Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why business analysts and project managers get higher salaries than programmers?

programmers.stackexchange.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 71 posts

Re: Why business analysts and project managers get higher salaries than programmers?

#51

Post by evo_9 »

I think it's purely confidence.

I just got a new fulltime job last week. I wasn't happy with the salary they offered, it was much lower than my previous fulltime job. I made it clear that salary would not work from the first conversation with HR. At no point did I change my stance.

I even suggested we should be creative asking if I could work from home twice a week so I could play hockey with some ex-pro's I'm in with (Stephen Yelle is my center...). I didn't even try to conceal why I wanted to work from home - I was straight up saying it was a quality of living issue.

They gave me the job and the two days off; they even came up halfway on the salary, going 8k above what they said they would ever pay for this position.

Bottom line: you have to ask for what you want; if you do that with confidence and a strong reason you can heartily defend you just may get everything you are asking for. It doesn't always work out this way, but I've never stuck to my guns so thoroughly before either and I gotta say, I am definitely going to always try to be creative when I negotiate now.

Re: Why business analysts and project managers get higher salaries than programmers?

#53

Post by switch »

+1 to what lionhearted wrote -

Because programmers don't ask for more money often enough.

In particular, Programmers never focus on 'ensuring they get what they deserve'. Other people take advantage of the fact that programmers never focus on this part.

Re: Why business analysts and project managers get higher salaries than programmers?

#54

Post by Sandman »

wazoox wrote: post #35

This is a beautiful answer, which thoughtfully explains what makes the difference between "big entreprise java coding monkeys" and "startup rockstars". I love it. The difference between "widget factory" and "film crew" explains also most of the differences between Java (archetypal "widget factory" tool) and dynamic ( or lesser known) languages, too.

I don't get your point. The choice of a language determines how a company will be run? No startup would ever use Java to create their product? Java is a bad language because it's used in large companies? What was your point exactly? Or is it that there is no point and you just felt the need to bash Java a little?

Re: Why business analysts and project managers get higher salaries than programmers?

#56

Post by eru »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #45
_delirium wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Walmart is the canonical example of a low-margin / high-volume business. Especially during their growth phase, every time they would find a way to reduce costs, they would funnel that savings into lower prices, rather than taking the savings in the form of a higher profit margin.

Very true, Walmart is a bit of a loaded example. But I found data more useful to the tech industry. If MS or GOOG pays their employees $200k/year, then employees are capturing about half of the value they create [1]. Worse than Walmart, but not that bad. http://royal.pingdom.com/2009/05/14/congratulations-google-s... [1] This is actually a fallacy, since it assumes all returns are due to labor, not capital.

To address the fallacy: Just state that labour and capital get half the returns each. We don't need to decide who or what creates value to make that statistic interesting.

Re: Why business analysts and project managers get higher salaries than programmers?

#57

Post by tastybites »

evo_9 wrote: post #51

I think it's purely confidence. I just got a new fulltime job last week. I wasn't happy with the salary they offered, it was much lower than my previous fulltime job. I made it clear that salary would not work from the first conversation with HR. At no point did I change my stance. I even suggested we should be creative asking if I could work from home twice a week so I could play hockey with some ex-pro's I'm in wit…

It takes people a while to figure it out (it took me almost 10 years in my career) - bosses pay more money to people they respect. Having standards is a respectable thing.

Re: Why business analysts and project managers get higher salaries than programmers?

#58

Post by Joeri »

duke_sam wrote: post #7

I'm also pretty sure this is why software houses run as widget factories will produce sub-standard solutions. The hierarchical structure gives more weight to the ideas of the people managing. This works if the manager is an expert (or at least as knowledgable as their reports) in their field but with software it results in the most informed opinions being ignored or devalued especially if the costs/benefits are not i…

Apple is a widget factory run by an expert. When Jobs left the company, it took a nose-dive. He came back and immediately things started improving. The man is a dictator, but he knows his stuff. However, if I were an apple shareholder, I would be very worried about his medical condition. Because when he leaves, apple will dive again.

Re: Why business analysts and project managers get higher salaries than programmers?

#59

Post by wazoox »

Sandman wrote: post #54
wazoox wrote: post #35

This is a beautiful answer, which thoughtfully explains what makes the difference between "big entreprise java coding monkeys" and "startup rockstars". I love it. The difference between "widget factory" and "film crew" explains also most of the differences between Java (archetypal "widget factory" tool) and dynamic ( or lesser known) languages, too.

I don't get your point. The choice of a language determines how a company will be run? No startup would ever use Java to create their product? Java is a bad language because it's used in large companies? What was your point exactly? Or is it that there is no point and you just felt the need to bash Java a little?

Many Java features are tailored to allow splitting a project in many submodules, and distribute tasks among a lot of coders with a spec. Many dynamic languages features are made to allow the quickest development by only a handful of developers.

Working in large teams with Ruby is harder than with Java. Getting a web app online in a week at 2 people is easier with Python than with Java.

Don't you agree that different languages are more or less adapted to various workflows, teams, applications, or environments?

Then about taste : passionate programmers learn by themselves. They may learn any language, Java, Python, C or Delphi. However the kind of people programming without passion mostly use Java, or C#, because the only matter of choice is language marketability. Therefore there many more poor, bland Java programmers than Python, Perl or Ruby programmers. There are many more Java programmers anyway :)

Re: Why business analysts and project managers get higher salaries than programmers?

#60

Post by trustfundbaby »

lemming wrote: post #39
lionhearted wrote: post #2

Because programmers don't ask for more money often enough. Seriously. Here's the three minute version of doing it: 1. Work hard on tangible stuff, document and claim credit for doing it, and notify people with what benefit the work provides . This sounds maybe stupidly obvious, but a lot of non-technical people don't understand the value in something. So, "Upgraded XYZ so our website loads faster, which is proven to…

While I agree that programmers don't ask for more money often enough, this is overly simplified and doesn't account for a lot of cases that are important to a lot of programmers. Firstly, a lot of work that programmers like to work on really is invisible to pointy-haired types. I run an infrastructure group, and when I do my job well the CEO hears less about my work because there are no problems. It's much more diffi…

This point hasn't been stressed enough ... it is hard to get people to pay you for making things work flawlessly ... really hard.

Either they let you go and have an 'oh shit' moment as your replacement flounders ... or they just won't take you seriously because the stuff you do isn't visible to them ... you have to make a detailed and provocative case, basically outlining what happens if you leave, to get what you want.

Post reply on HN