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How Not to Bomb Your Offer Negotiation

246 points by axk 10y ago

eru 10y ago
Nolo has a some decent advice about negotiations: http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/contract-negotiation-11-strategies-33340.html http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/contract-negotiation-...
35bge57dtjku 10y ago
> Now say you end up turning down their offer. They’ve spent over $24,000 just extending this single offer to you (to say nothing of opportunity costs), and now they’ll essentially have to start over from scratch. Most of that is to hire someone, not just 'you'. And they aren't even close to having to start from scratch if you don't accept.
- brianwawok 10y ago
  True. But they really do want you if they made an offer. I have never heard of someone asking for 5k more get their offer yanked, but I know people afraid to ask for that reason. The exact # they lose if you say no isn't the point. You are the top choice. Doesn't mean they will double your offer but they do like you.
  - 35bge57dtjku 10y ago
    I have had success with asking for modest increases. I think it helps to have a good reason, like them not doing any 401k matching.
    - ryanmccullagh 10y ago
      Is the median salary for the position a valid reason for an increase? For example 93000 is the median for software engineers in US according to the government.
      - windowsworkstoo 10y ago
        Anything that works is a valid reason....don't overthink it.
      - 35bge57dtjku 10y ago
        I wouldn't specify 'median' exactly. That sounds too technical - it doesn't have the same innocence and emotional appeal. I'd mention what other local companies are hiring for the same position at, and mention being surprised they aren't offering at least that. Or mention having friends that got hired for the same position at a salary that's 10k more than you're being offered. If you do it smoothly, I think the worst case scenario should be that they say they can't go any higher, or that they come back with a higher offer that's only 1/2 or 1/4 more than what you mentioned. Like Sun Tzu said, don't corner the enemy.
        AstralStorm 10y ago
        Replace median with typical and you're set. The only way to weasel out of that is to show you're below average. Now then, any kind of negotiation is risky for obvious reasons.
      - lostboys67 10y ago
        Depends on location the Valley or NYC has high housing costs
  - shostack 10y ago
    Try speaking to more non engineers. Not being snarky, but this is only applicable to professions that are in hot demand. But that should go without saying.
IamHWengineer 10y ago
Lol. This guy was involved in a massive scam in the online poker world years ago. not sure if he's completely changed. I don't know what he's doing in the SW world. Source: https://www.highstakesdb.com/2375-haseeb-qureshi-admits-to-chip-dumping-quits-poker.aspx https://www.highstakesdb.com/2375-haseeb-qureshi-admits-to-c... http://www.cardrunners.com/blog/internetpokers/the-girah-scandal http://www.cardrunners.com/blog/internetpokers/the-girah-sca...
- akhilcacharya 10y ago
  He explains himself here: http://haseebq.com/about/ http://haseebq.com/about/ If you didn't see his previous posts he's clearly a pretty skilled self-teacher - negotiated up to 220K offers at Google and Airbnb despite going to a bootcamp.
  - paulcole 10y ago
    >he's clearly a pretty skilled self-teacher I think it's pronounced "self-promoter."
    - Hydraulix989 10y ago
      Yeah, this is just sad. I know people personally that worked their asses off learning systems programming, algorithms, and advanced mathematics at top-tier four-year colleges with absolutely fantastic technical CVs that got offers that aren't even half of that. These are surely some of the smartest people in the world, too, but I suppose they don't play the "bluffing" game all too well (er, "negotation" -- call it whatever you want, ex-poker player). I'm not sure what makes this guy who ostensibly got his hand held through a three-month "learn to copy and paste Ruby from StackOverflow" camp eligible for a salary that is higher than some surgeons make. Without reading the article, sounds like he successfully bluffed to one company that another offered him some really high salary X, and then he went straight to the moon (or should I say, made out like a bandit) from there. As much as we like to think our hiring process is meritocratic, when confronted with someone with just the right physical characteristics or the right charismatic charm, our human social biases still seem to have a lot more power over us than we'd like to admit. I remember that one study that successfully correlated inches in height/stature to substantial dollar increases in salary.
bbcbasic 10y ago
How Not to Bomb your landing page (Hostgator error). Use a CDN.
- jeanlucas 10y ago
  this link was here on HN a while ago, but on Medium: https://medium.freecodecamp.com/how-not-to-bomb-your-offer-negotiation-c46bb9bc7dea#.veznhprsz https://medium.freecodecamp.com/how-not-to-bomb-your-offer-n...
SalimoS 10y ago
