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Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

fearlesssalarynegotiation.com

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Re: Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

#21

Post by FireBeyond »

phil21 wrote: post #17
romanows wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's fascinating, I wonder why that suggestion would be any more dangeous than any other advice. Too bad she didn't just put in a footnote describing why she can't suggest asking for 10% more.

Lying about this these days seems rather risky to me. Some employers may not care, but some will. The Worknumber product from ADP (and it's equiv from Paychex) covers a vast range of white collar employees. Perhaps most. Your new employer has a very good chance of seeing precisely what your current salary is down to the paycheck level going back years to even verify raises and title changes. Replying with what you re…

You can opt out of The Work Number. It's a bit of a convoluted process, but not byzantine - I did it a few months ago, involves filling out a form by hand and scanning it or mailing it, but I did get written confirmation that I'd been opted out.

Re: Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

#22

Post by scarface_74 »

I don’t negotiate. If I’m already working and looking for a job because I want more money, I know my market value and the percentage increase it would need to be for me to leave.

I’m also at the point in my life where I know the amount of money I need to meet my short term and long term goals- pay bills, travel extensively with my wife and save for retirement. But after that I start optimizing for other things - fully remote, enough paid time off to enjoy travel, smaller company (I’ll never work for BigTech company again), interesting work that keeps me up to date with technology, etc.

Re: Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

#23

Post by FirmwareBurner »

voytec wrote: post #19

I've talked to several recruiters and HR people who were prepared for quite a different answer than I gave to this question. I got the feeling that several interviews were carried out afterwards out of politeness or because the recruiter "had to" do it, but the interview ended before it began. Than, there's either ghosting or almost immediate (like up to an hour past the interview) copy-paste email along the lines of…

>Pointing out 20+ years of experience and listing accomplishments seems less important for a lot of businesses, than paying as little as possible.

If paying as little as possible wasn't that important to them, they wouldn't be hiring in Warsaw in the first place, but in the Bay Area, Seattle, Zurich, London, Sydney, etc

Re: Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

#24

Post by JumpCrisscross »

phil21 wrote: post #17
romanows wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's fascinating, I wonder why that suggestion would be any more dangeous than any other advice. Too bad she didn't just put in a footnote describing why she can't suggest asking for 10% more.

Lying about this these days seems rather risky to me. Some employers may not care, but some will. The Worknumber product from ADP (and it's equiv from Paychex) covers a vast range of white collar employees. Perhaps most. Your new employer has a very good chance of seeing precisely what your current salary is down to the paycheck level going back years to even verify raises and title changes. Replying with what you re…

> Lying about this these days seems rather risky to me. Some employers may not care, but some will

It doesn’t have to be a lie. Between base salary and the value of benefits (and expected value of equity) you have a wide range of where you can answer what you’re paid, what your compensation is, what your “take home” is (what does that even mean if you’re W-2 and 1099?), et cetera.

Re: Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

#25

Post by dtnewman »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #23
voytec wrote: post #19

I've talked to several recruiters and HR people who were prepared for quite a different answer than I gave to this question. I got the feeling that several interviews were carried out afterwards out of politeness or because the recruiter "had to" do it, but the interview ended before it began. Than, there's either ghosting or almost immediate (like up to an hour past the interview) copy-paste email along the lines of…

>Pointing out 20+ years of experience and listing accomplishments seems less important for a lot of businesses, than paying as little as possible. If paying as little as possible wasn't that important to them, they wouldn't be hiring in Warsaw in the first place, but in the Bay Area, Seattle, Zurich, London, Sydney, etc

From my experience, this is not necessarily true. Some companies might have the budget to pay at the 50th percentile in New York, or the 95th percentile somewhere else, and would prefer to do the latter

Re: Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

#26

Post by Fargren »

dijit wrote: post #4

Unless you end up with someone like me who has a budget and always pays the max. I usually ask "what do you expect to be paid" to understand if I'll make them happy or sad when discussing what I'll actually offer. This is not foolproof and has caused some issues with people coming in as very good negotiators and thinking my inability to budge is because I'm being hard-line, when in reality it's because- as mentioned,…

> Unless you end up with someone like me who has a budget and always pays the max.

