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Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

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Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#201

Post by slyall »

sillysaurusx wrote: post #96
fuzzythinker wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ouch, 25% vs. 6%. That's how they value managers vs. (engineers? or everyone else?). Sad.

I'm surprised there isn't more discussion on this. That's more than 4x more for managers than engineers.

It's a standard sort of thing.

The idea is that a non-manager has minimal ability to affect the company's bottom line. While those further up have the ability (and now have the incentive) to affect the profit of their division or the whole company.

So a worker gets 100k with a 10% bonus, his boss gets $120k with a 40 percent bonus etc. In a good year the boss will get almost twice the worker but in a bad year he will make just 20% more.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#202

Post by pnathan »

woeirua wrote: post #188

Bonuses should be: infrequent, irregular, unannounced, and large. Otherwise you end up in this trap where people expect the bonus and worse yet, count on it to pay their bills. It’s stupid to make it a part of your overall compensation package because if you do, then the bonus is always weighted based on overall company performance. So if the company has a bad year no one gets bonuses even if individual teams crushed…

I would concur. The bonus system at prior fine employers usually looks like Company_perf_scaling * Bonus_pool * Group_political_pie_slice * Personal_perf; I usually assess it as "magic money".

Yearly bonuses IMO should be rolled into base salary raises. Bonuses otherwise should be project based IMO. "Good job on the big projects, have xyz $/stock".

Bonus structures for ordinary engineering / programming where a bonus might be >20% of total salary seems to be out of line with our normal work output.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#203

Post by ryandrake »

dilyevsky wrote: post #178
sneak wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It wasn't unlimited though. If startups will let you take 4 weeks, or 8 weeks, or 12 weeks, or whatever - they should simply publish that up front. I am fairly certain that they would have had an issue with you taking 52 weeks of paid vacation time off per year. The actual policy number is somewhere between 2 and 52. I agree that 2 weeks of PTO for an employee per year is too little, but I think we are talking about…

When employer says “unlimited” they actually mean “take as many as you like as long as your manager is happy with your work” so I doubt you can formalize that in the offer. It’s good deal tho for people who can deliver the goods

If you do really good can you take a year off? If not, then it’s still not unlimited. I’d like my salary and benefits be quantified in my contract rather than “manager discretion” which can go south in a hurry if you have a terrible manager.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#204

Post by dboreham »

thyrsus wrote: post #176
mulmen wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait what? Who gets the tax break there?

Obliquely relevant question: can U.S. sole proprietors make expensed charitable contributions? I'm guessing not, because that would decrease the 13.5% Social Security "contribution", and would be on top of the "standard deduction" that was increased to make Schedule A itemization preferable only in exceptional cases.

I don't know anything about sole trader taxation but corporations can make charitable donations that are treated as business expenses (hence not taxed). They pretty much have to be cash, not in-kind contributions though. Ianaa, etc.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#205

Post by dboreham »

astrange wrote: post #194
dlp211 wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Charity is an above the line deduction.

It wasn't last year, now it is again, so people might've missed it. I thought you could only deduct $300 though.

Are you talking about California state tax? The $300 thing doesn't jive with my federal tax spreadsheet..

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#206

Post by jachee »

LambdaComplex wrote: post #199
kbenson wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’m not staying at a job past 5 unless I have a share of the company. Screw that. Every startup owner thinks they are unique and that’s why 90% of them fail. Not all companies are the same, and not all companies are startups. I'm back working at the same company which was my first job in tech. Not for the second time, not the third either, but the fourth time now. I was first hired there over 22 years ago in tech s…

> even if it can't pay a huge amount for some positions, there's always a lot of recognition that everyone is needed to make it work, and everyone is appreciated I can't pay my rent in recognition or appreciation though.

Then just move somewhere you can afford without "a huge amount".

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#207

Post by vehementi »

jrockway wrote: post #40

> I remember being in shouting matches with our signal integrity team about among other things, how many capacitors we needed. I think the place where big companies go wrong is by having teams that are too specialized. If you're the Signal Integrity team, the only thing you care about is signal integrity. You should just say no to anything but the most conservative arrangement possible; you're responsible for Signal…

You could have replaced SI with Security and described my current situation perfectly

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#208

Post by Natsu »

jedberg wrote: post #29
taeric wrote: post #26

This is literally a plot point in Christmas Vacation. Is also why I think it is silly for startups to provide too many perks. It sets obvious precedent and will upset more folks when you stop. Find ways to invest in the company so that success is it's own perk. If the company truly has more, work that into raises where you clearly tie the income to the success of the company.

> This is literally a plot point in Christmas Vacation. Ha! You're totally right. I'd forgotten about that. He acts out what everyone wished they could do. :)

But he did get a bonus! He got the jelly of the month club, the gift that keeps on giving :)

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#209

Post by DoreenMichele »

I knew a guy who put his two weeks notice in just before the annual Christmas bonus came out. So they stiffed him on the bonus.

They ended up paying for that in spades.

This was in the planning field and he was moving from a private consulting firm to a government job. Government is where the real power is for this industry.

If they were one minute late "Sorry, we are closed/you missed the deadline." If they had any errors in their paperwork "Sorry, reapply after you fix this."

Etc. Ad nauseam.

By. The. Book. Every step of the way. Zero wiggle room.

It had to have cost them more than the bonus they denied him.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#210

Post by dboreham »

adamcharnock wrote: post #57

This reminds me of my first job as a developer, age 21. I haven’t shared it before, so here goes... There was a ‘crunch’ coming up at work (i.e. IMHO, bad planning) and so the boss offered everyone a bonus if they performed well. However, the older employees warned me that the criteria for such bonuses were often ill-defined. I therefore pushed for clear achievable objectives. These pre-agreed objectives were promise…

Many psychopath in business settings.
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