Don't bring your note 7 ?? Sorry guys, it's very tempting ...
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
djcooley 10y ago
I highly recommend reading Never Split the Difference, by Chris Voss. The book offers a different take to negotiation, written by a former FBI negotiator. In his words, he could never split the difference in a hostage negotiation. When you enter the process understanding this, you do things differently.
- jsmeaton 10y ago
  Can you elaborate a bit please? Does this mean not meeting half way between your offer and theirs? And then what?
  - djcooley 10y ago
    Good questions. His techniques rely on building a relationship, empathy, and many other techniques. If you enter the process with a split the difference mentality, you invariably leave a lot of value on the table. It's late where I am, I'd just go read the book if you want to know more.
    - AstralStorm 10y ago
      Companies do not work on empathy, but on maximum reward for acceptable risk and investment.
      - mifreewil 10y ago
        This would be true if your offer was negotiated with a distant bureaucratic committee (or board), but most of the time, regardless of who they represent, you're just dealing with people.
        mstade 10y ago
        Many companies, particularly the larger organizations, have pretty strict boundaries though. Case in point: in a large corporation we tried recruiting an incredibly talented developer, but because of company rules, we couldn't offer him what he asked for despite us thinking he was definitely worth it (and really, it wasn't outlandish in any way) but HR would never let it fly because rules. His problem then, I think, was that he mentioned what he'd earned elsewhere, so some policy dictated we couldn't offer more than 20% than that, or whatever. Stupid, silly policy, and just goes to show you should never divulge information the other party just isn't privy to. (I've never told recruiters what I earned before, that's not their business.)
bentlegen 10y ago
Slightly-related: has anyone interviewing with Airbnb used the author's public starting offer of $220k total compensation to negotiate their own starting offer? Genuinely curious. http://haseebq.com/farewell-app-academy-hello-airbnb-part-ii/ http://haseebq.com/farewell-app-academy-hello-airbnb-part-ii...
- bentlegen 10y ago
  Alternatively, an existing Airbnb employee who negotiated a raise based on the same information.
- well_negotiator 10y ago
  Really sad to know he didn't get a good offer in Airbnb and you both think it's a good offer. But this looks totally like a new grad offer. I have my friends who just got offers in Airbnb who are getting paid 180k in salary and ~600K in stocks which is basically $330k/year. My other friend who is senior engineer with 5 year experience is compensated around 500k/year. I have similar experience and i recently did a job switch with around 11 competing offers and negotiated well more than the previous number. I negotiated with every offer except snapchat whom didn't move their needle but their offer was good not the best. If you're really good, you can easily negotiate up to 400k/year real money(cash + stocks). - Googler/Fb employee with 4 year work experience here.
  - jayjay71 10y ago
    Care to share some of the offers you got?
  - stale2002 10y ago
    O.o These numbers are surprisingly high, to the point of almost being unbelievable. And I go around telling my friends that software engineers can make 120k right out of college, and I'M getting laughed at by my friends at how apparently unbelievable ridiculously high this is. I've got 3 years experience and I'm making not much more than that working at a midsized startup (I went to a top tech school and everything!). And then I go on Hacker News and learn that the fair salary for people working at big companies, with around my experience is 330k!?! Man what am I doing wrong. Is this what it is like being the mythical, 10x developer unicorn that I hear so much about?
PieterH 10y ago
It's this kind of personality that I look for in my organisations, mainly to isolate and slowly get rid of. The focus on "me" is so toxic. No amount of brilliance makes up for circles of damage to other, modest, hard working people.
- johnnyfaehell 10y ago
  Having a bunch of people who think the same, leads to group think. Having someone who like attention isn't necessary bad. Just like having someone who complains a lot isn't bad. (in fact if you look at team dynamics they'll end up being the most important type of person to have on a team to create a high performing team.) It's how the team and management react to a team member that creates toxic environments. If you have someone who points out valid issues and you choose to ignore them then of course they're complaining is going to become an issue. However if you fix the majority of major issues said person comes out with your team morale will go up because their product is better. As they say there is no I in team, so acting like a single person can ruin a team feels rather stupid. It's a team that ruins a team.
  - PieterH 10y ago
