Because companies have imperfect reading on worker productivity, and are also trying to balance other priorities when determining pay, high output workers are consistently underpaid, called Wage Compression (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_compression)
After getting a 2% raise in the last cycle, and knowing that my granted options were going to be worthless (a factor which is under-discussed in popular news articles), I decided that it was a particularly opportune time to jump. Like many, I was not particularly unhappy, so I had not been motivated to go through the effort for search process before.
When I got an offer, my employer quickly matched it (suggesting that I really was worth that much to them) but burning a bridge with the contact you got me the new job was not worth simply reaching parity in my current one, so they lost me. If they had preemptively gotten a few percentage points closer before I sunk effort into interviewing, I probably would not have started looking.
Accepting a match is bad, it rewards underpaying. Also, the employer might have just offered you the match to buy themselves time to look for someone cheaper.
> Also, the employer might have just offered you the match to buy themselves time to look for someone cheaper.
This is "common knowledge" but I've never seen it in real life before.
I've accepted counter offers, as has my wife and quite a few former colleagues. And none of these people were ever let go from that position.
The logic doesn't even makes sense. In large companies, the hiring manager doesn't care about salaries beyond if it fits in the budget. And firing people is a huge pain in the ass. If the company wanted to replace a person with someone cheaper, letting them go would be the best strategy. That would give the company two weeks to get documentation of the job function in place and start interviewing.
I can see this kind of vindictive behavior a very small company, where decisions are made on the whims of a mercurial owner. But you're equally as likely to get fired from a place like this for any number of mundane offenses which the owner finds insulting.
My employer counteroffered 15% higher or so. I was kinda unhappy there, but they also promised that I would be in a position to change things, and that has so far (2 years later) been true.
I don’t know, I don’t necessarily think my employer is perfect, but they’re certainly good to me.
This also gives the current employer the benefit of doing nothing preemptively. It puts the onus on the employee to go through all this extra effort just to get the match. I'm sure plenty of employees take it too but shouldn't.
I tend to agree that too much accepting matches incentivizes companies to get lazy about making sure they are paying market value. However, I don't think most employees are thinking about changing the culture—they're just being mercenary and trying to get the best job they can.
When I left my last job the owner asked about a counter offer. My new wage was so much higher that I told him even if he offered me that much I would resent him for valuing me that highly and intentionally underpaying me.
Couldn’t you, as a strategy, just dress real nice once every six months and then every twelve or so, you just go to your boss and say you received an offer at 10% increased salary or something? They “match” that and you both feel like you made a good deal.
I have a very cynical view about this sort of behavior. I feel that managers do this to make the employee lose the offer at hand and then are put on the "first to be fired" list.
Once a decision has been made to move and you inform your employer that you are leaving, it is best to leave. Even if the counter offer is higher than the new offer. It just shows how dis-honest your manager is.
It is a common view that the manager is inherently dishonest and the IC is inherently hardworking, capable and honest, which aligns with the historically common concept of "people = good" and "elite = bad."
I have been both an IC and a manager, and when I was an IC I saw managers as vampires who fed on the blood of ICs. When I was a manager, I saw ICs as a bunch of whiny, entitled cogs. I am exaggerating for illustrative purposes.
Perhaps the manager had not been informed before of the IC's financial demands; perhaps the manager could not offer a raise before the employee had received an outside offer because of company policies; perhaps the manager did not see the IC as particularly capable, but this offer from a solid company made them think they had made a mistake; or perhaps they thought it was a bluff, and now they are paying for the all-in.
It is good to be cynical and to have one's own self-interest in mind. But the caricature that sees management as incompetent, corrupt or vindictive is all too easy to present to an audience that is well receptive to these appeals. I have met many like those, sure, but I have also met many ICs for whom I could use the same adjectives.
I've had several chances to switch positions for considerably more than I make now (40-50% on my current six figures), each time I've turned them down.
I am happy and content where I am at, the job has good work life balance, it is for a good cause, and I make enough to provide comfortably for me and my family, this employer is also very stable so I don't have to worry about economic uncertainty.
All in all I could make more money but I have found a level of contment and peace and it has allowed me to persue other hobbies outside of tech and serve in my local community.
So maybe I am stupid and leaving money on the table, but I have found peace for now. For those who feel they need to make more I tell them congratulations that is awesome for you. But for now I am happy.
As a 60+ geezer who is back to doing what made me happy in this business before career climbing and salary chasing took me into a bad place or two, let me commend you on realizing that contentment is what life is really all about. I truly wish I had understood this at 30 rather than finally and fully realizing it at 60.
