Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with salary and compensation

What metrics are sales professionals guided by?

Anonymous — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 08:27:00 -0800

What metrics are sales professionals guided by? Working with my sales manager to help redefine how inside and outside salespeople should be compensated and reviewed.

Everything from leadership to new accounts to call metrics to closed business... how does your business (or your competitors) judge the success of your sales force?

[Also, if you have any articles of interest or website recommendations, it would be just as valuable.]

How Can I, Early in the Process, Make Sure a Potential Employer and I Aren't Way Too Far Apart in the Potential Salary for a Position?

WCityMike — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 11:45:53 -0800

Does formal, or politely euphemistic, language exist by which, early on in the job-hunt process, you can make sure you and a potential employer aren't considering salary ranges that are half a planet apart? Like many Americans, I am unemployed and job-hunting. The career I last worked in has an extremely wide range of salaries, spanning a large chunk of the range of five-figure numbers.

Some job listings do provide the salary range the employer is looking to pay, but finding that information is a real hit-or-miss affair. For those listings that do not, how can I ascertain a job's salary range, pre-interview and early in the process?

I do understand employers oft make salary offers based on an applicant's experience.

However, the problem I find with solely relying on that is that either:

(a) Despite that variability, an employer can still be working with a salary ceiling in their mind which is still impractically low (either impractically just for me or, more often, impractically for anyone), or

(b) Many employers don't factor an applicant's experience into the salary they're willing to pay for the position, yet still don't make that number public to the applicant until the very end of the process, after a lot of time and effort has already been invested in the process by both applicant and employer. This can be a source of ... frustration, to understate it.

Bookselling salary guide?

Miko — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 11:14:45 -0800

I'm looking for salary guidelines for a job outside my field that I'm interested in -- coordinating events and marketing for an indie bookstore. So I just had some conversations with the owner of an independent bookstore. They're looking for someone to manage events and marketing. The goal is to take the bookstore from its current, basic approach to the newer model of community engagement, frequent instore events, partnerships, big author events, etc. The job would involve the event planning, working with publishers, marketing, managing a presence on social networks, etc. It will also involve serving as the assistant manager, the second of two fulltime staff in the store. About half the time would go to the marketing and events, the other half to bookselling and management tasks. I wouldn't do hiring or payroll.

The store is in an affluent Northeastern college town. The goal is revenue growth through increased event sales, and increased overall sales from newly-built customer loyalty. So there are some success measures that can be built into this job.

It's a newly created job; I would largely define what directions it develops in. I have all the required skills.

We're at the stage where I need to communicate my salary requirements to them. I'm coming from the world of nonprofit management, so it's not like I'm expecting hundreds of thousands; I already work for modest wages. But I'm afraid of both lowballing them, and coming in way too high, and I can't find any references. There's a baseline I need to make, but if I can beat it by a lot, I will definitely try. Does anyone have any idea what a job like this could command?

Determining salary and compensation requirements, prior to interview with new employer

valannc — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 13:23:02 -0800

Interviewing at new employer... how to determine salary and compensation requirements? My husband is about to have his third interview with a large IT corporation. The HR rep has asked for his compensation requirements -- base salary, equity, and bonus. Any tips on how to determine for the correct compensation figures, and how to negotiate? We don't want to lowball the salary request. We are clueless about requesting equity, as that has not been an option with previous employers.

If my husband takes the position, he will be a manager/analyst responsible for hiring and leading a small team. This is a high profile project and a great opportunity. There are other consideration outside of "typical" salaries for the job. He is an experienced SME with an advanced degree and professional certifications. We would need to relocate, which we would be happy to do.

I see several web sites that list compensation history for specific companies: payscale.com, vault.com, glassdoor.com, the US DOL's Occupational Outlook Handbook
Does anyone know which online resources have the best data and give the best advice?

Respondents to an earlier Askmefi post asserted that salary surveys are not reliable. Any opinions?

Compensation package for an inventor working for a non-profit

Cardboardbox — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 10:38:02 -0800

I'm an engineer/inventor who is in salary negotiations with a non-profit and I hold the patent for a mission critical technology. I have some questions about how to secure the best offer. I am dealing with some rather unconventional compensation negotiations. Here is the story:

I am working with a group of folks at a non-profit that, according to the business plan, will be able to produce its own capital. The revenue stream for this organization is generated by multiple installations of an engineering technology that I have patented, developed, and have extensive, unique experience implementing on a small scale. The revenue is directly related to the number of installations. The proceeds will then be used to fund other, less profitable projects thus the non profit status.

