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Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

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Re: Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

#241

Post by rayiner »

phkahler wrote: post #229
richdougherty wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll just put one citation into this discussion. Raj Chetty and his collaborators produce amazing research. I attended a talk when he visited New Zealand a few years ago. In this paper he's attempting to address the dream of measuring teacher value, by measuring changes in test scores against changes in lifetime income. Yes there are other ways of measuring teacher "value" too, but income changes are relevant to this…

I don't think the problem is evaluating individual teachers. If you look at average teacher compensation it isn't that much compared to the value they add. We could let the school and the union work out how to spread the pay among the teachers at a school, I think they're underpaid overall and that has nothing to do with evaluating them individually.

How much value do they add?

Re: Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

#242

Post by jasonkester »

simonswords82 wrote: post #199
jasonkester wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an engineer, the way you get paid for the value you create is by starting a company. In fact, that's the way you do it in pretty much every profession. The only difference between the guy who owns a successful Veterinary practice and the guy working as an underpaid veterinarian is that one of them went out and leased some office space.

> The only difference between the guy who owns a successful Veterinary practice and the guy working as an underpaid veterinarian is that one of them went out and leased some office space. I understand the point you're attempting to make but the guy who owns the has done much, much more than simply lease an office. Many business founders put their life savings on the line. Those who don't have that luxury ramp up thou…

That's why it's so much better to be a developer than a veterinarian.

I didn't have to buy an MRI machine to start doing my thing. I just had to register a domain name and sign up for a Stripe account.

Incidentally, there's a lot of room to build a successful software business with an effort between zero and "work every waking hour"/"put [your] life savings on the line". I built the products I live off in the downtime between contract gigs, when the surf wasn't working and conditions weren't right for climbing. With two digit hosting expenses for the first several years.

Definitely don't let fears like the ones you expressed above stop you from doing it.

Re: Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

#243

Post by SuperGent »

mavhc wrote: post #240
phkahler wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Teachers and engineers don't work for money. You're right. I hit the comment button and was going to say you're damn wrong - I have done a lot to increase my pay with each new job. I wouldn't be at work if not for the money. But then I realized you're right too. I don't think about money much at all when I'm a work. I do try to make a good product, and I do worry about bill of materials and production cost, but I…

An engineer doesn't want to make a bad product, but if a company has a good product they don't even need to hire a salesperson

That's not necessarily true. There are thousands of examples of good products that failed due to lack of marketing.

Re: Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

#244

Post by imron »

thanksgiving wrote: post #178
imron wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's right, we need more administrative staff, and laptops and iPads for all children. That should fix the problems in education.

> Public education by state rankings show that New York spent the most per pupil at $20,610. The next top five are District of Columbia ($18,485), Alaska ($18,416), New Jersey ($17,907), Connecticut ($17,745) and Vermont ($16,988). http://education.cu-portland.edu/blog/classroom-resources/pu... https://archive.fo/DeBGH A teacher's salary in New York isn't good enough but you can at least afford rent if you're smart.…

> Thus, when I see something that lets students learn without a one on one with a teacher, I imagine it saves money.

There is growing evidence to suggest that having laptops and ipads in class decrease learning outcomes. So you could be paying more for worse results.

Re: Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

#245

Post by jasonkester »

nthcolumn wrote: post #209
jasonkester wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an engineer, the way you get paid for the value you create is by starting a company. In fact, that's the way you do it in pretty much every profession. The only difference between the guy who owns a successful Veterinary practice and the guy working as an underpaid veterinarian is that one of them went out and leased some office space.

Glad you know that most vets are underpaid. Entry costs are massive - you can't just rent some office space and you cannot really do it alone, there are some single vet practices, they don't make much. If you think some of the equipment is 100k, x-ray 30k per plate. You also need a territory before you start. It is too easy for bigger practices to starve you out to just pile in 250k and hope for the best. You have to…

For what it's worth, I picked Veterinarian because a friend of mine did in fact make the leap from underpaid vet to small business owner. All in one go, with a small business loan.

His motivation for doing so was a conversation with his previous boss that included the quote "because I went out and got a lease on a building".

Re: Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

#246

Post by hacking_again »

rayiner wrote: post #241
phkahler wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the problem is evaluating individual teachers. If you look at average teacher compensation it isn't that much compared to the value they add. We could let the school and the union work out how to spread the pay among the teachers at a school, I think they're underpaid overall and that has nothing to do with evaluating them individually.

How much value do they add?

All of it? None of it? Teachers themselves don't add value, teachers enable value addition.

Re: Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

#247

Post by simonswords82 »

jasonkester wrote: post #242
simonswords82 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The only difference between the guy who owns a successful Veterinary practice and the guy working as an underpaid veterinarian is that one of them went out and leased some office space. I understand the point you're attempting to make but the guy who owns the has done much, much more than simply lease an office. Many business founders put their life savings on the line. Those who don't have that luxury ramp up thou…

That's why it's so much better to be a developer than a veterinarian. I didn't have to buy an MRI machine to start doing my thing. I just had to register a domain name and sign up for a Stripe account. Incidentally, there's a lot of room to build a successful software business with an effort between zero and "work every waking hour"/"put [your] life savings on the line". I built the products I live off in the downtim…

Too late I'm afraid, set this thing up 10 years ago and still going at it :)

https://www.atlascode.com

Re: Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

#248

Post by QuantumGood »

Agree that value is derived from all contributors to a project, but the value/income from a project is gated most at the level of the sale.

Projects can be created but not sold, or sold poorly, deriving little to no value for the organization. But great salespeople can even sell projects that have not been created (not always a good thing).

Also, where does the money come from to pay someone? With a sale, it's clear: The salesperson went out and harvested money directly. With everyone else, it's derived through politics, formulas and philosophies.

Re: Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

#249

Post by rayiner »

hacking_again wrote: post #246
rayiner wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much value do they add?

All of it? None of it? Teachers themselves don't add value, teachers enable value addition.

I mean, obviously everyone adds value (from janitors up to doctors). And my person view is that all jobs should be compensated at the same hourly rate. But is there anything special about teachers? Like if they all quit society would go to hell, but that’s true of garbagemen and road workers too. The question is, does it matter who does the job?

Re: Why Must You Pay Sales People Commissions?

#250

Post by jimbokun »

thanksgiving wrote: post #178
imron wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's right, we need more administrative staff, and laptops and iPads for all children. That should fix the problems in education.

> Public education by state rankings show that New York spent the most per pupil at $20,610. The next top five are District of Columbia ($18,485), Alaska ($18,416), New Jersey ($17,907), Connecticut ($17,745) and Vermont ($16,988). http://education.cu-portland.edu/blog/classroom-resources/pu... https://archive.fo/DeBGH A teacher's salary in New York isn't good enough but you can at least afford rent if you're smart.…

A documentary I watched claimed giving laptops or iPads to students is correlated with worse academic performance for those students.

Sorry, don't remember enough for a citation, but the suggested causal effect was students just spending even more time on social media, games, and web surfing instead of school work.

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