Perhaps you can strike a balance between the 2 options of the spectrum?
I would not imagine still working in the company where I started as a Junior (and only receiving a 5% raise per year).
In the same time, after jumping a few times, my salary increased 7x and I found a place where I felt really happy working, too. (before starting my own business)
Do you ever think back and wonder if maybe you did make the right decision?
After factoring in ~10x 15-20% jumps over 25 years, compounding interest and more maybe that translates to being 100% financially secure 10 years sooner. I didn't do the math but you get the idea. Basically is a temporary bad place or 2 for a year worth gaining 10 years of not having to work unless you wanted to?
We should recognize that there are universal needs for geezers and kids: we want some form of personal security. For a lot, that means home ownership.
Let’s look at data: If the geezer is 60 and paid off their loan today, they got it 30 years ago (in 1992). The median price of single family freestanding homes in LA county in 1992 was 221k. Today it’s 860k. In 1992 the median household income was 32k and in 2020 (last available data point) it’s 76k.
I understand that “the geezers” have something to teach us with a perspective of a lifetime and the needs all humans share.
At the same time, we have to acknowledge and account for the economics having totally changed.
As a side comment to this I always think that a lot of developers are very lucky that we can ride the balance of making good money AND have a comfortable life. But a lot of the time the promise of even more money makes us make choices that unbalance this and we end up working for companies we don't like, building things we don't support, living in cities we don't care about. In a way not reaping the real rewards of our luck. I guess it's related to the hedonic treadmill (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonic_treadmill)?
There's something unique about being in a position where you could exchange that extra money for other great comforts and STILL have plenty to do alright.
I've worked at multiple companies that independently developed jokey sayings along the lines of "The quickest way to get promoted is to work somewhere else for a few years and come back"
When I first started in tech it was always money money money, didn't care who I worked for or the work environment was like, all I saw was dollar signs. I did this from the time I started my career about 5 years ago until I joined my current job.
With my current job I know I could go elsewhere and make $50k more, but at what cost? It really started to make me consider, how much is remote work worth to me, how much is a laid back environment worth to me. For now even though I could be making more, the value in having the control over my time like I do not is worth more than what companies have been offering.
I'm certainly more in this camp of not looking to switch, but in the past I've moved jobs in the 2-3 year range. Right now, I feel that I'm well compensated, at a place that offers great work-life balance, is tackling interesting problems, and just lets me do my job. Part of the reason I'm not interested in leaving is that this is the first place that really has all four of those things, and given it took me 9-ish years to land at a place like this, there's going to have to be a significant jump in salary (like an extra 25-35%) to get me to move because of factors beyond my bottom line take home pay.
That being said, I've "hopped" jobs earlier in my career, but more in the 2-3 year window rather than 6-8 months. I can only imagine what I'd be making if I was still at the first two places I worked. It'd probably be 2/3rds of what I'm making now at best.
I don't think it's as clear as "always stay" or "always hop". At a certain point in your career, hopping may be looked at as a liability, and staying in a position that's a bad fit or doesn't advance your career doesn't make sense. Ultimately a job and your career is more about numbers, and you've got to optimize for more than just that. Understand when you are leaving money on the table, and when you've got something worth sticking around for.
You're not stupid for that, you've found contentment in your life that those who perpetually seek for more may never find. They may even pay for it later when the stress impacts their health and well-being.
I was in a similar place and changed jobs for 2x the pay. It has been a bit challenging and I do miss the culture/people/role at my previous place, but let’s see where this goes. I’m hopeful still!
I feel I can always go back if it gets really bad.
Ultimately 2x pay, say from 200 to 400, makes a huge difference to me, mainly with the current house prices.
You clearly need to balance all of the benefits of a job - compensation is just one aspect.
If you're looking for work-life balance, it doesn't make much sense to jump ship for a 50% increase in comp if your work week goes from an easy 6 hours/4 days per week to 12 hours days and working on weekends.
It might make sense to make such a jump if you’re young and early in your career. Young people have fewer commitments and they also have more energy, so they can handle those types of workloads more easily. And due to the way compounding (interest) works, choosing to make more money earlier in life is not such a bad idea.
The other benefit is that early in one’s career, a high salary can be a good boost of self esteem, and set one up for even higher salaries later.
I can relate. I have turned down many roles that would pay me more and in turn would have me taking on excess responsibilities (More than a single person can take on).
