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Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

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Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#641

Post by valdiorn »

teachingassist wrote: post #415
atypmorn wrote: post #72

In my last job I worked at a company that paid slightly below the market rate, not including the bonus. At the time I got the job, I didn't realise that I was already being significantly underpaid. I thought it was a bit low but didn't realise the extent of it. So when I got the new job, I was blown over by the huge jump in salary and couldn't be happier. What was better? I was entitled to receive each year up to a 1…

> both the recruiter and my new manager explained to me that I should think of the 10% bonus as a baseline expected part of my salary If a company does this in Europe [I think generally in the EU], I believe it would then be considered a contractual entitlement and part of your salary - so the company would legally have to pay it anyway.

I work London finance. Bonuses are a big part of the pay package (in many cases over 100% of your base, sometimes even 10x base for guys who work on successful algo-trading projects).

Every place I've received a bonus from gave me a gigantic, in-very-clear-terms, no-nonsense page to sign that said I acknowledge the this bonus is discretionary, it is not to be expected, there is no expectation to ever receive another one, etc.

This is most likely done because everyone expects to get some kind of a bonus (if you don't receive a bonus, unless the company is basically going bankrupt, that's a really, REALLY strong sign that you should probably your bags up and GTFO). It is considered part of the basic pay package, but then again, one of these years, there might not be a bonus, and they want to make it absolutely clear that you can't expect one in that case.

The reason for this is that most hedge funds pay bonuses out of their performance fees, and if you have a shit year in the market, there isn't any money to pay bonuses.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#642

Post by gedy »

musingsole wrote: post #619
gedy wrote: post #482

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Issue with this approach at some companies though is when Special X Team is measured by the quality of X, but has little authority over Product teams, who have no incentive to do X well.

> Special X Team is measured by the quality of X So don't measure the special X team by the quality of X, but the quality of service they provide to the product team in pursuit of X.

Agreed that would be nice, but you'd be surprised at some companies thinking..

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#643

Post by tharkun__ »

Cogito wrote: post #575
castlecrasher2 wrote: post #549

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be frank, it doesn't matter how much sense it makes in theory when in practice it has obvious downsides.

I think it makes sense in practice too, if you accept some incentive scheme. Perhaps no incentive is the best incentive, but I don't know the data on that. In my experience there was never a huge disconnect between an individual's performance and their expectation of their bonus. Your starting point was based on your position - say 5% for junior positions and 10% for senior positions. The thing you had control over w…

I always find it fascinating when employees try to justify these schemes. Both the bonuses and the rating systems.

Yes, all of your team can be 5s. They can all exceed expectations. And that's what each individually thinks too. He's gonna be so much better than everyone's else. Most people think that.

Of course the system is rigged. It's not really about exceeding your expectations. Even when they try to make it seem like it's possible. It's about making a nice bell curve of the ratings and assigning bonuses and salary increases based on it. If you're at the wrong company they also fire the bottom 10% or something like that.

Why they do this I will never understand. It kills intrinsic motivation (even for the 'exceeding' guys as seen in previous comments). Google the Oprah experiment. It kills morale if the company doesn't make it one time. It kills morale for the guys that don't get the bonus they wanted or makes them game the system. Which kills morale for the guys that are actually good at their job but don't care about gaming the system. So much to loose.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#644

Post by minitoar »

AussieWog93 wrote: post #476
unishark wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that a bit like evaluating the cost of coffee based on starbucks prices? We also don't know how recent this story is. When I was a kid, in the days before gentrification and gourmet-everything, there was a doughnut shop nearby that was like $2 for a dozen. It was way cheaper than regular fast food. I remember thinking what a great discovery it was until I found I couldn't handle more than a couple of them befor…

Are doughnuts different in America to other parts of the world? I couldn't imagine ever eating 12 Aussie-style doughnuts in 1 sitting, unless it was some sort of eating competition. It'd be like eating 3 hamburgers or 6 hot dogs.

I don’t think they are different. In my experience it’s common to buy them by the dozen because you’re taking them to some sort of event.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#645

Post by chii »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #563
andrepd wrote: post #458

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A co-operative model of ownership would solve that problem. Then if the company succeeds, the workers see the rewards.

are you, or anyone here, aware of a co-operative modeled SV style startup? I think 10yr (or 20 if that's possible) options is a good step towards that model so that you get back compensated for your contributions regardless of how long the investors resist IPO

if it's cooperative, then the workers are themselves the investors, and they would have had to put capital into the company. There's no need for options in that case (since those workers already would own the shares for putting in the capital!).

What you might be referring to is to have workers who _didn't_ put in capital, but still get given long dated options, along with their salary. This is funded by investors. So - the problem here is that there's no downside for the workers. If due to bad luck, they lose out on the value of the options, but still get paid their salary in the mean time, and yet get the upside of the long dated options should the company succeeds. The only people to lose out are the investors - who had to give up some of their shares (as options), for almost zero upside. I dont think it will work - no investor is going to be that sucker.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#646

Post by bsder »

emodendroket wrote: post #540
bsder wrote: post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, if someone actually asks for food, I'll probably help them out--certainly if I'm holding it in my hand. That's only happened once in all my years of walking around cities (and I generally walk a lot wherever I live--which is why I recognize all the habitual beggars). For almost a half-dozen of my too sympathetic friends, I have introduced them to the local beggar population that they wanted to help by saying: "…

Supposing someone didn't want food, I don't see that it changes the fundamental reality that they are homeless and begging. In fact it's hard to blame them for wanting a drink in that situation.

