else" or "It's out of my hands" are cut and dry sales tactics. I am a bit pejorative to that tactic because if answered correctly, it actually harms the salesman: proclaiming you cant give X salaries means that they dont respect market rates and thus an employee is incentivized to leave to someone t…
Sure it's a weakness, but they (management) don't care. If the developer leaves, they'll hire another and in the mean time the remaining devs get to pick up the slack. It's actually a convenient excuse for the schedule slipping; they blame it on the developer who left because he "wasn't a team player", even though management knows the real reason is because they simply don't ... know ... how ... to ... manage.
I can assure you as a (reluctant) manager I definitely care. Its literally the only reason I'm management. I'm also constantly having discussions with the people who generally make these kind of broad decisions about how unrealistic their decision making processes are. I tend to start those conversations with some variant on "it doesn't matter what you say the raise limits are for a person, the market sets those things and the market right now says you're wrong".
It turns out that deciding what a software developer is worth is a very challenging proposition because deciding which ones are good is an open problem. Probably the central open problem in our industry today. But salary conversations are largely not about that. In sufficiently large organizations they are about how well you, or your manager if they are good, play the game, and in smaller ones its about having the cash flow to back up outstanding liabilities.
In any case, I think its fair to characterize these approaches as a tactic, whether its a negotiation tactic or a real cost limitation varies from organization to organization but its not the employees job to worry about that. If you are in a good organization they are constantly making the value proposition to the company make sense, if not they aren't and you shouldn't feel guilty about either asking for more pay or leaving if it isn't provided.