Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?

#171

Post by metabagel » Fri, Sep 06, 2024, 8:09 AM UTC

BurningFrog wrote: post #108

alberth wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> included frustrations with management Which I presume this is another way to say “your direct boss”. Because 99% of an employees view of a company, and opinions about their employer, is actually just a reflection of their like/dislike of their direct boss.

Red Pill: The boss/employee relationship depends equally on both people. If you always "have a terrible boss" that really means your relationship with your boss is bad, which depends on both people. You were warned. The Red Pill is near: To spell it out: If you consistently have a terrible relationship with your boss, with several bosses... I'm sorry, but the common factor is you. You're probably a shitty employee.

What you wrote doesn’t seem related to the comment you are replying to.

Plus, your unrelated response comes off as arrogant and judgemental.

Re: Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?

#172

Post by mppm » Fri, Sep 06, 2024, 8:13 AM UTC

It's always puzzled me why many tech companies seem so reluctant to give counter-offers to departing employees. Trying to pay as little as possible and not easily giving raises, even to their most productive employees, is at least somewhat understandable. But if a valuable employee is about to leave, possibly taking some critical knowledge with them, you'd think that a 50% raise should be on the table out of pure self-interest. So why doesn't this usually happen? Is it just part of keeping up the charade (a big raise is a tacit admission that they have been underpaying massively)? Is it to increase the barrier to negotiations (you have to actually leave rather than just get an offer)? Is it because HR people get more points for bringing in "new talent" rather than keeping the current workforce? Or is it just that neither HR nor management have any clue who their critical employees are, so they are unable to prioritize?

Re: Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?

#173

Post by dmichulke » Fri, Sep 06, 2024, 8:13 AM UTC

kaba0 wrote: post #152

rsyring wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Facts and Fallacies of Software Engineering" cited research indicating it can be as high as 28x. To get that number, you have to take into consideration terrible devs who are negative multipliers. I.e. the scale is not 1x - 10x. It's more like -10x - 10x. I've personally experienced development projects where there was easily a -5x - 5x difference between the least and most productive. I've seen productivity improve…

Minus times plus is minus though :D

I suppose they couldn't call that new hire a -1000x developer either.

Re: Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?

#174

Post by metabagel » Fri, Sep 06, 2024, 8:14 AM UTC

mbsa_cs wrote: post #157

gregfjohnson wrote: post #78

A person close to me works at a law firm. She was feeling a bit stagnant, so she connected with a recruiter. She got a very solid offer with a significant pay bump. She gave her two weeks' notice to her firm, including appointments with the partners. One of the partners asked her for a half hour. They came back with a massive pay raise, and a promotion to partner if she would stay. She was in a state of shock, but th…

“but his talent to the current company is vastly greater than his generic value on the market” This has always been one of my fears. I would not want to become indispensable for a no name company while paying the price of being average to the market.

The point is that the market is willing to pay more, which seems counterintuitive since the employee should be much more valuable to their current employer. But, this does seem to happen with some frequency.

Re: Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?

#175

Post by creesch » Fri, Sep 06, 2024, 8:15 AM UTC

leros wrote: post #28

I've heard the argument that an engineer who wants to go should be let go. They won't be motivated anymore even if you pay them more to stay. Not sure if that's valid.

Like most simple arguments that make sense on the surface, reality is more complex. In some cases, this might be true, certainly if the engineer wants to go because of other reasons than pay.

I feel like this argument might be used by managers or HR in companies who know that their company isn't the greatest work environment.

Re: Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?

#176

Post by lrvick » Fri, Sep 06, 2024, 8:17 AM UTC

red_admiral wrote: post #148

As a regular reader of Rachelbythebay - I agree with the sentiment of a lot of other posters here, it's not the money that makes people quit. A classic story here is the "Sodas are no longer free" one: https://steveblank.com/2009/12/21/the-elves-leave-middle-ear... The total cost of free sodas for engineers is probably small compared to their salaries, and for the individual engineer, the new $0.50 per soda cost is p…

100% this.

In every company I have been at that was going south, the first things to go after a hiring freeze were snacks and lunch.

When companies walk back any benefits of the job that cause you to pay for things out of pocket, you just got a pay cut, and should GTFO.

Re: Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?

#177

Post by Sebb767 » Fri, Sep 06, 2024, 8:18 AM UTC

mppm wrote: post #172

It's always puzzled me why many tech companies seem so reluctant to give counter-offers to departing employees. Trying to pay as little as possible and not easily giving raises, even to their most productive employees, is at least somewhat understandable. But if a valuable employee is about to leave, possibly taking some critical knowledge with them, you'd think that a 50% raise should be on the table out of pure sel…

I think a lot of your points play a role, but a major one is that when the employee is handing in his resignation, it's likely they have mentally already closed that chapter in their life and won't remain happy or productive. At best they leave soon anyway, at worst you're now paying a premium for worse work.

Re: Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?

#178

Post by metabagel » Fri, Sep 06, 2024, 8:20 AM UTC

hysan wrote: post #151

rramadass wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well... Because the Industry thinks that Management/Marketing/Sales are the important "leaders" and Engineering is just mere "foot soldiers" and hence replaceable/dispensable as needed. The above is justified as "Business needs", "Investor returns", "Profit next quarter" etc.

Very early on in my career, I had a few good mentors who all told me the same piece of advice - tech (IT, programming, QA, etc) are __cost centers__ to most businesses. No matter how valuable you are, your pay is not going to scale the same way no matter how good your performance reviews are. I’m very thankful for that advice because I was never shocked when raises were low or when finding out that new, lower leveled…

Well, yeah, and generally you need to seek new employment regularly, because your current company is counting on you not recognizing your worth, whereas other companies will have to make competitive offers in order to win you over.

Re: Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?

#179

Post by knallfrosch » Fri, Sep 06, 2024, 8:23 AM UTC

The article ignores that "the market" works.

Switching jobs, with new physical locations, new informal structures, new colleagues imposes a change cost on the software engineer too. That's why a lot of people stay. Additionally, paying every engineer the market rate wastes money on those that would have stayed anyway.

As a similar problem, countries that pay for babies find that 98% of their money is wasted on couples that have babies anyway. The Economist says: "schemes in Poland and France cost $1m-2m per extra birth" https://www.economist.com/leaders/2024/05/23/why-paying-wome...

Now that's a scale problem. Is one engineer staying really worth $10m? $1m? You'll pay way more than you think.

Re: Why Don't Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?

#180

Post by yunohn » Fri, Sep 06, 2024, 8:23 AM UTC

YZF wrote: post #120

BurningFrog wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doubling your income would mean you can take 50% of your time off with the same income. Pretty sure that would change your life!

It doesn't really work like that. The reality is that you can't work 50% of the time for half the salary (if that's what you mean). When you make more money you typically want a nicer place to live, maybe a nicer car, your standard of living will go up somewhat. Now to maintain that standard of living you're going to need to save more money. Maybe you have kids and you want to be able to pay for their education, or b…

If anything, most tech company contracts are written the other way around - there is almost never overtime pay and any thinking/work done both within and outside work hours is completely owned by the company.