    Oh, I'm a great fan of diverse thinking in a group. Trouble with dominant individuals is they wipe that out, since most people will accept someone's contradictory opinion if it's backed up by force and charisma. And yes, such people can absolutely ruin a team, I've seen it happen many, many times. That is why I treat them as problems to solve.
    - johnnyfaehell 10y ago
      Basically you're solution to the problem of team dynamics is to basically bully them out? (Isolate and then remove, sounds like workplace bullying)
Panda15 10y ago
Someone needs to interview this guy's coworkers and ask them what they think of him.
ilaksh 10y ago
Lol Hostgator
rdtsc 10y ago
It might be important to keep in mind that there is a large difference between negotiating to buy a car and negotiating to work some place. A lot of the stuff you read seems to be geared toward "buying a car" -- used top 10 tricks, outsmart somehow the dealer, maybe act like an asshole a bit, and you're leaving and never seeing them again. I don't see it always working too well in job negotiations. Approaching it that way may backfire. So you "tricked" your future manager to give you a $50k more. In the end though, if they feel they didn't get a good deal because you oversold yourself, you won't have a good time eventually. The last thing you want to do is end up starting work and already having a target on your back, because the owner / manager feels a bit swindled by your "tactics". Surely you can end up in a large organization, maybe slip through the cracks, but in the end, you better be sure you can deliver according to what you are paid.
- mattm 10y ago
  There are two types of negotiations. One where it is a one off deal and you will probably never work with the person again. The other is where you are entering into a business arrangement that requires ongoing cooperation. The same techniques cannot be applied to both. Unfortunately a lot of negotiation advice doesn't specify which situation it is better applied to but it's worth keeping in mind.
- pandaman 10y ago
  Most companies employing programmers do not want employees to know each other salary. This means that if you are an individual contributor applying to such a company then your manager is not going to know your salary at all. The salary is going to be negotiated with somebody higher up, whose reports are other managers and not ICs. I would not worry about this.
  - r00fus 10y ago
    Are you kidding? I would be highly surprised if a manager didn't have access to the budget impacts of his/her direct reports. Where is this place where such info is hidden? Because I definitely don't want to work there.
tempestn 10y ago
There are definitely some good points here. As someone who has done a decent amount of negotiating on both sides, I will say that while it's true that even in a startup your boss won't much care if you negotiate... they might care if you mercilessly try to squeeze out every. last. drop. as described here - even if you do it unfailingly politely. In a situation where there only a handful of employees and you're reporting to the founder, they may actually care about that last 10k you squeezed out at the deadline. Probably not enough to withdraw the offer, but perhaps enough to put a bit of a damper on the future relationship. I'm not saying it's not something that could be overcome. If you really are a 'rockstar', it would probably be quickly forgotten. But still, there is some value to leaving a small amount on the table. Especially since you can always negotiate a raise if your performance is indeed excellent. (Although admittedly your current salary does always anchor that somewhat, so I'm certainly not recommending giving up a lot initially.)
gbrindisi 10y ago
As a side note I've found that negotiation room in EU is so tiny if not negligible. Maybe it is just me but I suspect it's a mix between a different culture and a - generally - more unionized and segmented job market. Wondering if you guys have experienced the same.
- yxhuvud 10y ago
  EU is not homogeneous. Different areas work differently. Which part do you have experience of?
  - gbrindisi 10y ago
    Italy, UK, Sweden to name a few, With UK being a bit more open.
    - mstade 10y ago
      My personal experience agrees with yours, there's not that much room – at least not in the higher end.
- lostboys67 10y ago
  In the mainland EU M&P (manergerial and professional ) jobs in the IT securer arn't unionized in the same way workers in BMW are. In the UK there are unions (Prospect and the FDA) that specialize in the M&P area and do have highly paid members I know an Ex CTO at Motorola was a member and the CEO of Hull communications was an activist in his early career.
- ThePawnBreak 10y ago
  I'm sure you can negociate if you have offers from Google, Facebook and Palantir in London. Negociating only works in hot markets, and there are very few of them for tech in the EU.
  - mstade 10y ago
