What do you do?

Cad_sl said:

Even though the reality is most people are mercenaries, when you make it obvious to your employer that you are a mercenary by looking for offers then accepting a counter, they just look at you differently. Can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on your job and what your employer expects of you, but in a traditional salary/office job type environment, your employer will look at you as a greedy mercenary and your bridge will be burned. Even if they keep you on for now, the writing is on the wall, and they'll fire you later when they find your replacement.

Thats why you typically don't accept counters.

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The upside is I have a super high demand super low supply skillset. I work as a consultant so mercenary nature is sort of assumed as well which helps out. But you are right, this is always my concern that it will poison the future making it a short term fix.

CnCGOD_sl said:

The upside is I have a super high demand super low supply skillset. I work as a consultant so mercenary nature is sort of assumed as well which helps out. But you are right, this is always my concern that it will poison the future making it a short term fix.

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Are you a project based consultant? There is always a risk that the counter-offer is just to cover the firm through the duration of the project that you are staffed on. Once the project ends, you might find yourself expendable. If you are in firm leadership, this isn't really a concern as your relationships are just as valuable as your hard-skills.

I am part of a consulting COE, more of a strike team that jumps from project to project and does mentoring engagements occasionally. Nothing longer than a few weeks in general and the job involves a lot of pre-sales work (my billable quota is < 50%). The counter isn't 100% hashed out but it moves me deeper into presales and even less engagements (less billable, more subject matter expert work). This will let me work at home ~70% of the time and travel for 1-2 days at a time max which is a big improvement over the 60% travel 40% WFH I have now.

Negotiating compensation as a new grad seems impossible. I recently got a tech job on the west coast (new PhD). I had a few contacts inside the company, so I knew the exact salary they were offering going back about 5 years. The pay they offered me was decent for the area (~120k), but it was the same amount they had offered some acquaintances 3 years ago (or about 7% ago in purchasing power terms). Delayed until 1-2 days before the deadline, then sent back a response saying as much, and they wouldn't budge, saying offers were standard and set by the department. Alternatively suggested a few more vacation days, as I'm in a long distance relationship and am planning on visiting the gf at least once/twice a month, but they made me feel like a douche ("So, on top of 3 weeks and company holidays, you want more?").

Was really worn down by the job search process (I had one other offer, but it was a lot worse), so I didn't feel like fighting it. Hopefully, there'll be more room to negotiate once I start producing.

Gauss_sl said:

Negotiating compensation as a new grad seems impossible. I recently got a tech job on the west coast (new PhD). I had a few contacts inside the company, so I knew the exact salary they were offering going back about 5 years. The pay they offered me was decent for the area (~120k), but it was the same amount they had offered some acquaintances 3 years ago (or about 7% ago in purchasing power terms). Delayed until 1-2 days before the deadline, then sent back a response saying as much, and they wouldn't budge, saying offers were standard and set by the department. Alternatively suggested a few more vacation days, as I'm in a long distance relationship and am planning on visiting the gf at least once/twice a month, but they made me feel like a douche ("So, on top of 3 weeks and company holidays, you want more?").

Was really worn down by the job search process (I had one other offer, but it was a lot worse), so I didn't feel like fighting it. Hopefully, there'll be more room to negotiate once I start producing.

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Man, that's rough only getting 120k fresh out of school... how do you get by?

Desidero_sl said:

Man, that's rough only getting 120k fresh out of school... how do you get by?

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He has a PhD and lives in California, probably in one of the super-expensive city areas. That's not a lot of money for that education and that area.

Xequecal_sl said:

He has a PhD and lives in California, probably in one of the super-expensive city areas. That's not a lot of money for that education and that area.

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This, assuming he lives in the Bay Area a quick cost of living calculation thanks to CNN shows the equivalent income in a midwestern city as $67,191 which is about average for a fresh PhD. I don't think people realize how astoundingly expensive the Bay Area has become.

On a side note I took the counter offer, Boss seemed totally on board with my getting more as well as the VP he reports to so everything seems rosy. Now I need to turn off linkedin or something to reduce the temptation!