Any company that allows me to define my own WLB and pursue my passions outside of it brings me tranquility. I cannot imagine the stress is worth it. It eats at you faster than you think. Then you'll be looking for another job two years later.
I know the received wisdom is to always keep moving, and never accept counter-offers. You've found happiness in staying in place. I've done both at different times. I think everybody has to make judgments based on where they are and what they're looking for, and a general rule might not apply in every case.
To broadly generalize, when I was younger I think it made more sense to move up by switching companies, and I'm not sure I really valued a stable team with great coworkers as much as I should have. When you find a really good team, that's worth staying in place.
I am happy and content where I am at
...
I have found a level of contment and peace
...
I have found peace for now
...
But for now I am happy.
Tell us you're happy and have found contentment and peace one more time just so we know you really mean it.
Joking aside, there's nothing wrong with staying with a job you like if it doesn't quite pay market, but take care not to end up getting underpaid to the point you don't have a cushion. Curious if by "several chances to switch positions" you just mean recruiters have reached out to you though, because that's not quite the same thing.
It can even be the other way round. The cheapest company will try to extract as much work from you as possible, while the company with tons of money will hire more employees so you get better work-life balance.
In my experience, the companies that paid least were also the most stressful, and the ones who paid most were a mixed bag.
I'm curious about why this matter?
As an european, owning is not a goal in my life. I would love to, but for now, I still want flexibility on my wereabouts.
No doubt about it, switching jobs will definitely get you that immediate compensation increase. But you have to consider all the baggage that a new job comes with. First of all, its a reset on context. You'll start at 0, and you'll have to learn, wind up, and prove yourself again. And its a reset on your team, you'll get a completely new set of people you'll have to learn to work and communicate with. Experience is also valuable, if you're somewhere for a longer period of time, the more things you've likely started and finished. Often times people who switch a lot, end up getting stuck at a terminal level unable to advance further, because they can't go beyond the surface level to really deeply think about problems and see the solutions through.
Ultimately I feel like switching jobs isn't entirely about money, but more so driven by a lack of growth and fulfillment in your role.
This fear of the unknown is the reason many people stay at their company, even when they know they're being underpaid. It's the reason companies are so slow to increase compensation for loyal employees.
IMHO, once you're in the new role, it's not so scary. Sure it's a risk, but life is all about calculated risks. Of course you should do your homework. Talk to people from the company, check out their Glassdoor, get some references from the potential employer, etc. My experience is that you can find good jobs and be paid well. I just make my expectations about work-life balance clear in the interviews. I won't work longer than 40 hours a week. If the expectation is more, I'm not your man. My priority is my kids, not work. Sure it has lost me some potential roles, but I've also had some great roles.
I've switched for higher salary 3 times. First two job switches were great #3 was an absolute disaster. Now I'm definitely more cautious about switching jobs.
No, 'zuhayeer is right. For anything beyond the Scrum rent-a-jobs you should be outgrowing in your first five years, being liked is more important than being highly effective. You can be great at your job, but if you fail the politics, the best-case scenario is that you get assigned more grunt work. I don't like that it's that way, but enough people are inherently corrupt that castle intrigue outweighs competence. So, every time you change jobs, you're rolling the dice on a new set of strangers.
That doesn't mean, of course, that changing jobs is never the right move. Clearly, it often is. If there's a re-org and you're not promoted, you should probably leave--you're going to have to prove yourself to a new set of people either way, so you might as well get paid for it.
As for the comp increases, this is tricky. If you're increasing your salary but not getting promoted, you're actually putting yourself first in line for layoffs in the future, because HR people are going to see you as anomalously expensive within a band. This strategy can pay off, especially because 99% of corporates are too dumb to assess performance correctly and so often you can improve your perceived performance by becoming more expensive--but you have to be sure you're getting yourself a better position in the pecking order, or otherwise you're going to end up in a career cul-de-sac.
Also, the job-hopper stigma is real. It isn't right, but if you have three or more jobs under 18 months, people are going to assume you keep getting fired for performance or, worse yet, keep getting fired because you're disabled... neither of which they'll touch.
The last thing I want to advocate for is corporate loyalty. They aren't loyal to you, and so you should always have your eyes open and be ready to take everything that isn't nailed down (within the confines of enforceable law, of course) and jump. However, you have to be strategic. Remember that these people are a lot more skilled at screwing people like you than you are at screwing them--that's just how capitalism works.
> Honestly, most software jobs, even "tough" ones with lots of domain knowledge are bullshit.