    Maybe, but the compensation range for developers in London is much narrower than you might think. From what I've seen, most startups offer in the range £30k-70k per year, probably with some mostly useless stock option deal. I've seen salaries out of Amazon and Facebook starting at £50k, and even at investment banks, for more junior positions. These are all basically suckers, given the cost of living in London, among other things. Anything below £70k isn't worth consideration, unless you really want to be in London I guess. There will be better offers elsewhere. Above £70k the range is basically £70k-100k, for a number of reasons. At £100k you end up in a different tax bracket, to the point where you may want to start considering taking other perks other than salary, to keep your tax cost down. Also, if you're being offered that kind of money, you're likely accepting a director-level offer, so really for engineers the meaningful range is about £70k-100k. Since you mentioned Palantir, I'll mention that I met with a recruiter of theirs who mentioned in our first (and only) meeting that their salaries were in this specific range. For contract work, you can quite easily break the £100k barrier, but obviously now you're running your own shop with all of the issues that brings. Or possibilities, depending on your perspective!
scotthtaylor 10y ago
Such a silly article; not a great way to start a relationship with your new colleagues.
- AstralStorm 10y ago
  Are you assuming HR is truly your colleague? Or maybe CFO or CEO? No, they are your bosses. They might be colleagues, but that is secondary.
  - sidlls 10y ago
    Can't emphasize this enough. This kind of mistake is common in our industry, though. I wish more software developers understood that when they say "human resources" they aren't lying: we are resources, like paper, electricity, and IT infrastructure. We are not their "colleagues," they don't see us as "colleagues," and it is damn obvious we aren't treated like colleagues.
s3nnyy 10y ago
Best is in my opinion to really practice salary negotiation with a friend. The most important aspects are: 1) Talk about salary at the very end of the interview process (by then the company should know your value). 2) Let the recruiter / manager say a number first. 3) If you get the offer, no matter how you feel, act satisfied, but not too satisfied. 4) Try to negotiate up reasonably. I talk more about this in my talk at Europython on tech-recruiting and salary negotiation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6PTaTDHUG4&feature=youtu.be&t=1595 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6PTaTDHUG4&feature=youtu.be... Disclaimer: I am a recruiter. If you're looking for a tech job in Zurich, I probably can help you out - you find my contact details in my HN handle.
DictumMortuum 10y ago
I quickly skimmed through the article and it seemed to me that most of the advice given where taken from here: http://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/ http://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/
nfriedly 10y ago
> I like the term BATNA a lot, mostly because it sounds like a gadget Batman would lob at bad guys. Glad I'm not the only one who thought this :)
mstade 10y ago
My main technique in negotiation is to make sure I've framed my own boundaries. I always know at what point I walk away, what's simply non-negotiable. Everything else is on the table, and it helps me frame the conversation. If I find whoever I'm negotiating with simply won't meet the walk-away limit, I walk away. No hard feelings, no regret – all of those what-if feelings were dealt with as I set the minimum limit before going into the conversation. As well, I make sure that minimum level is a level I am genuinely comfortable with. It's not a cop-out, it's a level where I will sign and feel happy about it. Anything more than that is a bonus, but if I don't get that I'm perfectly happy. I've found since I started doing this, and staying true to actually walking away if things aren't working out, the whole conversation has been much more professional and easy. Key to this though is that walk away means walk away, no childish "give me this or else I walk" nonsense. If you walk, you walk, that's it. Non-negotiable means just that. EDIT: Probably worth mentioning as well that I do plenty of research before setting that walk-away level. There's one aspect which is what I instinctively want, but then there's other things that come in to play as well of course, relocation if applicable, cost of living etc.
scarface74 10y ago
My takeaways.... 1. Communicate your BATNA but be subtle. When I was looking for a job two years ago and spoke with recruiters, I heard from a few that it would be "hard" to get $21K more than I was making at the time. I told them that I was happy with my current job at a major well known company (I wasn't) and that's what it would take to get me to leave. 2. Salary was the main reason I was leaving, but like he said, it's much easier to negotiate one time signing bonuses and things that don't cost the company money -- like more work from home days. 3. Know your worth - it's hard to negotiate more than your market value. When I was interviewing I had 10 prospects that were in various stages of the interview process. I was able to confidently cut the process short for some knowing I had others and I had outside recruiters negotiating on behalf so they could get their commissions.

