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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)

#61

Post by willseth »

tomp wrote: post #32
scarface_74 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The incentive is not to make sure you get the most money. The incentive is to make sure you get placed fast. While $200K vs $220K means a lot to you over the course of your job, they aren’t going to risk losing a placement arguing for you to get $20K more so their firm can get $44K instead of $40k and the recruiter themselves can get maybe 60% of what the firm gets. There was a famous similar study published in Freak…

200 vs 220 is likely noise. The recruiter shouldn’t care about tha2, and neither should you. But £200k vs £400k is real! That’s the real span for e.g. hedge funds in London. Actually, it was a few years ago. Probably more now!

20k isn’t noise to most people in a 200k salary range.

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

#62

Post by johnnyanmac »

goldeneye13_ wrote: post #36

I always recommend this article: https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/ I think this topic is super important and I’m really glad I didn’t follow advice of saying your “expected salary or expected +20%”. Here my anecdotal SWE salary history: Worked at a startup for a bunch of years making 90k by the end Got offered a place at FAANG. Recruiter pushed me a little bit on expected salary but I didn’t gi…

> to show other engineers that your idea of how much you should be payed could be completely wrong.

Defintiely could be. But not in this economy. I'll take what I can get.

But in general, it really is a matter of knowing your worth and what they could pay. IF you have a certain noteriety in a community of a domain and you get an offer, understand how much leverage you have vs. yet another front end web dev. Let alone 99% of students out of college.

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

#63

Post by ewuhic »

goldeneye13_ wrote: post #36

I always recommend this article: https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/ I think this topic is super important and I’m really glad I didn’t follow advice of saying your “expected salary or expected +20%”. Here my anecdotal SWE salary history: Worked at a startup for a bunch of years making 90k by the end Got offered a place at FAANG. Recruiter pushed me a little bit on expected salary but I didn’t gi…

Ah, the United States of America, this is hardly possible in Europe, especially Germany.

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

#64

Post by goldeneye13_ »

ewuhic wrote: post #63
goldeneye13_ wrote: post #36

I always recommend this article: https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/ I think this topic is super important and I’m really glad I didn’t follow advice of saying your “expected salary or expected +20%”. Here my anecdotal SWE salary history: Worked at a startup for a bunch of years making 90k by the end Got offered a place at FAANG. Recruiter pushed me a little bit on expected salary but I didn’t gi…

Ah, the United States of America, this is hardly possible in Europe, especially Germany.

This is UK

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

#65

Post by petters »

ewuhic wrote: post #63
goldeneye13_ wrote: post #36

I always recommend this article: https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/ I think this topic is super important and I’m really glad I didn’t follow advice of saying your “expected salary or expected +20%”. Here my anecdotal SWE salary history: Worked at a startup for a bunch of years making 90k by the end Got offered a place at FAANG. Recruiter pushed me a little bit on expected salary but I didn’t gi…

Ah, the United States of America, this is hardly possible in Europe, especially Germany.

This is why we Europeans like working at American companies (in Europe)

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

#66

Post by johnnyanmac »

akomtu wrote: post #45
harimau777 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why they demand high salaries. You are paying so much to convince them to build boring software instead of the fancy bridges and gothic temples.

Rather than hiring architects as landscapers and paying them a lot to trash their skills, I tell candidates upfront that the job is to mow a lawn and the pay is appropriate for the job.

That's great transparency. And I imagine you get what you pay for. That's honestly not a bad thing as long as it's a living wage. You don't always need an achitect, especially non-tech .

But we should always keep in mind that these crazy salaries aren't all a result of impact software can make, but also as a bid to prevent other companies from hiring those architects. Paying someone an extra 200k/yr to potentially keep a new competitor from making 10m/year is an obvious bargain sale if you can afford it.

At least, that was the gameplan back in the '10's. I think we're past that point and those levels of salariesare only reserved for director+ level people in 2024/5.

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

#67

Post by goldeneye13_ »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #62
goldeneye13_ wrote: post #36

I always recommend this article: https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/ I think this topic is super important and I’m really glad I didn’t follow advice of saying your “expected salary or expected +20%”. Here my anecdotal SWE salary history: Worked at a startup for a bunch of years making 90k by the end Got offered a place at FAANG. Recruiter pushed me a little bit on expected salary but I didn’t gi…

> to show other engineers that your idea of how much you should be payed could be completely wrong. Defintiely could be. But not in this economy. I'll take what I can get. But in general, it really is a matter of knowing your worth and what they could pay. IF you have a certain noteriety in a community of a domain and you get an offer, understand how much leverage you have vs. yet another front end web dev. Let alone…

Notice I’m not suggesting that people go for “hard” negotiation. You don’t loose anything by not revealing comp early. Worst case you will get offer that’s too low. But best case you get offered above what you expected.

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

#68

Post by ewuhic »

petters wrote: post #65
ewuhic wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, the United States of America, this is hardly possible in Europe, especially Germany.

This is why we Europeans like working at American companies (in Europe)

Now the question is where to find American companies willing to do B2B/freelance contract without location-adjusted bs.

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

#69

Post by fn-mote »

akomtu wrote: post #45
harimau777 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why they demand high salaries. You are paying so much to convince them to build boring software instead of the fancy bridges and gothic temples.

Rather than hiring architects as landscapers and paying them a lot to trash their skills, I tell candidates upfront that the job is to mow a lawn and the pay is appropriate for the job.

I respect this approach.

I hope it reduces the mismatches of salary expectations in your hiring process. Less drama for everyone.

I would never apply, but that’s fine. I’m not a landscaper.

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

#70

Post by itronitron »

Thorrez wrote: post #53
paulddraper wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it helps you position the offer, and emphasize/sell certain parts. Salary, equity, title, working hours, etc. More information always helps.

Fargren is asking why a recruiter would want to to withhold information. Your answer is "More information always helps." That doesn't answer the question.

Yeah, the company can tell the candidate the salary they will pay for someone in the role. If that doesn't match the candidate's needs then the process stops. If the candidate's performance during the interviews shows they can't function effectively in the role, the process stops.
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