Career Advice

[Saul Good]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

I've never approached my employer for a raise or let them know of another job offer and expected a counter offer. All the jumps were for clearly better positions.

Neither have I. Then again, my raises have been about 3% over the last 4 years, so maybe I need to re-think my strategy.

If the new employer offers me 20%, and my current employer offers me 10%, I'm thinking I'll probably stay. Anything less than that makes it really tough to decide. The more I think about it, the more I wonder if this isn't about stroking my own ego. If my current employer told me that they could only offer me 7% but really hopes that I will stay because they realize that I am valuable to them, that would probably mean more to me than them offering me 10% and telling me to take it or leave it.

[rageeumr]

Originally Posted by Saul Good

Neither have I. Then again, my raises have been about 3% over the last 4 years, so maybe I need to re-think my strategy.

If the new employer offers me 20%, and my current employer offers me 10%, I'm thinking I'll probably stay. Anything less than that makes it really tough to decide. The more I think about it, the more I wonder if this isn't about stroking my own ego. If my current employer told me that they could only offer me 7% but really hopes that I will stay because they realize that I am valuable to them, that would probably mean more to me than them offering me 10% and telling me to take it or leave it.

I'm not offering this as advice, simply as an anecdote. My wife and I went to undergrad together. She's a year older than me, graduated a year earlier and went to grad school. I graduated and took a job. When she got out of grad school she had an offer with a company in Pittsburgh that she really wanted to take. I went and interviewed with them, and they made me an offer for substantially more than I was making at the time. In the end, I convinced her to move to KC.

I took my offer letter from the other company in and gave it to my boss. I explained to him that I wasn't looking to negotiate and that I had already turned the offer down, but I wanted him to know what my market value was. My next raise was to the exact level of that offer.

[Saul Good]

Originally Posted by rageeumr

I'm not offering this as advice, simply as an anecdote. My wife and I went to undergrad together. She's a year older than me, graduated a year earlier and went to grad school. I graduated and took a job. When she got out of grad school she had an offer with a company in Pittsburgh that she really wanted to take. I went and interviewed with them, and they made me an offer for substantially more than I was making at the time. In the end, I convinced her to move to KC.

I took my offer letter from the other company in and gave it to my boss. I explained to him that I wasn't looking to negotiate and that I had already turned the offer down, but I wanted him to know what my market value was. My next raise was to the exact level of that offer.

Interesting. That's kind of similar to what my strategy with my current employer is going to be (except I'm not going to shut the door completely first). I'm planning on showing them the offer and telling them that I want to stay where I'm at, but I think that they should pay me market value.

Three things can happen, the way I see it.

1. They can give me a raise.
2. They can tell me that they don't think I'm worth that much.
3. They can tell me that I'm worth that much but they are going to choose to under-pay me.

Situation 1 is a total win. Situations 2 and 3 would tell me that I'm probably better off going somewhere else, anyway.

[alnorth]

Originally Posted by Saul Good

Interesting. That's kind of similar to what my strategy with my current employer is going to be (except I'm not going to shut the door completely first). I'm planning on showing them the offer and telling them that I want to stay where I'm at, but I think that they should pay me market value.

Three things can happen, the way I see it.

1. They can give me a raise.
2. They can tell me that they don't think I'm worth that much.
3. They can tell me that I'm worth that much but they are going to choose to under-pay me.

Situation 1 is a total win. Situations 2 and 3 would tell me that I'm probably better off going somewhere else, anyway.

There's nothing wrong with this course of action, as long as you are professional and honest with everyone (the current and offering companies). I'm sure it isn't the first time your boss has ever had this conversation either. The only thing is, once you start that conversation you have to be ready to leave. You cant take it back if your boss reacts poorly and you didn't really want to accept the offer at all.

[Saul Good]

Originally Posted by alnorth

There's nothing wrong with this course of action, as long as you are professional and honest with everyone (the current and offering companies). I'm sure it isn't the first time your boss has ever had this conversation either. The only thing is, once you start that conversation you have to be ready to leave. You cant take it back if your boss reacts poorly and you didn't really want to accept the offer at all.

My boss is actually pretty big on employees doing what is best for themselves as long as there's nothing shady going on. I'm not worried about getting a poor reaction if I don't completely overplay my hand.

As I've gotten older, I see myself getting more disgusted by the imbalance of power between employees and employers. In a normal economy, it's as hard for an employer to find a good employee to fill a position as it is for an individual to find a good job. A company really isn't doing an employee a favor by letting that employee work there any more than the employee is doing the company a favor by showing up to work.

If my employer doesn't think that I'm giving them their money's worth, they will find someone to replace me with someone who will. If I don't think the company is paying me what I'm worth, it's up to me to replace them with a company that will. (Of course, the current job market complicates things.)

[Buehler445]

Originally Posted by Saul Good

When I started the job 5 years ago, I was 27 and single. I had a good job before, and this job nearly doubled my salary. It was great, but I'm not making that much more now than I was 5 years ago, as standard raises have been about 3% a year. It's still really good money, but it's hard to take a risk when I find myself in a comfort zone.

What type of raise would someone have to offer you in order to take a lateral position at another company?

Originally Posted by Bugeater

It would have to be at least 25% for them to even get my attention. It's tough to put a dollar value on not dreading to have to go to work in the morning.

A wise man told me 20% to move. That was before the crash.

My advice is talk to your potential employer and talk to them about what your average day was like. Try to determine what the corporate culture is like.

That might make things easier.