246 points by axk 10y ago

eru 10y ago

Nolo has a some decent advice about negotiations: http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/contract-negotiation-11-strategies-33340.html http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/contract-negotiation-...

35bge57dtjku 10y ago

> Now say you end up turning down their offer. They’ve spent over $24,000 just extending this single offer to you (to say nothing of opportunity costs), and now they’ll essentially have to start over from scratch. Most of that is to hire someone, not just 'you'. And they aren't even close to having to start from scratch if you don't accept.

brianwawok 10y ago
True. But they really do want you if they made an offer. I have never heard of someone asking for 5k more get their offer yanked, but I know people afraid to ask for that reason. The exact # they lose if you say no isn't the point. You are the top choice. Doesn't mean they will double your offer but they do like you.
- 35bge57dtjku 10y ago
  I have had success with asking for modest increases. I think it helps to have a good reason, like them not doing any 401k matching.
  - ryanmccullagh 10y ago
    Is the median salary for the position a valid reason for an increase? For example 93000 is the median for software engineers in US according to the government.
    - windowsworkstoo 10y ago
      Anything that works is a valid reason....don't overthink it.
    - 35bge57dtjku 10y ago
      I wouldn't specify 'median' exactly. That sounds too technical - it doesn't have the same innocence and emotional appeal. I'd mention what other local companies are hiring for the same position at, and mention being surprised they aren't offering at least that. Or mention having friends that got hired for the same position at a salary that's 10k more than you're being offered. If you do it smoothly, I think the worst case scenario should be that they say they can't go any higher, or that they come back with a higher offer that's only 1/2 or 1/4 more than what you mentioned. Like Sun Tzu said, don't corner the enemy.
      - AstralStorm 10y ago
        Replace median with typical and you're set. The only way to weasel out of that is to show you're below average. Now then, any kind of negotiation is risky for obvious reasons.
    - lostboys67 10y ago
      Depends on location the Valley or NYC has high housing costs
- shostack 10y ago
  Try speaking to more non engineers. Not being snarky, but this is only applicable to professions that are in hot demand. But that should go without saying.

IamHWengineer 10y ago

Lol. This guy was involved in a massive scam in the online poker world years ago. not sure if he's completely changed. I don't know what he's doing in the SW world. Source: https://www.highstakesdb.com/2375-haseeb-qureshi-admits-to-chip-dumping-quits-poker.aspx https://www.highstakesdb.com/2375-haseeb-qureshi-admits-to-c... http://www.cardrunners.com/blog/internetpokers/the-girah-scandal http://www.cardrunners.com/blog/internetpokers/the-girah-sca...

akhilcacharya 10y ago
He explains himself here: http://haseebq.com/about/ http://haseebq.com/about/ If you didn't see his previous posts he's clearly a pretty skilled self-teacher - negotiated up to 220K offers at Google and Airbnb despite going to a bootcamp.
- paulcole 10y ago
  >he's clearly a pretty skilled self-teacher I think it's pronounced "self-promoter."
  - Hydraulix989 10y ago
    Yeah, this is just sad. I know people personally that worked their asses off learning systems programming, algorithms, and advanced mathematics at top-tier four-year colleges with absolutely fantastic technical CVs that got offers that aren't even half of that. These are surely some of the smartest people in the world, too, but I suppose they don't play the "bluffing" game all too well (er, "negotation" -- call it whatever you want, ex-poker player). I'm not sure what makes this guy who ostensibly got his hand held through a three-month "learn to copy and paste Ruby from StackOverflow" camp eligible for a salary that is higher than some surgeons make. Without reading the article, sounds like he successfully bluffed to one company that another offered him some really high salary X, and then he went straight to the moon (or should I say, made out like a bandit) from there. As much as we like to think our hiring process is meritocratic, when confronted with someone with just the right physical characteristics or the right charismatic charm, our human social biases still seem to have a lot more power over us than we'd like to admit. I remember that one study that successfully correlated inches in height/stature to substantial dollar increases in salary.

bbcbasic 10y ago

How Not to Bomb your landing page (Hostgator error). Use a CDN.

jeanlucas 10y ago
this link was here on HN a while ago, but on Medium: https://medium.freecodecamp.com/how-not-to-bomb-your-offer-negotiation-c46bb9bc7dea#.veznhprsz https://medium.freecodecamp.com/how-not-to-bomb-your-offer-n...

