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Common mistakes in salary negotiation

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Re: Common mistakes in salary negotiation

#451

Post by nunez »

pdonis wrote: post #160
nunez wrote: post #147

> My general policy with third-party recruiters is to not tell them ANYTHING and to always deal directly with the companies they introduce you, once you establish a point of contact there. You should assume that anything you tell your recruiter is going to get back to every company you’re working with. Why? Because their primary objective is to place your butt in the seat of one of the companies they’re working with,…

> If you want $200,000, $400,000, whatever, just say so. BEFORE you start any interviews. Unless the number you give is significantly higher than any of your potential employers are ever going to offer you, you are shortchanging yourself by giving that number--it means that you have now foreclosed potential higher offers that otherwise might have come your way. That is the basis of the advice given in the article. I…

> Unless the number you give is significantly higher than any of your potential employers are ever going to offer you, you are shortchanging yourself by giving that number--it means that you have now foreclosed potential higher offers that otherwise might have come your way. That is the basis of the advice given in the article.

That's why I said to give the number you _want_ up front.

This way, you don't have to worry about haggling up to get to a number you're happy with or getting FOMO over offers for more that might have been.

Otherwise, you're going to enter a negotiation with a recruiter who has way more information and access than you do, and you'll still feel FOMO anyway at the end result _while_ potentially losing out on getting what you wanted (which might have been achievable, had you stated your asking up front).

> What knowing what you are worth should do is help you to decide, on your own (i.e, without asking recruiters who have conflicts of interest), which potential employers are worth your time to even look at in the first place.

I've interviewed, and have worked at, several places whose comp ranges really surprised me.

I've also worked at Google, which is where I got paid the _least_ in my career thus far. (Note to readers: unless you really really really don't care about the money, don't EVER take a pay cut at face value!)

You really can't judge a book by its cover, and, again, recruiters know more than you about what their clients can (or would be willing to) afford.

Also, at the end of the day, recruiters are salespeople. If they think a candidate is a perfect fit for a client's needs, they (the good ones, at least) will absolutely go to bat to negotiate with the hiring managers for the highest comp package they can. Of course, it would be way more efficient to have a direct connection with the hiring manager, but that's not always possible.

Re: Common mistakes in salary negotiation

#452

Post by nunez »

pdonis wrote: post #241
pandaman wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You argument is essentially hanging on the assertion that the first number an employer would offer is also the maximum number it could offer. I know exactly one company that operated like that: they'd make the maximum offer and if you did not like it there was no further negotiation. Most companies don't do that (neither does that one any more, the CEO who had this policy had retired a while ago). What I've observed…

> You argument is essentially hanging on the assertion that the first number an employer would offer is also the maximum number it could offer. Not at all. You should expect to negotiate once they have made an offer. But your negotiating position will be better if you don't give a number first. > in reality the hiring manager had the range like 200-250 and you asked for 210. Why would he bother to try to push you dow…

> Because you've now anchored the negotiation at 210 as the max, and he's going to try to get you for less because this is business. He's not going to just take your first number any more than you would just accept his first offer.

But if you're currently making 150, then 210 is a huge jump up!

Sure, you could have asked for 250, and I would've recommended that the candidate ask for 250 (because you would've likely gotten 225 or something like that), but asking for 210 and getting it is extremely ideal IMO.

This is better than "I'm not going to tell them my salary or target so that I can wow the shit out of them during the interviews, and then negotiate up once at the offer stage in hopes that they'll instantly approve it since they're over the moon to have me."

It's not that that doesn't work (it does, sometimes); it's just incredibly risky (what if you get a stump-the-chump interviewer that NO HIRES basically everyone they interview?) and very likely to result in "sorry, but that's not in the range for this role, but you can interview for the Staff role..." and then potentially have to do the already-excruciating interview loop _again_.

Re: Common mistakes in salary negotiation

#453

Post by nunez »

pdonis wrote: post #165
nunez wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is another side to this advice. If you don't know what market is, you can do one of three things: 1. Check out levels.fyi (overindexed on FAANG; not reliable), 2. Ask for a number that "sounds" high to you, and let the recruiter negotiate down (risky; recruiters might laugh you out the room if you go too high), or 3. Ask a recruiter, and then add a premium on top of whatever they tell you! Recruiters will be an…

You left out: 4. Don't give a number at all. If you are interested in Company X, and you've gone far enough in the process to know they are interested in you, tell the recruiter that you would be interested in seeing a competitive offer from Company X, or something along those lines. At the end of the day, the best negotiating leverage you have is that if Company X actually does want to hire you, at some point they h…

I left it out because I don't agree that this works in the general sense. I think not specifying a number is very likely to leave money on the table.