I agree 100% with this. If you are staying long time at a big corporation, you will eventually become an expert in the domain you are covering. Now, sure you can transfer some experiences to other companies, but mostly the domain knowledge is worthless outside of the company.
Its not that hard, the core of programming is the code-debug-fix cycle.
That is something people can take with them no matter the job or the programming language. Pretty much comes down to where to put break point, print statements or how to setup traceable logging when working in multi services landscape.
Knowing this cycle well you're already effective when starting a new job.
Want to start even faster keep your tools limited and multi platform, lets just say your tool set shouldn't exceed a post-it note using big letter sizes.
The rest is domain knowledge something you will pick up over the coming months or years from colleagues and be paying attention at refinements and other meetings.
This is mostly about software development jobs/gigs, if you're doing some STEM job in nuclear reactor design etc then yeah thats a completely different story.
That's a gift and a curse. After working on the same things for years, not being responsible for any of the current woes can be very freeing. My MO early in my career was going into new positions and cleaning up the mess. It seems most like greenfield, but I like cleaning :)
You’re absolutely right, there are uncertain challenges associated with the benefit. But I am reminded of this study where people were challenged to flip a coin when making life decisions, and the random half who took the leap were (more often) happy with their call:
> First of all, its a reset on context. You'll start at 0, and you'll have to learn, wind up, and prove yourself again. And its a reset on your team, you'll get a completely new set of people you'll have to learn to work and communicate with.
I just went through this starting earlier this year, and it didn't go well. It was a smaller company and even though I knew all the parts of the tech stack ahead of time, there were just a ton of undocumented internal-isms and an overall culture of "just stay in your lane and iterate on JIRA tickets. None of us really understand how to build the software, can deploy the software, or can trace inputs and outputs throughout the system." Among other tedium.
I only lasted four months before moving on, but the new job is working out a lot better and pays more, too. So I agree it's not risk-free, but at the end of the day, I was getting paid the whole time and ended up somewhere better, so it worked out anyway.
Lots of people switch jobs to get a promotion. Its much easier to find a company that will give you a higher level and boomerang back into your original job than fight for a promotion.
For any company loyalists, this should be crystal clear - by and large, your sticking with a single company is costing you some serious salary increases. For all the talk, and verbal recognition, there's nothing that compares to an increase in the bottom line.
I started out with a start-up, the pay was poor and any benefits or 401k were very very minimal. I put up with it because the work was "interesting". Then I got a call from a recruiter in a FAANG company, and their salary range for the exact same role, started at an 80% increase in baseline salary, with nearly the same again in RSU's and benefits. Then I went into a managerial role with a non-tech company, which was a small increase again, and more lately back into another tech company which has me getting an increase yet again.
In ten years I've probably tripled my baseline salary, and total compensation is probably 5 to 10 times what it was for a similar level of effort.
> Then I went into a managerial role with a non-tech company, which was a small increase again
How did you do this? I think it would be hard for me to make the same outside of tech. Tech to managerial role outside of tech doesn't sound like an obvious or easy move.
I made a move like this in the past through a recruiting agency. I was very specific about what I was looking for, and about 4 months later they sent me an oppertunity that looked like a fit, I interviewed then took the job.
You get into a para-managerial role in tech first, then leverage the new job title to get a more purely-managerial role elsewhere, emphasizing the organizational elements of your experience.
I recently switched from tech to education by emphasizing the educational parts of my previous jobs, which were otherwise very technical.
It was surprisingly simple, even though they were non tech (utility company) they still needed data processing, scripting, and some basic ML work, especially in their marketing team. Same kind of work, however to a more credulous senior management team. Their main problem was they didn't know what could be done, let alone how to do it.
I previously worked with a young woman who would hop jobs every 2-3y. She told me that the first thing she’d do after being at a job for 90 days is put in for her old job and see how much they’d pay to have her back.
Now, when she left us, I can assuredly say that she wouldn’t have gotten an offer to return because of pseudo-regulatory reasons and red tape, but the sheer hustle-mindedness struck me as impressive.
I’m sure she makes much more than I do now, and I clear a quarter mil doing 1099 work and have several decades of experience to sell.
In todays world and particularly in America, the game is entirely rigged for those who have money. In that regard I find it disingenuous to fault those who pursue the money therefore, being the only true security in this country.
"the game is entirely rigged for those who have money. "
I'd say the game's outcome for an individual is determined by whether or not that individual puts in the effort to grow an in-demand skillset (i.e. development of competency), followed by marketing their skillset.
I used to live in a tent. But during that time I began teaching myself software development skills. Now I make nearly $200k, 100% remotely.