The patented technology is the only revenue stream for this venture. however, the patent itself is only enforcible in the US, so they don't really need to license it from me. At the same time, the technology that is needed for this project is far enough from the one in the patent that they can't just get rid of me and deploy the technology. It will require at least another year of development under my supervision before it is ready. Because I am so familiar with the technology it would likely take someone else quite a bit longer than that.

My job in this venture will be to direct R&D to improve the technology to the point that it can be deployed on the proposed scale (hundreds). My responsibility will be to continue the R&D, and develop the construction management and maintenance operations. Essentially everything except for the finances, legal and regulatory matters.

I am now engaged in compensation negotiations and am looking for ways to present my case in a logical fashion that relies on existing precedents.

About the work

-The job will require me to spend more than half the year living in a decidedly third world country.

-This will be an incredibly high stress job due to the headaches that come with working in the third world and with developing a new technology.

-External factors are forcing us to do this in an accelerated fashion. The milestones are very ambitious and they border on unrealistic. Trying to meet them is going to be a major struggle.

-This single project should have annual proceeds on the order of a few million for a period of 10 years.

-The job will have me managing a work force of a few hundred people

About me
-In the context of these negotiations, I consider myself an inventor, in addition to being an engineer. I do have a BS and MS in the field. Beyond the patent, I have received a couple of national awards for my inventions including the one in question.

-I have 5 years of experience working in the country where the project will take place. Essentially doing the same work on a smaller scale

-After doing this job for about 3 years, the protocols should be advanced enough that they can be managed by someone less qualified than myself. These protocols can be used to duplicate the project elsewhere without my assistance. Ideally, I would work this job for 3 years and be done.

-Due to my experience, I would be very hard to replace. Any suitable replacement would require quite a bit of training.

-At present, this venture has little money and I have been working for them for free with the understanding that I would be paid in the future for that time. There will likely not be any money for at least another few months. If the business doesn't pan out, I stand to loose the value of that time.

-I am not a philanthropist, however, many of the people I'm negotiating with are. This may complicate things.

My questions
1. As I understand, people at nonprofits typically get paid less than their counterparts in other sectors for the same job. Is this because nonprofits usually rely on donations, and donors prefer to see relatively low employee salaries? Am I correct in reasoning that this shouldn't apply in my case, since the org will fund itself through it's business activities?

2. My work will play a crucial role in making the org hundreds of millions of dollars if all goes well and they replicate the project. I think it is reasonable that they give me some percentage of the gross revenue generated by the first project. Is this reasonable? Does anyone have any idea of what this percentage should be?

I know this is a somewhat unconventional situation, but if someone has any numbers from a related situation, I'd love to hear them. Any info on what kinds of percentages inventors get when they help start a for-profit company using venture capital would be helpful. I realize that this is not a question that has an easy answer, I'm just looking for some data points so I can try to triangulate.

3. I will have to live and work on the other side of the planet, in a developing nation, and when I'm there, the work will pretty much be non-stop. I am trying to negotiate a schedule that is similar to that of someone who works on an offshore oil rig. IE a a few weeks at sea, a few weeks off. Does any one have ideas on how to go about drawing an equivalence between normal working schedules/salaries and "oil-rig" schedules/salaries?

Maybe something like "a person with X qualifications could be employed on an oil rig for Y or in a US office for Z"? (It doesn't have to be an off shore oil-rig, that was just the first thing that popped into my head)

Somewhat related, I've heard hearsay that the engineers who work for companies like Haliburton in places like Iraq make pretty large salaries (250k) due to the location and associated risks. Is there any truth to this?

4. Based on what I've said, what would you consider to be appropriate compensation for this work?

5. Any ideas on how to state my case in my counter offer? I'm planning on writing a 3-5 page document that explains my reasoning as to why I believe my counter offer is fair. I'd like to populate this document with some numbers and citations.

Any other relevant advice would be greatly appreciated.

Sorry for the length, and thanks in advance for your help!

Why was I changed from exempt to non-exempt at my job?

Anonymous — Wed, 14 Dec 2005 20:42:31 -0800

Changed from an exempt to a non-exempt employee; what gives? First, background: I work in Chicago for the technology division of a large investment bank based in NY. I am within a couple days of receiving my year end bonus and raise numbers. Yesterday, my bosses' boss called me directly to inform me that I was being changed from an exempt to a non-exempt employee, effective in the new year. I was told not to expect a change in my job responsibilities or hours. With my new status, I will make my base salary based on 40 hours per week. In addition, my "overtime premium" will be one half (not time-and-a-half) of my hourly rate for all hours worked over 40 in a workweek. They claim this is not being done to reward or compensate me. Every person in my group and department is exempt AFAIK (though some may have just received the same news I have). I am being told so far that this status will not affect my eligibility for my yearly bonus and raise. I currently work on average 45-55 hours a week, make a base salary of $70,000 and a bonus of $30k-$40k.