The world of government contracting has been slowly crushing my soul for the past year for a measly 35k/year, which is basically unlivable around Washington, D.C. I don't know how the hell people can stand being in this business longterm.

I'm seriously considering saying fuck it all and going abroad to teach English.

My friend is graduating as a dentist on sunday. Told me he's starting his first job making 100K, Whatever he produces/4, 42% of office profit. Lucky son of a bitch. 250K in debt.

CnCGOD_sl said:

So, my current employer threw a wrench into things a bit. My manager offered me a different position on the same team which would be focused on remote work and shorter and less frequent trips in addition to bumping my salary to 10k more than the offer I accepted. I know the drum beat of "never accept a counter" but he addressed both compensation AND the travel which was the reason I was looking.

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The "never accept a counter offer" thing is usually in reference to a company finding out you have been job shopping so what they do is offer you a counter-offer to keep you aboard while they start looking for someone to replace you so they let you go because you went job shopping. In reality if the job you are working at is one in which you fit in well, employees/managers like you, and your skills aren't immediately replaceable then accepting a counter offer is perfectly fine. If you and the job don't go so well together then it isn't bad a assumption that they will replace you eventually.

There are also other factors like if they are under or overpaying you currently. Generally after working somewhere 4-5 years you can get an idea of what your co-workers make and if they are underpaying you and then it makes perfect sense for you to seek better compensation.

Another factor is if you went job shopping or if recruiters came to you. Sometimes your skills are in demand (many tech jobs are like this) in which case you are always being headhunted and when a better offer comes your company has to compete or else spend time and money training someone else IF they can find competent people on the cheap.

Yea, I felt comfortable taking it because the skill is hot. If they decide to ditch me in 6 months, I can ALWAYS find something else. My Linkedin gets 1-2 valid and 4-5 near hits a day from internal recruiters and the good (not bodyshop) headhunters. I have not actively done any job searching in years, just keep my Linkedin relatively current and the opportunities flow in.

I am at the point where overpay or underpay can't be determined, the market is changing really fast and wages are all over the place. Good place to be for once!

The thing with tech is that everyone wants senior people and almost noone wants new grads. So you have to get 5-6 years of experience before you become a hot commodity (unless you come from Stanford/MIT etc) that people will bid against each other for. Once you get to that stage, it is still hard from a "I want to be a nice guy" standpoint when you like your team/boss but the employer/employee loyalty bond has been one sided for a long time. People need to fight for what they are worth otherwise they get taken advantage of.

CnCGOD_sl said:

This, assuming he lives in the Bay Area a quick cost of living calculation thanks to CNN shows the equivalent income in a midwestern city as $67,191 which is about average for a fresh PhD. I don't think people realize how astoundingly expensive the Bay Area has become.

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Seriously... as a science guy, the software boom has made it pretty much impossible to buy a home or start a life in the Bay Area. I was looking at apartments in the southwest corner of the bay, but being around so many nouveau riche douchebags in company t-shirts and jeans with sports cars was nauseating.

CnCGOD_sl said:

The thing with tech is that everyone wants senior people and almost noone wants new grads. So you have to get 5-6 years of experience before you become a hot commodity (unless you come from Stanford/MIT etc) that people will bid against each other for. Once you get to that stage, it is still hard from a "I want to be a nice guy" standpoint when you like your team/boss but the employer/employee loyalty bond has been one sided for a long time. People need to fight for what they are worth otherwise they get taken advantage of.

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If anecdotal evidence means anything I saw huge 10-20k raises over the 5 years I first started in tech and then during my 6 - 7th year I got an offer for double what I currently made. And I had been getting 3-5 offers a year (Gogo linkedin) before that but they were usually comparative or lower then what I was currently making. Advice for anyone working in the tech industry make sure you start looking again after 5-7 years.

Cad_sl said:

It's cute when middle class people disparage someone as nouveau riche. The irony is pretty fascinating.

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How is it ironic? Even a retard can spot another retard. You live in Dallas, IIRC, which is a pretty diverse city economically, so you could theoretically escape the yuppies if you so chose.