SalimoS 10y ago

Don't bring your note 7 ?? Sorry guys, it's very tempting ...

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

djcooley 10y ago

I highly recommend reading Never Split the Difference, by Chris Voss. The book offers a different take to negotiation, written by a former FBI negotiator. In his words, he could never split the difference in a hostage negotiation. When you enter the process understanding this, you do things differently.

jsmeaton 10y ago
Can you elaborate a bit please? Does this mean not meeting half way between your offer and theirs? And then what?
- djcooley 10y ago
  Good questions. His techniques rely on building a relationship, empathy, and many other techniques. If you enter the process with a split the difference mentality, you invariably leave a lot of value on the table. It's late where I am, I'd just go read the book if you want to know more.
  - AstralStorm 10y ago
    Companies do not work on empathy, but on maximum reward for acceptable risk and investment.
    - mifreewil 10y ago
      This would be true if your offer was negotiated with a distant bureaucratic committee (or board), but most of the time, regardless of who they represent, you're just dealing with people.
      - mstade 10y ago
        Many companies, particularly the larger organizations, have pretty strict boundaries though. Case in point: in a large corporation we tried recruiting an incredibly talented developer, but because of company rules, we couldn't offer him what he asked for despite us thinking he was definitely worth it (and really, it wasn't outlandish in any way) but HR would never let it fly because rules. His problem then, I think, was that he mentioned what he'd earned elsewhere, so some policy dictated we couldn't offer more than 20% than that, or whatever. Stupid, silly policy, and just goes to show you should never divulge information the other party just isn't privy to. (I've never told recruiters what I earned before, that's not their business.)

bentlegen 10y ago

Slightly-related: has anyone interviewing with Airbnb used the author's public starting offer of $220k total compensation to negotiate their own starting offer? Genuinely curious. http://haseebq.com/farewell-app-academy-hello-airbnb-part-ii/ http://haseebq.com/farewell-app-academy-hello-airbnb-part-ii...

bentlegen 10y ago
Alternatively, an existing Airbnb employee who negotiated a raise based on the same information.
well_negotiator 10y ago
Really sad to know he didn't get a good offer in Airbnb and you both think it's a good offer. But this looks totally like a new grad offer. I have my friends who just got offers in Airbnb who are getting paid 180k in salary and ~600K in stocks which is basically $330k/year. My other friend who is senior engineer with 5 year experience is compensated around 500k/year. I have similar experience and i recently did a job switch with around 11 competing offers and negotiated well more than the previous number. I negotiated with every offer except snapchat whom didn't move their needle but their offer was good not the best. If you're really good, you can easily negotiate up to 400k/year real money(cash + stocks). - Googler/Fb employee with 4 year work experience here.
- jayjay71 10y ago
  Care to share some of the offers you got?
- stale2002 10y ago
  O.o These numbers are surprisingly high, to the point of almost being unbelievable. And I go around telling my friends that software engineers can make 120k right out of college, and I'M getting laughed at by my friends at how apparently unbelievable ridiculously high this is. I've got 3 years experience and I'm making not much more than that working at a midsized startup (I went to a top tech school and everything!). And then I go on Hacker News and learn that the fair salary for people working at big companies, with around my experience is 330k!?! Man what am I doing wrong. Is this what it is like being the mythical, 10x developer unicorn that I hear so much about?

PieterH 10y ago

It's this kind of personality that I look for in my organisations, mainly to isolate and slowly get rid of. The focus on "me" is so toxic. No amount of brilliance makes up for circles of damage to other, modest, hard working people.

