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Ask HN: Why corporate culture never increment your salary?

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Re: Ask HN: Why corporate culture never increment your salary?

#41
The way you describe it, it looks like your company is systemically underpaying employees. This typically cannot be changed overnight (unless your company is really small).

Do not discuss it with anyone. Just line up your next job and leave with minimum notice. Be open with your colleagues during your notice period about the reasons you are leaving. This would be an excellent time for them to renegotiate their salaries, if leaving is not something they want to do.

Re: Ask HN: Why corporate culture never increment your salary?

#45
post #35
post #28

Because they know you'll do the work you're doing -- and the tenfold increase -- for what they're paying you. They exist to make money, not to enrich their workers. The optimisation strategy is to pay as little as possible for as much productivity and labour as possible, then charge as much as possible for it to customers as a package item. Everything trickles up to the top of the pyramid. Sadly the only way to relia…

I don't agree that the only way to increase pay is to move jobs. I've had a lot of success simply asking for more money while explaining why I feel I provide value enough to justify it. I got a 20% increase this year just by asking for it.

It's even better if you do look for a job, get and offer and say to your manager that you already have an offer but you would stay for X amount. This worked for me twice before and the company went out of its way to meet my request and now pays me the maximum allowed for my position.

Re: Ask HN: Why corporate culture never increment your salary?

#46
Taking a leap here, but reading OPs post it reads as if English is not their first language. If they are a remote employee, say from India - that company is probably doing global remoting precisely to pay as little as possible for engineering staff. It is little wonder they are not proposing raises if this is the case, and it also complicates some of the advice here about just putting in notice and heading across the street for a better paying job. Purely speculation but would be curious to have OP clarify.

Re: Ask HN: Why corporate culture never increment your salary?

#47

People will say that you must confront your manager and demand fair compensation. That's true, but if anybody was paying attention to your work and your worth, if they actually cared about you as a person, they would have given you a raise already before you started feeling this way. They're ripping you off, and that's business as usual. Yes, being exploited is disappointing - you have to demand what you're worth, or…

> but if anybody was paying attention to your work and your worth, if they actually cared about you as a person, they would have given you a raise already before you started feeling this way

This would be wonderful in an ideal world, but it's not reality. You wouldn't need marketing if your customers just already knew how amazing your product was. You wouldn't need a CV if employers just understood your worth. It's unreasonable to expect people to care about you as deeply as you do. If they happen to care that's an amazing plus to be valued. It's not what you should expect.

Re: Ask HN: Why corporate culture never increment your salary?

#48
Did they refuse your ask? Or are you complaining that you never even thought to ask for a raise and your job didn't read your mind or offer first?

If the latter, you have comically absurd and unreasonable expectations -- you can't complain about not getting a raise if _you never asked for one_. Geez.

Re: Ask HN: Why corporate culture never increment your salary?

#49
Did you ask for a raise? Because if not, then this is completely normal. You have two options (leaving out the "just continue and feel miserable"):

- ask for a raise

- change the company

Whatever you do, make sure to have a realistic idea of what your work is worth. Ask fellow employees how much they make and check local statistics about salary in your specific field.

Isn't Canada in a shortage of skilled software engineers? Take advantage of that.

Re: Ask HN: Why corporate culture never increment your salary?

#50
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't agree that the only way to increase pay is to move jobs. I've had a lot of success simply asking for more money while explaining why I feel I provide value enough to justify it. I got a 20% increase this year just by asking for it.

It's even better if you do look for a job, get and offer and say to your manager that you already have an offer but you would stay for X amount. This worked for me twice before and the company went out of its way to meet my request and now pays me the maximum allowed for my position.

Whether that works depends on the company culture. It makes you look like "you're only working for the money" and people won't trust you because "you will switch as soon as you get a better offer".
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