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The one-salary experiment, ten years in

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Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#161

Post by snovv_crash »

alain94040 wrote: post #106
bmdavi3 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if you went to your manager, or whoever you feel is the right person, asked if you could speak one on one, and said... "I really love working at this company. The work is interesting, I love the people, the culture, . But I also know I could be making X if I went elsewhere. I love the work I'm doing, and I want to keep doing it here, but I also don't want to be leaving money on the table. What can we do?" This p…

This is the correct approach. There is a very simple reason your employer doesn't give big raises to existing employees: they know that a year ago, you were happy with your salary. Why would you want a 30% raise today, no matter what the outside market says? You were fine last month, what changed between you and the employer? Nothing. Of course, long term, if the market goes up a lot, people will be underpaid and eve…

A year ago I had 1 year of experience with the company's tech stack, product portfolio and clients. Now I have 2 years of experience. If that isn't worth an extra 30% in value to the company, I'd rather provide that value where it's appreciated.

Sure, after a couple years there are definitely diminishing returns, but the company (mistakenly, IMO) thinking they can get the same value from a fresh hire as from someone who's been there for a while already is what has set up this whole culture in the first place.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#162

Post by eesmith »

Cd00d wrote: post #139
kzisme wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2-5% raises are all I've seen pretty much (which is just cost of living).

I see this sentiment often, but I don't quite understand. Inflation has been at I'm in NYC and our trouble with the subway have highlighted that MTA workers get a standard 6% raise each year as cost of living. But, it's way more than that, and it's actually a salary doubling every 11 years or so, which is not at all in line with overall wage growth - it's huge. Sure, in tech you can jump jobs every 3 years for 20% ju…

If you want, the MTA is hiring. Or, you can start a union at push for pay raises for your industry.

Putting that aside, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_New_York_City_transit_cri... points out that worker salaries are only one of many costs for the MTA, and not the predominate problem:

> On November 18, 2017, The New York Times published its investigation into the crisis, with over 1,000 readers having submitted stories about the effects of the past year's subway delays. It found that politicians from both the Democratic and Republican parties, at the mayoral and gubernatorial levels, had gradually removed $1.5 billion of MTA funding. ...

> The New York Times described MTA funds as a "piggy bank" for the state, with the issuance of MTA bonds benefiting the state at the MTA's expense.[16] By 2017, a sixth of the MTA's budget was allocated to paying off debt, a threefold increase from the proportion in 1997. The city's $250 million annual contribution to the MTA budget in 2017 was a quarter of the contribution in 1990.

> This lack of funds was not only due to the gradual reduction of funding. Other actions by city and state politicians, according to the Times, included overspending; overpaying unions and interest groups; advertising superficial improvement projects while ignoring more important infrastructure; and agreeing to high-interest loans that would have been unnecessary without these politicians' other interventions.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#163

Post by cs02rm0 »

kzisme wrote: post #120
brianwawok wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies give raises. Have you or anyone you know never gotten a raise?

2-5% raises are all I've seen pretty much (which is just cost of living).

I never had a raise as an employee more than 5%. I only once moved jobs as an employee for less than 50% and I tended to stay for 18 months to 3 years.

I've been contacting for 8 years now, have nearly doubled my rate over that time mostly with the same client and never been told they won't pay the rate rise (number of employee devs who been there longer is zero - they haven't had pay rises). I've probably nearly found the limit without calling myself something other than a developer, or giving up being remote.

Someone told me at the start of my career that dev jobs don't tend to give pay rises and to just suck it up and move every couple of years if you want the rewards. I think they were about right, short of contracting which changes that relationship. It sucks but companies are wired to take advantage.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#164

Post by JamesBarney »

issa wrote: post #84

I've always found it strange that companies don't give raises to current employees. A team I am on just lost a good engineer to another company offering him a $30k+ raise. He would have stayed if our company had even given him half of that. Instead, they let him go, and how will have to hire someone else, probably at that higher salary. So weird, and seems to happen a lot.

The company's thinking works like this. Your good engineer might have been worth a $15k raise. But once it gets out you can get a 15k raise by just getting a new offer then another 3-4 people will go get offers and asks for raises. This ends up costing the company an extra $60k-$70k to retain your good engineer, and he might not be worth that to the company.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#165

Post by sdoering »

virgilp wrote: post #152
user5994461 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a myth spread out by recruiters. They do not get paid when the developer doesn't change job. They'll say anything to get you to leave. Truth is, counter offers happen and work out. When it's about compensation, not toxic workplace/coworker, or relocating elsewhere to live with your wife/children.