Re: Common mistakes in salary negotiation

#454

Post by photonerd »

leeny wrote: post #22
photonerd wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of businesses post stupid ranges. Like, ok your range is $150-250k, fan-fucking-tastic, that’s completely unhelpful

Author here. These ranges are typically wide because your compensation depends on your interview performance and perceived seniority/value add to the company. There's no way to tease this out before you interview, except that if you're looking for compensation that's significantly above the top of the band, it might be hard to get. (A little above the top is possible, and sometimes a lot is possible too... that's whe…

A range that spans 2-3 job levels is not useful at all except for telling me the company is completely unserious & should be avoided.

If your salary range for, say, a senior staff engineer includes what you should be paying seniors: you’re wasting everyone’s time.

Re: Common mistakes in salary negotiation

#455

Post by photonerd »

Lucasoato wrote: post #26
photonerd wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of businesses post stupid ranges. Like, ok your range is $150-250k, fan-fucking-tastic, that’s completely unhelpful

It's better to have reasonably large salary ranges than no range at all.

It’s functionally the same. Salary Comp data will give you a better range than that

Re: Common mistakes in salary negotiation

#456

Post by photonerd »

brianwawok wrote: post #60
photonerd wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of businesses post stupid ranges. Like, ok your range is $150-250k, fan-fucking-tastic, that’s completely unhelpful

But like, that is a perfectly valid salary range for a job? Not all companies have a 10k salary band on a given title.

A 100k range means they don’t even know what they’re hiring for, or have no idea the demands of the role.

Or at least, that’s what it tells me as a 20 year veteran of this business.

Re: Common mistakes in salary negotiation

#457

Post by photonerd »

roland35 wrote: post #80
brianwawok wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But like, that is a perfectly valid salary range for a job? Not all companies have a 10k salary band on a given title.

It can be a valid range - I've seen plenty of postings (internal at least) where the the seniority is flexible. Also a flexible location could also lead to a big range depending if you are based in NYC versus Iowa...

Fair, but at that point they’re not hiring for a role or need; they’re hiring to get butts in seats.

That’s a strategy, for sure, but not a great one.

Re: Common mistakes in salary negotiation

#458

Post by photonerd »

sneak wrote: post #58
photonerd wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of businesses post stupid ranges. Like, ok your range is $150-250k, fan-fucking-tastic, that’s completely unhelpful

That's not "completely unhelpful" - if your current job is $99k/yr or $400k/yr it answers your "should I bother spending time interviewing here?" question quite nicely. The fact that the range is 100k isn't that big of an impediment to utility.

It makes it functionally less useful than Glassdoor. Which means it’s lacking utility

Re: Common mistakes in salary negotiation

#459

Post by gambiting »

ryan_lane wrote: post #448
gambiting wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>If a company gives you an exploding offer, it's a strong signal that the culture of that company isn't good, or that they can't afford to hire quality candidates (or both). I work in games - what happens for us quite often is that we'll interview ~10 candidates and 2-3 are actually good enough to hire. So the process is to give the top candidate the offer with a few days to accept it, if they don't then we move on…

> I work in games Are there any gaming companies not known to have a poor culture? That industry is well known to be exploitative, with low pay.

>>Are there any gaming companies not known to have a poor culture?

Of course. Where I work the culture is very good, with strong emphasis against overtime, no crunch and very good benefits, and it's one of the biggest publishers in the industry.

Re: Common mistakes in salary negotiation

#460

Post by gambiting »

ohthatsnotright wrote: post #441
gambiting wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>If a company gives you an exploding offer, it's a strong signal that the culture of that company isn't good, or that they can't afford to hire quality candidates (or both). I work in games - what happens for us quite often is that we'll interview ~10 candidates and 2-3 are actually good enough to hire. So the process is to give the top candidate the offer with a few days to accept it, if they don't then we move on…

> I work in games That's your indication. There are a lot of people who want to work in games, but that doesn't mean it's a good culture.

I don't understand. OP suggested that giving people "explosive" offers is an indication of poor culture - I point out that the necessity to make a decision quickly is dictated by respect to candidates since we don't want to make people wait any longer than necessary. So again, how is this an indication of poor culture?
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