The only reason my career worked out:
- I went to the Bureau of Labor Statistics and saw SWE as a top 20 fastest growing occupation, and as a field with a very high amount of job openings & among the highest pay rate. Yet requires no degree.
- While living in a tent in the US, and later got sick of living in a tent and drove into the developing country next door where I survived on a $5/day food budget (got malnourished, health declined a bit), I sat at a table and built my skills daily. Once I had decent skills, I marketed my skillset via open source projects, a web portfolio, and a linkedin presence
I literally just had a strategy which I knew was foolproof, and I knew the outcome was guaranteed because the data demonstrated such.
Now that you have earned such an amount, I’m sure you’ve put an amount of money away for safekeeping.
Let’s say something catastrophic happened. Doesn’t matter what exactly, the question is this: Is there ANY likelihood that you wouldn’t be able to secure a decent standard of living based on your in-hand capital? Can you see yourself in a tent ever again?
Once you have acquired a certain amount to provide for yourself, it’s easier to take risks. It’s easier to make moves. For people caught in wage traps with kids and debts, it’s not so easy.
I respect what you’ve done and I’m very proud for you. I know your future must be very bright if momentum counts for anything, because you’ve done wonderful work already. With that being said, it’s reductionist at best to say that your path is just freely replicable by anybody living in poverty. Particularly those who aren’t gifted towards computers. How’s a teacher supposed to make their way in America? Probably half of them are either living off food stamps or close to doing so. Should they give it up and just write Vue/React all day and take home their six figures?
This is far deeper an issue than can be discussed in HN comments anyhow. I hope you can see where I’m coming from.
Given that most of the companies/bosses are just not worth any loyalty it is the wise move to move on the 2 year limit. It's not only the salary increase -almost impossible to achieve by staying. To me more important is the job security by ensuring employability. As long as I can be hired elsewhere I know I'm still in the game. Another big plus is I can ignore a lot of the usual b..shit that I'd have to pay attention to if I was in for the long run.
Gosh. Lately I find it terribly difficult even to hit 1 yr mark. Companies and bosses whine about how difficult it is to find skilled people but they do whatever they can to drive them away on first chance.
It's become crystal clear when companies refused for remote work during covid, or being the first one to mandate wfo after even though the productivity is good or even higher.
If they don't care for me, I may as well get the most benefit in cash instead
I stuck with my employer for many years, even though they paid a "competitive" salary (read: "low"). I was also able to keep a team of experienced C++ image processing pipeline engineers on board. Any one of them could have easily left, and made more than I.
It's been my experience that people leave managers; not companies. I had good managers (for the most part). One of my old managers went on to become the Chairman of the company, so I did have "friends in high places." I always enjoyed seeing the shocked faces of the local execs, when he'd insist on coming down to visit my humble little office.
I stayed for many reasons, and compensation was not one of them.
However, as time went on, the HR of our company became more and more "American" (it is a Japanese company, but I worked for a US subsidiary). By the time I left, the company was pretty much an awful place to work; mostly because the Americans ran everything. I stayed on, knowing the team was doomed, because I wanted to be there for my team.
If you can't afford a relaxed housing, it matters very little that your manager is a 8 whereas the other one is a 6.
If you've got basic meets met, the other things matter far more.
Aside from compounding factors, that's really what's happening here. People are fighting decades of lackadaisical attitude slowly making what was the status quo unreachable, despite efficiency increasing tremendously and doubling the working population. For no good reason but "the economy says so".
Even software devs across the world aren't immune.
Readit News
Because companies have imperfect reading on worker productivity, and are also trying to balance other priorities when determining pay, high output workers are consistently underpaid, called Wage Compression (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_compression)
After getting a 2% raise in the last cycle, and knowing that my granted options were going to be worthless (a factor which is under-discussed in popular news articles), I decided that it was a particularly opportune time to jump. Like many, I was not particularly unhappy, so I had not been motivated to go through the effort for search process before.
When I got an offer, my employer quickly matched it (suggesting that I really was worth that much to them) but burning a bridge with the contact you got me the new job was not worth simply reaching parity in my current one, so they lost me. If they had preemptively gotten a few percentage points closer before I sunk effort into interviewing, I probably would not have started looking.
This is "common knowledge" but I've never seen it in real life before.
I've accepted counter offers, as has my wife and quite a few former colleagues. And none of these people were ever let go from that position.