A former manager - and friend - of mine told me that, when switching jobs, former employer made a handsome counter-offer, I think basically doubling his compensation; it was more than he got at the new gig. His reaction? "Now I also feel insulted. So that's how much I was worth to you, but you waited for me to leave before adjusting my pay?" It strikes me as a reasonable attitude, and one that I've adopted too. I don…

Wow. I have never thought about it that way. But now I read it, I will never be able to not think about it that way.

Thanks for that nugget of wisdom.

Personal "fun" fact. I now get about 28% more then when I startet 4 years ago. That is quite a hefty increase and something to be very happy about.

But on the other hand, due to a change in my role I now have insight into how much others in my company doing the same work make. Often with way less senior roles. And I can see, that they got hired at a lower level for about what I make after 4+ years in a more senior position.

So now I feel insulted, because I know - even after having risen in money, that I am still being not payed adequately.

For comparison: I am talking about 1/3 less then others in my seniority level. That equals about what intermediate colleagues two levels down the ladder make.

So I went from feeling being treated good to being treated unfairly with more insights into what everybody around me gets. I love other countries (think Norway) for making this information public, as it gives a clear lever for everybody to demand fair pay.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#166

Post by Ultimatt »

JamesBarney wrote: post #164
issa wrote: post #84

I've always found it strange that companies don't give raises to current employees. A team I am on just lost a good engineer to another company offering him a $30k+ raise. He would have stayed if our company had even given him half of that. Instead, they let him go, and how will have to hire someone else, probably at that higher salary. So weird, and seems to happen a lot.

The company's thinking works like this. Your good engineer might have been worth a $15k raise. But once it gets out you can get a 15k raise by just getting a new offer then another 3-4 people will go get offers and asks for raises. This ends up costing the company an extra $60k-$70k to retain your good engineer, and he might not be worth that to the company.

Right... but the engineer who leaves still made that extra money with a good offer. They just had to follow through on leaving. So what happens is everyone immediately finds and accepts a better offer. This is quite literally what happened in a startup I was with. When people talk about "churn" Im not sure they have witnessed entire disgruntled teams paid like 60% market rate (at best) just drop tools because the "mission" of the company wasn't enough anymore.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#167

Post by a_imho »

protomyth wrote: post #57
ng12 wrote: post #8

People have written books on this stuff. There's an entire field of research on this subject and I think tech people discount it for being "too MBA". One of the most important findings is that pay generally will never motivate employees, but it will reduce their incentive to leave. Generally most job factors affect one of two separate but related scales: motivation to stay and reluctance to leave. Entirely non-surpri…

One of the most important findings is that pay generally will never motivate employees Grow up poor, and see how much pay motivates you. I think never is too strong a word.

This myth is perpetuated by people who never tried to motivate people with money.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#168

Post by a012 »

issa wrote: post #84

I've always found it strange that companies don't give raises to current employees. A team I am on just lost a good engineer to another company offering him a $30k+ raise. He would have stayed if our company had even given him half of that. Instead, they let him go, and how will have to hire someone else, probably at that higher salary. So weird, and seems to happen a lot.

A lot of places would give a raise too, but frequently attached to a fixed raise rates. It's bad too because they'd rather hire a new one than break the rates to keep the experieced employees.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#169

Post by tuesdayrain »

virgilp wrote: post #152
user5994461 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a myth spread out by recruiters. They do not get paid when the developer doesn't change job. They'll say anything to get you to leave. Truth is, counter offers happen and work out. When it's about compensation, not toxic workplace/coworker, or relocating elsewhere to live with your wife/children.

A former manager - and friend - of mine told me that, when switching jobs, former employer made a handsome counter-offer, I think basically doubling his compensation; it was more than he got at the new gig. His reaction? "Now I also feel insulted. So that's how much I was worth to you, but you waited for me to leave before adjusting my pay?" It strikes me as a reasonable attitude, and one that I've adopted too. I don…

>"Now I also feel insulted. So that's how much I was worth to you, but you waited for me to leave before adjusting my pay?"

I mean yeah, it's a business. If they paid him exactly what he was worth then he would make them a net profit of $0.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#170

Post by colordrops »

rjp0008 wrote: post #98
wting wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe grandparent was referring to proactive raises. Reactive counter offer raises typically don't work because the employee's mind has been made up to leave. Compensation is usually only part of why someone decided to leave.

If you pay everyone more that gets expensive quick. Seems like it could be cost effective to give almost rock bottom raises and just replace the people who aren't 100% into it.

This comment is getting downvoted, but is probably the closest to representing how HR actually things about these things.
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