Questions/concerns: why the hell would they do this? Knowing I already work over 40 hours a week as a rule, why would they change my status to non-exempt and be effectively paying me more money for the same work? As I said, this is not considered a comp reward. Could they be doing this in reaction to a lawsuit or settlement by a former employee who claimed a violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act? Could this sudden change to non-exempt at my salary level and amount of hours I work in any way forecast my being layed off? Finally, as I understand it, the FLSA defines overtime as being time-and-a-half; why are they defining my "overtime premium" as 50% of my normal hourly rate?

US v. European salaries

carter — Tue, 09 Aug 2005 08:14:21 -0800

Cost of living comparison. Is there any way to compare salaries and standard of living between USA, UK, and France? If I relocate between these, how much should I ask for to attempt to maintain a standard of living? If someone offers me (just for example) USD 50k to work in the US, how much could I ask for an equivalent post in Europe? Having lived in both US and UK, I'd be tempted to go for GBP 50k in the UK, as everything seems to be the same in price terms there, just in pounds rather than dollars. Whether I'm likely to get GBP 50k is another question, though. Also, what about France? Would EUR 50k be roughly equivalent, given the higher cost of living in France, but also the ~1.2:1 exchange rate? Or should I be asking for more Euros?

I'm going to ignore tax, benefits, etc., as I think these will tend to wash out, and also location (as the type of jobs I'm looking at are often in the same type of towns/cities).

Help me write my own ticket!

Anonymous — Thu, 09 Jun 2005 09:01:09 -0800

I've been recruited to help start a company. Help me write my own ticket. A friend/former colleague of mine has been working for a biotech/pharma consultancy in Boston, and has been working with the CEO to spin off a NYC-based (where I live) software company serving that industry. This company has done custom development, and wants to start selling standardized products, which is where I come in. He's asked me to come abord and basically run the technology end (handle initial development personally and then build out infrastructure). I'm basically paid employee #1. He's also asked me to write my own ticket.

I'm very familiar with that market and we all see eye-to-eye on the opportunity, and this is something I have experience in. The CEO of the "parent" company has deep pockets and is basically angel-investing the new one until VC funding is secured. There's going to be some overlap with the parent company in terms of leveraging resources, but their priority is going to be fulfilling project-level obligations. The exit strategy is that we turn into the NYC arm of the parent company and keep doing gun-for-hire work. The preferred outcome is that the company/product portfolio gets bought.

I currently work in technology for a large non-software company, making a good (low six-figure) salary at a place where I'm respected, work closely with executive management on key decisions, and work on reasonably interesting, challenging projects. There's not much more advancement I can do here other than annual salary increases, but there are certainly enough projects to keep me busy for a long time, and I'm not currently feeling bored or boxed in. I figure that, even if I don't do this startup, I'm probably going to start exploring my options in another year.

Given that I have nothing to lose if this deal falls through, what should I ask for, within reason? My inclination is $current+30%, plus health benefits from the parent company. Am I being reasonable/not aggressive enough? What about equity? All things considered, I'm at a point in my life where cash-in-hand is much more preferable to potential windfalls, but I do expect a stake.

I realize that there's a certain amount of "you'll never get what you don't ask for" at work, and that everything requires negotiation, but I don't want to come across like a dipshit by asking for something reasonable.

Anything else I should be asking for? Also, any input on the current state of the VC world in NYC would be appreciated. Is it sane to start a software company these days?

compensation package/salary

specialk420 — Tue, 03 May 2005 12:19:36 -0800

Suggestions for a very fair compensation package for a design manager/art director (department head) for a mid-sized fast growing media company? Web resources on this front? I've seen the aquent/aiga guide.

How much can I fudge my salary history?

Anonymous — Wed, 12 Jan 2005 09:35:47 -0800

Relating to yesterday's credit check question, how do you reply to a prospective employer who wants your salary history in a way that's fair to your value? So many IT/Web type jobs over the past few years have seen pay rates chopped down. If they ask, and A) I know my former employers don't give out salary information; and B) they don't require some sort of three year old pay stub - then why can't I just fluff it up to my true value again? I don't want to get in trouble, but I'm sick of getting low-balled. There's no way I can let them continue to get away with this! Do you just lie? What's the system?