johnnyfaehell 10y ago
Having a bunch of people who think the same, leads to group think. Having someone who like attention isn't necessary bad. Just like having someone who complains a lot isn't bad. (in fact if you look at team dynamics they'll end up being the most important type of person to have on a team to create a high performing team.) It's how the team and management react to a team member that creates toxic environments. If you have someone who points out valid issues and you choose to ignore them then of course they're complaining is going to become an issue. However if you fix the majority of major issues said person comes out with your team morale will go up because their product is better. As they say there is no I in team, so acting like a single person can ruin a team feels rather stupid. It's a team that ruins a team.
- PieterH 10y ago
  Oh, I'm a great fan of diverse thinking in a group. Trouble with dominant individuals is they wipe that out, since most people will accept someone's contradictory opinion if it's backed up by force and charisma. And yes, such people can absolutely ruin a team, I've seen it happen many, many times. That is why I treat them as problems to solve.
  - johnnyfaehell 10y ago
    Basically you're solution to the problem of team dynamics is to basically bully them out? (Isolate and then remove, sounds like workplace bullying)

Panda15 10y ago

Someone needs to interview this guy's coworkers and ask them what they think of him.

ilaksh 10y ago

Lol Hostgator

rdtsc 10y ago

It might be important to keep in mind that there is a large difference between negotiating to buy a car and negotiating to work some place. A lot of the stuff you read seems to be geared toward "buying a car" -- used top 10 tricks, outsmart somehow the dealer, maybe act like an asshole a bit, and you're leaving and never seeing them again. I don't see it always working too well in job negotiations. Approaching it that way may backfire. So you "tricked" your future manager to give you a $50k more. In the end though, if they feel they didn't get a good deal because you oversold yourself, you won't have a good time eventually. The last thing you want to do is end up starting work and already having a target on your back, because the owner / manager feels a bit swindled by your "tactics". Surely you can end up in a large organization, maybe slip through the cracks, but in the end, you better be sure you can deliver according to what you are paid.

mattm 10y ago
There are two types of negotiations. One where it is a one off deal and you will probably never work with the person again. The other is where you are entering into a business arrangement that requires ongoing cooperation. The same techniques cannot be applied to both. Unfortunately a lot of negotiation advice doesn't specify which situation it is better applied to but it's worth keeping in mind.
pandaman 10y ago
Most companies employing programmers do not want employees to know each other salary. This means that if you are an individual contributor applying to such a company then your manager is not going to know your salary at all. The salary is going to be negotiated with somebody higher up, whose reports are other managers and not ICs. I would not worry about this.
- r00fus 10y ago
  Are you kidding? I would be highly surprised if a manager didn't have access to the budget impacts of his/her direct reports. Where is this place where such info is hidden? Because I definitely don't want to work there.

tempestn 10y ago

There are definitely some good points here. As someone who has done a decent amount of negotiating on both sides, I will say that while it's true that even in a startup your boss won't much care if you negotiate... they might care if you mercilessly try to squeeze out every. last. drop. as described here - even if you do it unfailingly politely. In a situation where there only a handful of employees and you're reporting to the founder, they may actually care about that last 10k you squeezed out at the deadline. Probably not enough to withdraw the offer, but perhaps enough to put a bit of a damper on the future relationship. I'm not saying it's not something that could be overcome. If you really are a 'rockstar', it would probably be quickly forgotten. But still, there is some value to leaving a small amount on the table. Especially since you can always negotiate a raise if your performance is indeed excellent. (Although admittedly your current salary does always anchor that somewhat, so I'm certainly not recommending giving up a lot initially.)

gbrindisi 10y ago

As a side note I've found that negotiation room in EU is so tiny if not negligible. Maybe it is just me but I suspect it's a mix between a different culture and a - generally - more unionized and segmented job market. Wondering if you guys have experienced the same.

yxhuvud 10y ago
EU is not homogeneous. Different areas work differently. Which part do you have experience of?
- gbrindisi 10y ago
  Italy, UK, Sweden to name a few, With UK being a bit more open.
  - mstade 10y ago
    My personal experience agrees with yours, there's not that much room – at least not in the higher end.
lostboys67 10y ago
In the mainland EU M&P (manergerial and professional ) jobs in the IT securer arn't unionized in the same way workers in BMW are. In the UK there are unions (Prospect and the FDA) that specialize in the M&P area and do have highly paid members I know an Ex CTO at Motorola was a member and the CEO of Hull communications was an activist in his early career.
ThePawnBreak 10y ago
I'm sure you can negociate if you have offers from Google, Facebook and Palantir in London. Negociating only works in hot markets, and there are very few of them for tech in the EU.
- mstade 10y ago
  Maybe, but the compensation range for developers in London is much narrower than you might think. From what I've seen, most startups offer in the range £30k-70k per year, probably with some mostly useless stock option deal. I've seen salaries out of Amazon and Facebook starting at £50k, and even at investment banks, for more junior positions. These are all basically suckers, given the cost of living in London, among other things. Anything below £70k isn't worth consideration, unless you really want to be in London I guess. There will be better offers elsewhere. Above £70k the range is basically £70k-100k, for a number of reasons. At £100k you end up in a different tax bracket, to the point where you may want to start considering taking other perks other than salary, to keep your tax cost down. Also, if you're being offered that kind of money, you're likely accepting a director-level offer, so really for engineers the meaningful range is about £70k-100k. Since you mentioned Palantir, I'll mention that I met with a recruiter of theirs who mentioned in our first (and only) meeting that their salaries were in this specific range. For contract work, you can quite easily break the £100k barrier, but obviously now you're running your own shop with all of the issues that brings. Or possibilities, depending on your perspective!