Why don't you disclose the value to the candidate then, rather than asking what's their expectation?

Re: Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

#27

Post by Joel_Mckay »

In general, vertical movement in the tech sector is near zero these days. Thus do a search on the government published wage ranges for the mean/maximum listed for your region (this is what HR does anyway.)

The mistake people make is forgetting to sum up the liabilities of working at some firms:

1. Commute time/costs from home at rush hour (3 hours a day is equivalent to a 30% to 40% pay cut)

2. Cost of both temporary and permanent housing (urban metropolis are economically hostile if you are paying over 27% of your income on your home)

3. Cost of insurance and healthcare (property crime, environmental disasters, and pollution)

4. Location specific risks like Crime/Violence, or Hazmat (money is meaningless if you are not enjoying life)

5. Never bluff in game theory... just explain the options... than follow through and just leave for the competition.

Tip: If you compete with desperate demographics to be at the bottom, than your quality of life may be far lower than expected.

Sometimes taking a $10k income cut makes more sense, than being a poser in a high tax bracket city. i.e. the amount of cash in your hands after taxes can actually be higher.

It is complicated for sure, but employee retention is usually a function of location, skill uniqueness, and wage rates. Best of luck =3

Re: Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

#28

Post by the_gipsy »

dijit wrote: post #4

Unless you end up with someone like me who has a budget and always pays the max. I usually ask "what do you expect to be paid" to understand if I'll make them happy or sad when discussing what I'll actually offer. This is not foolproof and has caused some issues with people coming in as very good negotiators and thinking my inability to budge is because I'm being hard-line, when in reality it's because- as mentioned,…

Are you not allowed to disclose salary first? Sorry to be blunt, but if you are allowed, then this sounds incredibly stupid.

Re: Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

#29

Post by ripped_britches »

slwvx wrote: post #9

Stacey Vanek Smith wrote "Machiavelli for Women". She said in radio interviews about the book that she wanted to put in the book the suggestion that if an interviewer asks what you make, an interviewee should reply with the real value plus 10%. Apparently legal people at her publisher did not allow her to put this in the book. I think it's reasonable to ask what an interviewee expects to make, but not reasonable to a…

Bad idea to lie when there are other equally valid negotiation tactics available.

I had a job early in my career and they asked to see my W2 from my previous employer to validate that my previous job income answer was correct and finish onboarding.

Much better to instead have a second competing job offer in hand. Clearly that’s more competitive than your old job you’re leaving anyway.

Re: Salary expectations questions – How should you answer them? (2020)

#30

Post by voytec »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #23
voytec wrote: post #19

I've talked to several recruiters and HR people who were prepared for quite a different answer than I gave to this question. I got the feeling that several interviews were carried out afterwards out of politeness or because the recruiter "had to" do it, but the interview ended before it began. Than, there's either ghosting or almost immediate (like up to an hour past the interview) copy-paste email along the lines of…

>Pointing out 20+ years of experience and listing accomplishments seems less important for a lot of businesses, than paying as little as possible. If paying as little as possible wasn't that important to them, they wouldn't be hiring in Warsaw in the first place, but in the Bay Area, Seattle, Zurich, London, Sydney, etc

I'm not interacting with companies seeking cheap labor in Poland - like Intel. Despite their quite active recruiters, all conversations with whom end up at "company policy doesn't allow me to discuss salary range".

I've set up a small business with EU tax id over a decade ago and I'm issuing invoices to European countries (EU and Schengen) and North America.

It's a trade-off of giving up European employment safety, pension, some quality of life when working in different timezone, benefits and job security, to work for higher salary.

But it only makes sense until some business decides that they would like a contractor from Poland with a Polish salary.

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