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High Salaries Haunt Some Job Hunters

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Re: High Salaries Haunt Some Job Hunters

#71

Post by fweespeech »

zippergz wrote: post #48
pmoriarty wrote: post #20

"Time and again, he says, employers seem to lose interest after he answers a question that they ask early on: 'What was your last salary?'" I never answer that question. Almost always it's been recruiters asking that (and only some recruiters, the less reputable ones). This is a seller's market for IT talent. You don't have to give in to bullying tactics to get a good job. I've had to walk away exactly once when a re…

I've found this to be an excellent way to waste a bunch of time by getting far along in the process, only to find out near the end that the company won't make an offer that's anywhere near my requirements. While I don't like being the first to name a number, I also haven't found putting the discussion off until the end of the process to be beneficial. I've been on the hiring side as a manager in a number of companies…

> I've been on the hiring side as a manager in a number of companies, and I've NEVER seen a situation where a candidate was so uniquely awesome that the company was willing to make an offer drastically larger than their normal range for that role. A bit more? Sure. Some more stock or something? Often. But not, say, 50% more salary than anyone else at that level is getting.

Fyi, at $DayJob we have one guy at my level who makes 50% more than anyone else at the level he is at.

So it does happen but its unusual. [e.g. Developer A-Z get $60-80k, Developer Unicorn gets $120k]

Re: High Salaries Haunt Some Job Hunters

#72

Post by jeffasinger »

joezydeco wrote: post #28
maxsilver wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Where is it that late-career engineers are barely pulling in six figures? Almost everywhere in the Midwest, except Chicago perhaps. Unless your remote working, low cost of living doesn't come without a big catch.

No, it's Chicago too, unless you're working on low-latency finance stuff.

I've seen companies willing to pay >100k in Chicago and relocate people there, for engineers with only ~4 years of experience.

Re: High Salaries Haunt Some Job Hunters

#73

Post by krschultz »

fweespeech wrote: post #71
zippergz wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've found this to be an excellent way to waste a bunch of time by getting far along in the process, only to find out near the end that the company won't make an offer that's anywhere near my requirements. While I don't like being the first to name a number, I also haven't found putting the discussion off until the end of the process to be beneficial. I've been on the hiring side as a manager in a number of companies…

> I've been on the hiring side as a manager in a number of companies, and I've NEVER seen a situation where a candidate was so uniquely awesome that the company was willing to make an offer drastically larger than their normal range for that role. A bit more? Sure. Some more stock or something? Often. But not, say, 50% more salary than anyone else at that level is getting. Fyi, at $DayJob we have one guy at my level…

How are you defining 'level'? Two individual contributors are not at the same level just because they do relatively the same job. I'm sure some of the better IC engineers at my company make 2x or more what the new guys do, but there is 15 years of experience between them.

Re: High Salaries Haunt Some Job Hunters

#74

Post by jasonkostempski »

joezydeco wrote: post #34
pmoriarty wrote: post #20

"Time and again, he says, employers seem to lose interest after he answers a question that they ask early on: 'What was your last salary?'" I never answer that question. Almost always it's been recruiters asking that (and only some recruiters, the less reputable ones). This is a seller's market for IT talent. You don't have to give in to bullying tactics to get a good job. I've had to walk away exactly once when a re…

But it goes the other way, too. I've been contacted by many many recruiters offering interesting jobs but won't discuss the salary range targeted for that position. So how much time are you willing to spend on resume polishing, phone screens, on-site interviews, getting to an offer ...just to find out that they can't even come close to your current salary? So now I just flat out say what my jump-number is. Any answer…

What's a jump-number? Googling it came up with your comment as the top result and then skydiving :)

Re: High Salaries Haunt Some Job Hunters

#75

Post by coke12 »

jasonkostempski wrote: post #74
joezydeco wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it goes the other way, too. I've been contacted by many many recruiters offering interesting jobs but won't discuss the salary range targeted for that position. So how much time are you willing to spend on resume polishing, phone screens, on-site interviews, getting to an offer ...just to find out that they can't even come close to your current salary? So now I just flat out say what my jump-number is. Any answer…

What's a jump-number? Googling it came up with your comment as the top result and then skydiving :)

The salary number that would convince joezydeco to "jump ship".

Re: High Salaries Haunt Some Job Hunters

#76

Post by fweespeech »

krschultz wrote: post #73
fweespeech wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've been on the hiring side as a manager in a number of companies, and I've NEVER seen a situation where a candidate was so uniquely awesome that the company was willing to make an offer drastically larger than their normal range for that role. A bit more? Sure. Some more stock or something? Often. But not, say, 50% more salary than anyone else at that level is getting. Fyi, at $DayJob we have one guy at my level…

How are you defining 'level'? Two individual contributors are not at the same level just because they do relatively the same job. I'm sure some of the better IC engineers at my company make 2x or more what the new guys do, but there is 15 years of experience between them.

Same job title. All relatively junior developers with less than 10 years of experience. Unicorn has 4.

Re: High Salaries Haunt Some Job Hunters

#77

Post by Retric »

cushychicken wrote: post #68
jrs235 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We've NEVER had someone be so stubborn about sharing their salary". If I heard that and felt I was going to walk away anyway, I'd be tempted to throw back "How much do you make?" And watch to see if they squirm to not share. If they came back with "what I make has nothing to do with this position you're being interviewed for" come back with "then neither does my previous salaries, if they do then I need to know how…

The techniques in Patrick's post are a less abrasive version of this.

The key point is going to walk away anyway

Your goal should be to get several competitive offers rather than simply taking the first thing that somewhat fits. As such you should expect to walk away from several companies.

In any major city you should easily be able to burn bridges it's simply not a big deal.

Re: High Salaries Haunt Some Job Hunters

#78

Post by Riod »

tossaway1 wrote: post #35
pmoriarty wrote: post #20

"Time and again, he says, employers seem to lose interest after he answers a question that they ask early on: 'What was your last salary?'" I never answer that question. Almost always it's been recruiters asking that (and only some recruiters, the less reputable ones). This is a seller's market for IT talent. You don't have to give in to bullying tactics to get a good job. I've had to walk away exactly once when a re…

As someone who's regularly on the other side of the hiring (i.e. negotiating with candidates), I often prefer to have some insight into a candidate's rough salary requirements early in the process -- especially if it's someone that might demand more than I could offer. The hiring process is a huge time commitment for both me and the candidate -- I don't want all that time to be wasted if we could identify early on th…

I think the issue is that a fair number of people doing hiring think this is still the 1980s. People worth hiring would like the company to be upfront with them too. If you put the salary range in the posting or mentioned it upfront then problem solved no?

Re: High Salaries Haunt Some Job Hunters

#79

Post by [deleted] »

tossaway1 wrote: post #35
pmoriarty wrote: post #20

"Time and again, he says, employers seem to lose interest after he answers a question that they ask early on: 'What was your last salary?'" I never answer that question. Almost always it's been recruiters asking that (and only some recruiters, the less reputable ones). This is a seller's market for IT talent. You don't have to give in to bullying tactics to get a good job. I've had to walk away exactly once when a re…

As someone who's regularly on the other side of the hiring (i.e. negotiating with candidates), I often prefer to have some insight into a candidate's rough salary requirements early in the process -- especially if it's someone that might demand more than I could offer. The hiring process is a huge time commitment for both me and the candidate -- I don't want all that time to be wasted if we could identify early on th…

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