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Comment by jghn | Hacker News Reader

At my company I get headcount based on level, not raw dollars. Once I +1 a candidate at a level, it moves to HR and they are the ones doing the negotiation. At that point I become an advocate for them to get more compensation. It behooves me to have HR not play hardball and to max out their comp at the level I've specified as that makes it more likely the candidate signs. Once in a while HR will ask me "Are you sure?" and I always say "Yep, do it".

It does get a bit tricky if they're comp demands wind up out of band and then I need to decide if it's worth a higher level head count, but otherwise go for it.

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A long time ago I worked for a company where I did the hiring and then HR did the salary negotiation, but I got to give a recommendation. One time I hired someone and they accepted the job, but I found out later that HR had negotiated a salary that was about 15% less than what I'd suggested. It really annoyed me. The guy was worth more.

The worst part was that he left after 8 months because he wanted more money (he didn't ask for a raise; he just found a better paying role) and I had to do all the hiring nonsense again.

HR people might be good for the company bottom line but they're not good at retaining staff.

I too never ask for a raise and rarely get one. Out of the last 6 companies I worked for, one gave regular raises of 3% and one seemed to alternate between 1% raises and 1% bonuses. I was around 50K and 85K respectively. As you can see, I've received much higher raises moving companies. Now I'm a bit over 100k in the midwest.

Current company brought me in as a contractor at a good rate. Contract house had decent benefits, decent PTO, etc. It was very similar to the companies, just PTO was a bit less.

They eventually wanted to bring me on as a regular employee and offered about a 10% pay cut. WTF? I'm not dumb. I know they are paying a significant overhead to the contract house. I was honestly expecting a small pay bump when I came on as a regular employee.

I asked to stay a contractor and told them if they couldn't do that I guess I would have to take the salary they were offering. I didn't say I wouldn't stick around, but we both knew. They eventually came back with an offer at the same as my current salary, which was still a pay cut after the new benefits cost. Not big, but maybe a hundred bucks every two weeks on my take home.

Now they've converted another contractor to employee, who maybe played more hardball, but I'm pretty sure he's topped my salary even though he's clearly not as experienced and was making a lower salary before.

I'm deciding if I should do anything because there are now 3 senior's and I believe I'm the lowest paid. The other two guys are single white guys, and I'm Hispanic with kids.

I've previously noted the newest guy seems to have some lowkey racial issues with me, which is why I think he bargained so hard on salary. We discussed salary when we were contractors. He's always seemed to measure himself against me in a weird way.

> I've previously noted the newest guy seems to have some lowkey racial issues with me, which is why I think he bargained so hard on salary. We discussed salary when we were contractors. He's always seemed to measure himself against me in a weird way.

You sure it's related to race? IMO bargaining harder makes more sense if/when you have extra information (e.g. someone else's salary), regardless of whether you love or hate that other person.

That part is based on our previous 8 months of interactions. The way he treats me and the way he poo-poos any sort of discussion that implies people of color should have any problems with how things are done.

He was also hired at a lower level and doesn't have my experience.

You sound bitter. You should be bitter. Your gut instinct is right and you probably are the least paid senior there. Not because you bring the least value but because you refuse to negotiate. Read the article, know your worth, and get outside your comfort zone.

I'm more surprised they hired him as a senior then whatever salary they gave him.

Why bother fighting over 4 or 5 percent when I can just get another job in afew months that pay 10 or 20 percent more? I don't see the value, and obviously they don't either. I'm more astounded by the number of people who stick around at jobs for years getting very little pay or loyalty in return.

Just out of curiosity, if a candidate asks what the salary range is for the position, do you tell them?

Yes, but I also explain how our HR dept calculates target compensation within a level and that ultimately the comp decision is out of my hands. I have a good sense for where candidates are in a band and try to set expectations accordingly.

If they're pushing for more than HR wants to give, like I said I'm an advocate but the final say isn't mine if they're pushing tooooooo far off the calculated target amount.

The premis of this article is that everyone should push more because it is assumed that the range (upper limit) is low bailed.

Does this create a perverse incentive to not encourage promotions because it will mean a lower headcount going forward?

Depending on the company, but yes if the company is not growing, the incentive would be to discourage promotion. At that point, if it is a good company, they would know it and will prioritize a different kind of employees.

For us no, that’s tracked in a separate bin from net new hires

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