The issue is that someone genuinely homeless will happily take the drink and sandwich and consume them later (thus the "no mayo") if they happen to not be hungry right now.

Someone who is panhandling wants money and they get very angry when you interrupt that process. At least in the US, the panhandlers tend not to be the genuinely homeless--they mostly tend to be scummy people. It's a semi-regular news occurrence for someone to follow a panhandler with a camera to find out they really aren't homeless.

It really makes the political discussion about how to help the "homeless" a lot harder because now you have to deal with "How do we make sure that we help the "homeless" instead of these scummy jerks?" And it's impossible to make the separation--the scummy jerks will always work your system better than the genuinely homeless. It's one of the reasons why I'm generally for the basic income kind of approaches--the scummy jerks can't work your system to the detriment of those who genuinely need it.

In the US at least, the "genuinely homeless" that you could actually help tend to be nearly invisible because they don't want to be seen--getting seen gets you noticed and harrassed.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#647

Post by sombremesa »

EdwinLarkin wrote: post #358
foobazzy wrote: post #353

At a certain multinational company that Anon(a close friend) is currently employed at had this way of distributing bonuses when the pandemic hit. Context: the company is chasing a $100mn y-o-y growth at this point. - All employees in the US offices get a hefty bonus for the profits they contributed to - All employees in the India office were to not receive bonuses/increments because we wanted to cut costs (not to for…

That's completely normal and does not only apply to India but all other offshore centers like Eastern Europe or the Philippines. You guys are a cost centre.

The only profit center is a customer whose check hasn't bounced.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#648

Post by bsder »

emodendroket wrote: post #539
bsder wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> very poor sad little came up to me asking for help Never give to beggars. Ever. For any reason. If you just feel you must give, give food --something that can't be converted to cash. Nothing pisses off "beggars" faster than giving them a sandwich. 1) Most of the time it's a scam. Often the individual isn't really that badly off or, if they're children, the money is being skimmed by adults. 2) A lot of the time it's…

> Often the individual isn't really that badly off or, if they're children, the money is being skimmed by adults. This is a comforting thing to tell oneself but I don't think it's true.

> the individual isn't really that badly off

I probably should have chosen my words a touch better. Beggars are certainly never in a good place in life irrespective of whether they homeless or not. I don't subscribe to the "welfare queens" rhetoric.

However, giving a small amount of money to that particular person right now does nothing to improve the situation. And, in fact, it makes the surrounding area slightly worse for the people who live there by creating an attractive nuisance.

Comforting? Not particularly. My mother had quite bad dementia. Without me around, I could have easily seen a path for her to becoming homeless. This is a huge indictment of our current government and economic system that having a mental health crisis can consign you to homelessness.

> if they're children, the money is being skimmed by adults

This one may vary by country, but I'll stick by it.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#649

Post by emodendroket »

bsder wrote: post #646
emodendroket wrote: post #540

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Supposing someone didn't want food, I don't see that it changes the fundamental reality that they are homeless and begging. In fact it's hard to blame them for wanting a drink in that situation.

The issue is that someone genuinely homeless will happily take the drink and sandwich and consume them later (thus the "no mayo") if they happen to not be hungry right now. Someone who is panhandling wants money and they get very angry when you interrupt that process. At least in the US, the panhandlers tend not to be the genuinely homeless--they mostly tend to be scummy people. It's a semi-regular news occurrence fo…

> Someone who is panhandling wants money and they get very angry when you interrupt that process. At least in the US, the panhandlers tend not to be the genuinely homeless--they mostly tend to be scummy people. It's a semi-regular news occurrence for someone to follow a panhandler with a camera to find out they really aren't homeless.

My belief is that this is a very small percentage of beggars and the videos are so widely shared not because they reflect a common situation but because they make the people share them feel better about walking on by. I don’t actually think that you can determine that someone isn’t homeless just because they don’t want to accept food from you.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#650

Post by [deleted] »

hintymad wrote: post #92
jedberg wrote: post #17

When I worked at eBay, we had a bonus program based on company revenue. It was around 6% of your salary max and managers got around 25% max based on the same formula. For the first few years, you could count on getting a max bonus every quarter. To the point where most everyone who worked there had always gotten one. And the one quarter, we didn't get the max bonus. In fact, I don't think we got it all. People scream…

Is this natural dynamics in an increasingly large company? As a company grows, individual's impact diminishes and so does visibility, and revenue per employee dwindles. Consequently, resources increasingly concentrate to the top. That's why we hear Microsoft's engineers below level 68 complain about pay, and Amazon's entry-level engineers are known for their relatively small package. Ebay's situation was probably eve…

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