scotthtaylor 10y ago

Such a silly article; not a great way to start a relationship with your new colleagues.

AstralStorm 10y ago
Are you assuming HR is truly your colleague? Or maybe CFO or CEO? No, they are your bosses. They might be colleagues, but that is secondary.
- sidlls 10y ago
  Can't emphasize this enough. This kind of mistake is common in our industry, though. I wish more software developers understood that when they say "human resources" they aren't lying: we are resources, like paper, electricity, and IT infrastructure. We are not their "colleagues," they don't see us as "colleagues," and it is damn obvious we aren't treated like colleagues.

s3nnyy 10y ago

Best is in my opinion to really practice salary negotiation with a friend. The most important aspects are: 1) Talk about salary at the very end of the interview process (by then the company should know your value). 2) Let the recruiter / manager say a number first. 3) If you get the offer, no matter how you feel, act satisfied, but not too satisfied. 4) Try to negotiate up reasonably. I talk more about this in my talk at Europython on tech-recruiting and salary negotiation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6PTaTDHUG4&feature=youtu.be&t=1595 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6PTaTDHUG4&feature=youtu.be... Disclaimer: I am a recruiter. If you're looking for a tech job in Zurich, I probably can help you out - you find my contact details in my HN handle.

DictumMortuum 10y ago

I quickly skimmed through the article and it seemed to me that most of the advice given where taken from here: http://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/ http://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/

nfriedly 10y ago

> I like the term BATNA a lot, mostly because it sounds like a gadget Batman would lob at bad guys. Glad I'm not the only one who thought this :)

mstade 10y ago

My main technique in negotiation is to make sure I've framed my own boundaries. I always know at what point I walk away, what's simply non-negotiable. Everything else is on the table, and it helps me frame the conversation. If I find whoever I'm negotiating with simply won't meet the walk-away limit, I walk away. No hard feelings, no regret – all of those what-if feelings were dealt with as I set the minimum limit before going into the conversation. As well, I make sure that minimum level is a level I am genuinely comfortable with. It's not a cop-out, it's a level where I will sign and feel happy about it. Anything more than that is a bonus, but if I don't get that I'm perfectly happy. I've found since I started doing this, and staying true to actually walking away if things aren't working out, the whole conversation has been much more professional and easy. Key to this though is that walk away means walk away, no childish "give me this or else I walk" nonsense. If you walk, you walk, that's it. Non-negotiable means just that. EDIT: Probably worth mentioning as well that I do plenty of research before setting that walk-away level. There's one aspect which is what I instinctively want, but then there's other things that come in to play as well of course, relocation if applicable, cost of living etc.

scarface74 10y ago

My takeaways.... 1. Communicate your BATNA but be subtle. When I was looking for a job two years ago and spoke with recruiters, I heard from a few that it would be "hard" to get $21K more than I was making at the time. I told them that I was happy with my current job at a major well known company (I wasn't) and that's what it would take to get me to leave. 2. Salary was the main reason I was leaving, but like he said, it's much easier to negotiate one time signing bonuses and things that don't cost the company money -- like more work from home days. 3. Know your worth - it's hard to negotiate more than your market value. When I was interviewing I had 10 prospects that were in various stages of the interview process. I was able to confidently cut the process short for some knowing I had others and I had outside recruiters negotiating on behalf so they could get their commissions.