The logic doesn't even makes sense. In large companies, the hiring manager doesn't care about salaries beyond if it fits in the budget. And firing people is a huge pain in the ass. If the company wanted to replace a person with someone cheaper, letting them go would be the best strategy. That would give the company two weeks to get documentation of the job function in place and start interviewing.
I can see this kind of vindictive behavior a very small company, where decisions are made on the whims of a mercurial owner. But you're equally as likely to get fired from a place like this for any number of mundane offenses which the owner finds insulting.
I don’t know, I don’t necessarily think my employer is perfect, but they’re certainly good to me.
Can't underestimate job security in the evaluation of salary.
“Neoclassical” economists might say you made an irrational choice.
Human beings know that how you feel is as important as how much you’re getting.
I have a very cynical view about this sort of behavior. I feel that managers do this to make the employee lose the offer at hand and then are put on the "first to be fired" list.
Once a decision has been made to move and you inform your employer that you are leaving, it is best to leave. Even if the counter offer is higher than the new offer. It just shows how dis-honest your manager is.
I have been both an IC and a manager, and when I was an IC I saw managers as vampires who fed on the blood of ICs. When I was a manager, I saw ICs as a bunch of whiny, entitled cogs. I am exaggerating for illustrative purposes.
Perhaps the manager had not been informed before of the IC's financial demands; perhaps the manager could not offer a raise before the employee had received an outside offer because of company policies; perhaps the manager did not see the IC as particularly capable, but this offer from a solid company made them think they had made a mistake; or perhaps they thought it was a bluff, and now they are paying for the all-in.
It is good to be cynical and to have one's own self-interest in mind. But the caricature that sees management as incompetent, corrupt or vindictive is all too easy to present to an audience that is well receptive to these appeals. I have met many like those, sure, but I have also met many ICs for whom I could use the same adjectives.
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I am happy and content where I am at, the job has good work life balance, it is for a good cause, and I make enough to provide comfortably for me and my family, this employer is also very stable so I don't have to worry about economic uncertainty.
All in all I could make more money but I have found a level of contment and peace and it has allowed me to persue other hobbies outside of tech and serve in my local community.
So maybe I am stupid and leaving money on the table, but I have found peace for now. For those who feel they need to make more I tell them congratulations that is awesome for you. But for now I am happy.
I would not imagine still working in the company where I started as a Junior (and only receiving a 5% raise per year). In the same time, after jumping a few times, my salary increased 7x and I found a place where I felt really happy working, too. (before starting my own business)
After factoring in ~10x 15-20% jumps over 25 years, compounding interest and more maybe that translates to being 100% financially secure 10 years sooner. I didn't do the math but you get the idea. Basically is a temporary bad place or 2 for a year worth gaining 10 years of not having to work unless you wanted to?
Let’s look at data: If the geezer is 60 and paid off their loan today, they got it 30 years ago (in 1992). The median price of single family freestanding homes in LA county in 1992 was 221k. Today it’s 860k. In 1992 the median household income was 32k and in 2020 (last available data point) it’s 76k.
I understand that “the geezers” have something to teach us with a perspective of a lifetime and the needs all humans share.
At the same time, we have to acknowledge and account for the economics having totally changed.
Dead Comment
There's something unique about being in a position where you could exchange that extra money for other great comforts and STILL have plenty to do alright.
What about you?
With my current job I know I could go elsewhere and make $50k more, but at what cost? It really started to make me consider, how much is remote work worth to me, how much is a laid back environment worth to me. For now even though I could be making more, the value in having the control over my time like I do not is worth more than what companies have been offering.
That being said, I've "hopped" jobs earlier in my career, but more in the 2-3 year window rather than 6-8 months. I can only imagine what I'd be making if I was still at the first two places I worked. It'd probably be 2/3rds of what I'm making now at best.
I don't think it's as clear as "always stay" or "always hop". At a certain point in your career, hopping may be looked at as a liability, and staying in a position that's a bad fit or doesn't advance your career doesn't make sense. Ultimately a job and your career is more about numbers, and you've got to optimize for more than just that. Understand when you are leaving money on the table, and when you've got something worth sticking around for.
Ultimately 2x pay, say from 200 to 400, makes a huge difference to me, mainly with the current house prices.
You clearly need to balance all of the benefits of a job - compensation is just one aspect.
If you're looking for work-life balance, it doesn't make much sense to jump ship for a 50% increase in comp if your work week goes from an easy 6 hours/4 days per week to 12 hours days and working on weekends.
The other benefit is that early in one’s career, a high salary can be a good boost of self esteem, and set one up for even higher salaries later.
