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Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

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Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#631

Post by Viliam1234 »

matwood wrote: post #474
jedberg wrote: post #17

When I worked at eBay, we had a bonus program based on company revenue. It was around 6% of your salary max and managers got around 25% max based on the same formula. For the first few years, you could count on getting a max bonus every quarter. To the point where most everyone who worked there had always gotten one. And the one quarter, we didn't get the max bonus. In fact, I don't think we got it all. People scream…

I think bonuses can work as long as they are an actual bonus. The base salary needs to be correct first. I worked at one place where the base salary was lower, but the bonus made up for it and it was super stressful. I ended up negotiating for a higher base. One upside I've seen with company performance bonuses is that it can (not always) force even a private company to share more information with employees. This is…

My approach is to think about the base salary as the "real salary" and the bonus as "lottery".

I negotiate the base salary as high as I need to make. When discussing bonuses, I politely pretend to be interested, but what I actually think is "this is just some imaginary number, that maybe I could get if I win a lottery, which probably is not going to happen".

My family budget is calculated on the base salary. If I get a bonus, I will probably immediately move it to a savings account, or maybe use it as an extra payment on mortgage, to get it out of sight.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#632

Post by Thorrez »

Lev1a wrote: post #454
Thorrez wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Larry Ellison, Mark Zuckerberg each have a $1 salary. https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/032315/why-did-larr...

They've already made more money than they or their descendants (probably for generations) will ever need and are very likely also getting capital gains on that wealth through one way or another. The $1 salary is just posturing.

I wasn't saying whether it was moral or immoral or good or bad. I was just giving an example.

I'm curious, would you say it is better for them to have a $1 salary, a $100k salary, or a $100M salary?

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#633

Post by Thorrez »

liamwire wrote: post #288
Thorrez wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Larry Ellison, Mark Zuckerberg each have a $1 salary. https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/032315/why-did-larr...

This is just arguing in bad faith.

I don't think I'm intending to deceive anyone. It's an interesting salary setup that popped into my mind when I read CamelCaseName's, ryandrake's, and supernovae's comments.

I'm sorry if it came off as deceitful or misled anyone.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#635

Post by Thorrez »

karaterobot wrote: post #543
Thorrez wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Larry Ellison, Mark Zuckerberg each have a $1 salary. https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/032315/why-did-larr...

In addition to being edge cases, the people you listed are not managers.

I think they are/were, or at least some of them have been at some points in time during which they had a $1 salary. Although maybe there are different definitions of the word manager and I'm not really familiar with them all.

>Typically, responsibilities include being a decision maker on business strategy and other key policy issues, leader, manager, and executor.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chief_executive_officer

>"We've never been ones to hold on to management roles when we think there's a better way to run the company. And Alphabet and Google no longer need two CEOs and a President," their letter said.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-50653345

That was said when Larry Page and Sergey Brin were stepping back. So it seems to imply their old roles were management roles and their new roles aren't.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#636

Post by rdtwo »

tveita wrote: post #628
rdtwo wrote: post #27

Op got robbed. Not only did he work way more hours to meet a milestone but in the end he got the bonus because it was structured in such a way that he did not have sufficient control of the outcome. It always surprises me how genius level folks can’t do simple math to realize that salaried employees get compensated on the compensation/hours worked formula and if compensation is fixed and hours increase you are gettin…

Right, as I read it they worked themselves to exhaustion and relations between teams were breaking down. It sounds miserable, and even if the full bonus had been actually achievable it wouldn't have worth the risk of burnout. And presumably this was the intention, tricking people into working unreasonably hard for an uncertain reward. I was surprised the ending was a note about gratitude and not about leaving the com…

Yeah I didn’t expect that either. I expected the author to realize he got cheated and leave for a better spot. It surprised me that he wrote that whole thing and never realized how badly he got cheated

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#637

Post by [deleted] »

Salgat wrote: post #338
Thorrez wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well the employee doesn't have to pay income tax or payroll tax on the money, so in that sense there is a tax break compared to if the money was given to the employee.

Not a tax break for the employee, since the net effect is still less money. Unless you consider losing your job and having no salary to tax also a tax break.

[deleted]

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#638

Post by Thorrez »

Salgat wrote: post #338
Thorrez wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well the employee doesn't have to pay income tax or payroll tax on the money, so in that sense there is a tax break compared to if the money was given to the employee.

Not a tax break for the employee, since the net effect is still less money. Unless you consider losing your job and having no salary to tax also a tax break.

Yeah, it depends on what situation you're comparing against.

If you're comparing against the employee getting a gift and keeping it, then yes, the employee was better off before.

But you're comparing against an employee who was previously donating the gift and getting a tax deduction on that donation, the employee is better off now.

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#639

Post by MarblePillar »

faeyanpiraat wrote: post #336
MarblePillar wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The incentive is in the mind of the beholder. $42,000 captured the mind of the author; for its promise, he worked extremely hard and long, mustering a productivity far and above what he normally would have achieved. Then, when he in fact received not $42,000 but $3,666, less than one-tenth what he expected, he convinced himself that this was not a loss but a win because $3,666 is $3,666 more than $0. What is your les…

The house can go bankrupt aswell.

Can you remember the last time that you heard of shareholders losing their collective shirt?

Re: Thanks for the Bonus, I Quit

#640

Post by xyzelement »

soulbadguy wrote: post #557
xyzelement wrote: post #460

"One of our things is that money follows; it does not lead." --Dan Gilbert In my experience, successful people go work hard and are excited about "the right things" and incur financial benefits along the way. If you are working on the right stuff in the right way, on average you should get good comp/bonuses. On the flip side, if your only connection to your work is the bonus then you're probably unhappy anyways. "Som…

> In my experience, successful people go work hard and are excited about "the right things" and incur financial benefits along the way. If you are working on the right stuff in the right way, on average you should get good comp/bonuses. Is this true, or a form or survival biais ? I am most of us agree that working hard is somewhat a requirement for meaningful success. What is in question here is whether it's sufficie…

> And the first step is the ability to ask a fair share of the value one is generating.

I feel like you missed my point. I am talking about getting into a employer-employee relationship that you can feel good about. Compensation is obviously a huge component of that and you should absolutely make sure it's what you need and deserve. The point I am making is that if your relationship with your employer is so weak that you're walking out because of what happened with a single bonus, then you weren't in a good relationship to begin with.

> I think one can be unfair in the way one is generous.

Yes and it doesn't matter. The example that Ray Dalio uses in his book is this - the company office is in Connecticut and a lot of employees commuted from NYC. So at some point Ray bought a bus to shuttle employees back and forth. Sounds like a purely good thing, right?

Well, some Connecticut-based employee complained - the NYC-based people got a "gift" in convenience and cost of their commute, so he thought that Connecticut people should get something to improve their commute too (ignoring the point that their commute was never as bad to begin with). Ray points out that this is a huge entitlement - just because you gave a gift to someone, doesn't mean others deserve.

The point is - you can't manage your company and your life to meet the whims of the most unreasonably entitles. And on the flip side, the less unreasonable expectations you have, the happier you will be.

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