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Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

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Re: Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

#551

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Director is the UK term for CEO

This particular guy is a middle manager. In the US typically right under VP. He has been there for around 10 years. The fact that he has stayed on for 10 years while mistrusting people who have worked for him for the same time doesn't make sense. But neither does it for managers who have nice offices to promote open office arrangements for their workers. Hypocrites are everywhere.

LOL

Re: Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

#552
post #341
post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. Business is business and personal is personal. If you look at them both the same you'll end up stuck in a job you hate for 8 years thinking you're being super loyal and that raise is just around the corner. Spouses are loyal back, businesses are not.

That's not true at all in my experience. Both as a manager to others, I've always tried to be loyal to employees who invested in the employer/employee relationship - and as an employee who benefitted from having an employer/managers look out for me when inevitable bumps in the road occurred in my personal life. Outside of my own direct experience, I can also recall many other co-workers' experiences where the compani…

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Re: Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

#553

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Finally, in general people who are average but think they're above average really do not like to confront the fact that they're average. I don't think this is necessarily a consequence of overinflated egos. I consider myself an average to slightly above-average developer, yet my salary is consistently higher than my peers. It's higher because I'm willing to negotiate on my compensation. I don't concern myself with…

> myself an average to slightly above-average developer His point was that everybody thinks this about themselves. This is the "I'd rate myself about a 8/10" thing.

I understand. My point was that it isn't necessarily true. A lot of people say the "Id give myself an 8" because that's how you get higher compensation. I think a large number of people don't really care how good they actually are because a lot of people aren't especially excited about their jobs, they're just there for they money

Re: Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

#554

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps then, you should consider looking to work for a company that will be loyal to you. :)

Well, when the company owners share their non-re-invested profits with the employee, we can talk about that...

And when the company invests his own money in the company we can talk about that.

Re: Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

#555
post #34

There is a plateau as one reaches senior positions. As I went from "no" experience to my current position my job switches (every ~2 years) always were for 10%-25% (in one case, 100%, but that was Midwest to Bay Area so other factors are at play). I never got more than 5% merit increases otherwise. Most of my friends who have been at the same place for >10 years in engineering (not software) are just now reaching pari…

> Two year tenures isn't job hopping. It's a reflection of how this industry works. Very few companies offer sufficient breadth and depth of product complexity, career advancement, or other similar things to make it worthwhile. I'd say the sweet spot is 2-4 years, except at very large companies (e.g. Google) (EDIT:) or companies which are developing complicated products with physical engineering or regulatory factors…

You have to balance what you're doing now with where you want your career to go, whether you like where you are now (work, location, etc.), and how much you're getting paid. If you're getting paid a lot to occupy a niche that's a career dead-end, and probably won't carry you through retirement, you should leave, even if it means taking a pay-cut. If you're terribly unhappy with what you're doing there or your company or team, you should look for something better. If you hate the area you live in, you should look for a way to move someplace you like better. But if you like where you live, you like the company and the work, and you don't see it as a resume-killer and don't see a problem getting a similar job if something goes south with this one, you might as well stay.

Re: Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

#556

Best way to increase salary at current workplace? Get offers from other companies & ask for a meeting with your boss (or whoever decides your pay, so HR etc.). Bring up the offers, discuss what you'd get from there and also go through the potential career you could build at those companies. For example: Consultancy X would pay me $k/mo and every 6months it will go up the ladder if I perform well. With this kind of di…

Might work somewhere else. I always felt blackmailed in a situation like this and wished the employee all the best with his new job. [Edit] To clarify the blackmail note: It's better to talk in the weekly 1:1 about salary expectations, changing markets or during people development focus, than to pull up a competing offer out of your hat while not talking about your dissatisfaction with pay during weekly 1:1s. 1. If t…

A wonderful list of excuses to pay your employees as little as possible. Kudos.

Re: Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

#557

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What else would they be motivated by? The actual work (what is being done), the mission of the company (are you helping kids send pictures that disappear after 10 seconds or are you working on finding a cure to hearing loss?), the team, the location (do I have to spend 2h commuting?), the opportunities to learn, the opportunities to grow, etc. We each value different things, but if money is your only consideration,…

Unless you run a non-profit, your company is also motivated by money and all your work and mission are only means to an end, which is to maximize the shareholders profit. That's why the company was founded, right? Of course you have the right to deny a rise and let the employee go, maybe it really doesn't fit in your budget and/or you can hire someone else for less, but don't talk like the employee is wrong for searc…

Many non-profits exist to make money too. Some people find doing a non-profit makes more money than a "for profit" company. I do think that money isn't always the main motivator, it's more complex than that. But generally, at the end of the day, money matters, even for non-profits.

Re: Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

#558

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really, there are plenty of 12-months and indefinite rolling contracts. I've met a few engineers who made $800 USD per day for several years and many (including myself) who earned at least $650 per day doing rolling contracts... You can stay as long as you want - The main problem is boredom that kicks in after 3 to 6 months. I don't usually have any gap between jobs. On two occasions, companies offered me to work…

> companies offered me to work for them for two weeks Damn. I haven't yet found something like this, most companies want a six-month minimum. I would love to take a two-week contract in Australia, just so I can delete "visit Australia" from my bucket list :)

In one case, a digital agency had one of their developers going on holiday and the deadline for the project was two weeks away. So they needed a quick replacement.

If you know some good recruiters and you let them know about your situation, they can get very creative.

Re: Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

#559

Maybe I'm more conservative than others here, but anything less than 2 years tenure at a company seems suspicious to me. The people I've known who bounced after ~18 months or less were often the ones I would've wanted to quit anyway, who weren't cutting the mustard and weren't on track for promotion. For them, talking a big game at interview time every two years probably is income-maximizing because the longer they s…

You only have my word for it, but I've had the highest marks from both co-workers and managers at reviews and have gotten higher than average raises.

But my last job was for a consulting company and we finished the job in 10 months and it wasn't that clear what other gig I would be moved to so I accepted a job with someone who I had worked with before and was now a technical manager (another point that I'm not someone you wouldn't want to work with). My job before that I finished a project in 18 months and was transitioning into maintenance mode. I was bored and under paid, so I took another job offer also with someone I had worked with before. Each of these were 10-15% raises, so that was incentive too.

So your intuition might fit some cases, but definitely not all.

Re: Employees Who Stay in Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less

#560

Sad, I am. I think I'm perfectly capable to sell myself to the next job. But I like what I'm doing, I like the goals that are still ahead and being worked towards, great team, all good. And whether you read the article with a bit (or a lot) of skepticism, it seems common knowledge that the biggest steps in salary are made when going to that next job. So... where's the silver lining for loyal dogs? Should I just pick…

It doesn't hurt to ask! It can be nerve racking but I've done it and it went over well. It can be a simple conversation, plenty of articles on how to do it genially.
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