Any company that allows me to define my own WLB and pursue my passions outside of it brings me tranquility. I cannot imagine the stress is worth it. It eats at you faster than you think. Then you'll be looking for another job two years later.
To broadly generalize, when I was younger I think it made more sense to move up by switching companies, and I'm not sure I really valued a stable team with great coworkers as much as I should have. When you find a really good team, that's worth staying in place.
Joking aside, there's nothing wrong with staying with a job you like if it doesn't quite pay market, but take care not to end up getting underpaid to the point you don't have a cushion. Curious if by "several chances to switch positions" you just mean recruiters have reached out to you though, because that's not quite the same thing.
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In my experience, the companies that paid least were also the most stressful, and the ones who paid most were a mixed bag.
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Ultimately I feel like switching jobs isn't entirely about money, but more so driven by a lack of growth and fulfillment in your role.
IMHO, once you're in the new role, it's not so scary. Sure it's a risk, but life is all about calculated risks. Of course you should do your homework. Talk to people from the company, check out their Glassdoor, get some references from the potential employer, etc. My experience is that you can find good jobs and be paid well. I just make my expectations about work-life balance clear in the interviews. I won't work longer than 40 hours a week. If the expectation is more, I'm not your man. My priority is my kids, not work. Sure it has lost me some potential roles, but I've also had some great roles.
Yup. If you're decent at your current job, you'll be decent at the next job after an initial adjustment period.
The only time I'd be worried is if I thought I was bad at my job, because I feel like a new company is going to be more critical at first.
Like compounding comp increases?
Honestly, most software jobs, even "tough" ones with lots of domain knowledge are bullshit.
It's very easy to jump into a new job and immediately be "highly effective."
Sorry you didn't figure this out yet, but those traits can be taught. You are not a lost cause.
That doesn't mean, of course, that changing jobs is never the right move. Clearly, it often is. If there's a re-org and you're not promoted, you should probably leave--you're going to have to prove yourself to a new set of people either way, so you might as well get paid for it.
As for the comp increases, this is tricky. If you're increasing your salary but not getting promoted, you're actually putting yourself first in line for layoffs in the future, because HR people are going to see you as anomalously expensive within a band. This strategy can pay off, especially because 99% of corporates are too dumb to assess performance correctly and so often you can improve your perceived performance by becoming more expensive--but you have to be sure you're getting yourself a better position in the pecking order, or otherwise you're going to end up in a career cul-de-sac.
Also, the job-hopper stigma is real. It isn't right, but if you have three or more jobs under 18 months, people are going to assume you keep getting fired for performance or, worse yet, keep getting fired because you're disabled... neither of which they'll touch.
The last thing I want to advocate for is corporate loyalty. They aren't loyal to you, and so you should always have your eyes open and be ready to take everything that isn't nailed down (within the confines of enforceable law, of course) and jump. However, you have to be strategic. Remember that these people are a lot more skilled at screwing people like you than you are at screwing them--that's just how capitalism works.
I agree 100% with this. If you are staying long time at a big corporation, you will eventually become an expert in the domain you are covering. Now, sure you can transfer some experiences to other companies, but mostly the domain knowledge is worthless outside of the company.
Knowing this cycle well you're already effective when starting a new job. Want to start even faster keep your tools limited and multi platform, lets just say your tool set shouldn't exceed a post-it note using big letter sizes.
The rest is domain knowledge something you will pick up over the coming months or years from colleagues and be paying attention at refinements and other meetings.
This is mostly about software development jobs/gigs, if you're doing some STEM job in nuclear reactor design etc then yeah thats a completely different story.
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That's a gift and a curse. After working on the same things for years, not being responsible for any of the current woes can be very freeing. My MO early in my career was going into new positions and cleaning up the mess. It seems most like greenfield, but I like cleaning :)
https://bigthink.com/neuropsych/decision-making-process/
I just went through this starting earlier this year, and it didn't go well. It was a smaller company and even though I knew all the parts of the tech stack ahead of time, there were just a ton of undocumented internal-isms and an overall culture of "just stay in your lane and iterate on JIRA tickets. None of us really understand how to build the software, can deploy the software, or can trace inputs and outputs throughout the system." Among other tedium.
I only lasted four months before moving on, but the new job is working out a lot better and pays more, too. So I agree it's not risk-free, but at the end of the day, I was getting paid the whole time and ended up somewhere better, so it worked out anyway.
this; I read the headline as:
"People who regularly out-grow their roles earn more than people who are sitting still."
