The one-salary experiment, ten years in • Hacker News Board

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#81

Post by rgoulter » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 1:50 AM UTC

Aside from pay, I find the anti-hierarchical aspects interesting.

How people interact in a small business is surely different than in a larger business, so I'd guess small business is more inclined to need a culture of "we're all in this together".

I think that "everyone is as important as everyone else" is in tension with "the market rate for developer and support roles are different than our flat salary".

I think they're right about some of the negatives about "traditional performance reviews and salary negotiation". But I'd be cautious about whether "everyone is as valuable as everyone else" brings more problems than it solves.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#82

Post by war1025 » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 1:53 AM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #20

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…

What’s the difference between motivation to stay and reluctance to leave?

The way I think about it is motivation relates to the things you actively enjoy about your job. These are the "here are the neat things I do at my work" type of items.

Reluctance to leave is the sum of things that make you want to stay where you currently when someone else tells you about all the exciting things they do at their work. It's more like friction keeping you where you are.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#83

Post by war1025 » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 2:00 AM UTC

steven2012 wrote: post #64

Right now I'm struggling with whether or not to leave. I'm currently at a well-known company, and I'm uncharacteristically happy because my WLB is the best it's been in my career. However, I'm getting a bit bored and I also know I could make at least $50,000 a year more if I leave. Hell, even the new engineers joining my company at the same level are making more than I am. But the culture and pay at my company is jus…

I was in a very similar situation at the end of last year. Young kids and a work life balance that couldn't be beat. Had a couple expenses pop up that aggravated my irritation at being underpaid to the point that I looked for a different job. Calculated out how much I thought I'd need to offset the work-life balance bit, and went out and got an offer for that amount. Actually accepted the offer but my employer said they'd match that offer, which was a much better outcome for me given the work-life balance part. I figure if it doesn't end up working out, the worst case scenario is I'll feel comfortable asking a higher salary next time I am on the job hunt. For now I'm living in the best of both worlds.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#84

Post by issa » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 2:14 AM UTC

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.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#85

Post by brianwawok » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 2:18 AM UTC

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.

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

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#86

Post by polpenn » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 2:20 AM UTC

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.

Current company knows his worth. New company doesn’t so your teammate has informational advantage and can negotiate a higher salary.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#87

Post by war1025 » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 2:24 AM UTC

readingnews wrote: post #70

steven2012 wrote: post #64

Right now I'm struggling with whether or not to leave. I'm currently at a well-known company, and I'm uncharacteristically happy because my WLB is the best it's been in my career. However, I'm getting a bit bored and I also know I could make at least $50,000 a year more if I leave. Hell, even the new engineers joining my company at the same level are making more than I am. But the culture and pay at my company is jus…

Saying things like "I could make 50k more at blah" seems to be taken so lightly these days. I would party/panic/freak out like I won the lotto if you told me I could make 50k more somewhere else. 50k... do you have any idea what that does to your future earnings? Your 401k/retirement? Hell, even if you live the same as now, sticking 25K in the bank every year is worth a whole heaping spoonful of whatever hell they co…

The Mexican fisherman story [1] is what it comes down to for me. You can work a little, play a little, and generally have a good time with life and get by (Mexican fisherman), or you can start a business, work long hours, build a fleet of boats that makes a ton of money, and then sell it all someday when you retire, at which point you can work a little, play a little, and generally have a good time. (American businessman).

For me, I make enough to get by and then some. Yes I could work harder, but life is pretty good this way.

[1] https://bemorewithless.com/the-story-of-the-mexican-fisherma...

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#88

Post by ashtonian » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 2:26 AM UTC

polpenn wrote: post #86

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.

Current company knows his worth. New company doesn’t so your teammate has informational advantage and can negotiate a higher salary.

If the market is going to give him that rate (assuming he can adequately perform the new job) that is his market value..

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#89

Post by aidenn0 » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 2:29 AM UTC

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.

Lots of places give raises; in fact one place I worked had the specific goal of after 10 years, the top performers should be making about 2x what the "okay" performers do; and the "okay" performers got at least a cost of living raise each year.

Re: The one-salary experiment, ten years in

#90

Post by ajdlinux » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 2:30 AM UTC

sa46 wrote: post #29

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…

> Entirely non-surprising that devs are the ones who left because by hard capping their pay you are reducing their reluctance to go work somewhere else with higher pay. The surprising part is that their dev retention (article notes small sample size) of ~3 years matches Google at 3.1 years and surpasses Uber, Dropbox, Tesla, Facebook and Airbnb. [1] That suggests that the culture created by the one-salary experiment…

Note that they're also New Zealand-based - I don't know the numbers but I wouldn't be surprised if average retention there is a bit higher than the Bay Area. (Someone correct me if they have stats that say otherwise!)