I started out with a start-up, the pay was poor and any benefits or 401k were very very minimal. I put up with it because the work was "interesting". Then I got a call from a recruiter in a FAANG company, and their salary range for the exact same role, started at an 80% increase in baseline salary, with nearly the same again in RSU's and benefits. Then I went into a managerial role with a non-tech company, which was a small increase again, and more lately back into another tech company which has me getting an increase yet again.
In ten years I've probably tripled my baseline salary, and total compensation is probably 5 to 10 times what it was for a similar level of effort.
How did you do this? I think it would be hard for me to make the same outside of tech. Tech to managerial role outside of tech doesn't sound like an obvious or easy move.
Doesn’t hurt to be friendly with a few recruiters
I recently switched from tech to education by emphasizing the educational parts of my previous jobs, which were otherwise very technical.
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Now, when she left us, I can assuredly say that she wouldn’t have gotten an offer to return because of pseudo-regulatory reasons and red tape, but the sheer hustle-mindedness struck me as impressive.
I’m sure she makes much more than I do now, and I clear a quarter mil doing 1099 work and have several decades of experience to sell.
In todays world and particularly in America, the game is entirely rigged for those who have money. In that regard I find it disingenuous to fault those who pursue the money therefore, being the only true security in this country.
I'd say the game's outcome for an individual is determined by whether or not that individual puts in the effort to grow an in-demand skillset (i.e. development of competency), followed by marketing their skillset.
I used to live in a tent. But during that time I began teaching myself software development skills. Now I make nearly $200k, 100% remotely.
The only reason my career worked out:
- I went to the Bureau of Labor Statistics and saw SWE as a top 20 fastest growing occupation, and as a field with a very high amount of job openings & among the highest pay rate. Yet requires no degree.
- While living in a tent in the US, and later got sick of living in a tent and drove into the developing country next door where I survived on a $5/day food budget (got malnourished, health declined a bit), I sat at a table and built my skills daily. Once I had decent skills, I marketed my skillset via open source projects, a web portfolio, and a linkedin presence
I literally just had a strategy which I knew was foolproof, and I knew the outcome was guaranteed because the data demonstrated such.
Let’s say something catastrophic happened. Doesn’t matter what exactly, the question is this: Is there ANY likelihood that you wouldn’t be able to secure a decent standard of living based on your in-hand capital? Can you see yourself in a tent ever again?
Once you have acquired a certain amount to provide for yourself, it’s easier to take risks. It’s easier to make moves. For people caught in wage traps with kids and debts, it’s not so easy.
I respect what you’ve done and I’m very proud for you. I know your future must be very bright if momentum counts for anything, because you’ve done wonderful work already. With that being said, it’s reductionist at best to say that your path is just freely replicable by anybody living in poverty. Particularly those who aren’t gifted towards computers. How’s a teacher supposed to make their way in America? Probably half of them are either living off food stamps or close to doing so. Should they give it up and just write Vue/React all day and take home their six figures?
This is far deeper an issue than can be discussed in HN comments anyhow. I hope you can see where I’m coming from.
Gosh. Lately I find it terribly difficult even to hit 1 yr mark. Companies and bosses whine about how difficult it is to find skilled people but they do whatever they can to drive them away on first chance.
If they don't care for me, I may as well get the most benefit in cash instead
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It's been my experience that people leave managers; not companies. I had good managers (for the most part). One of my old managers went on to become the Chairman of the company, so I did have "friends in high places." I always enjoyed seeing the shocked faces of the local execs, when he'd insist on coming down to visit my humble little office.
I stayed for many reasons, and compensation was not one of them.
However, as time went on, the HR of our company became more and more "American" (it is a Japanese company, but I worked for a US subsidiary). By the time I left, the company was pretty much an awful place to work; mostly because the Americans ran everything. I stayed on, knowing the team was doomed, because I wanted to be there for my team.
Captain, ship, etc.
If you can't afford a relaxed housing, it matters very little that your manager is a 8 whereas the other one is a 6.
If you've got basic meets met, the other things matter far more.
Aside from compounding factors, that's really what's happening here. People are fighting decades of lackadaisical attitude slowly making what was the status quo unreachable, despite efficiency increasing tremendously and doubling the working population. For no good reason but "the economy says so".
Even software devs across the world aren't immune.
But software developers are really highly-paid, compared to a lot of vocations. I'm not sure how many of us truly appreciate that.
We get to complain about not being able to afford million-dollar Capes in Palo Alto, while teachers can't afford a trailer in East Palo Alto.
We have the rare luxury of being able to choose.