4 ms·

Point one: if you want me to want to stick around, your company has to have challenges I want to work on over time. Point two: do not underpay me. I will toler

by pnathan 11y ago

Point one: if you want me to want to stick around, your company has to have challenges I want to work on over time. Point two: do not underpay me. I will tolerate a fuzz around market rate, and I will adapt to market conditions. I will quit as soon as I can if you systematically undervalue me (see point one: my value will go up). Point three: build a company designed for fifty years, to deliver use and value, and you might get people looking to stick around for fifty years.

killface 11y ago
All great points. I work with a consulting company, and we have a lot of really great people. They come to us because we pay fair (good hourly rate on w2 (paid overtime) + benefits), we work with a wide variety of companies and industries, and we're not looking to sell out or get acquired.
clavalle 11y ago
Don't forget to build a culture of expectations that one can last 50 years in. Constant crisis mode is a sure way to lose good people.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
borski 11y ago
Are these hard rules for you? Do certain harder (more challenging) challenges make up for lower pay? Are there culture benefits or actual benefits that can make up for lower pay? I ask because I hear things like this all the time, and there seem to be two schools of thought: 1) intangibles matter, 2) tangibles (money) is all that matters. If the latter is true for you (or anyone in a position to be making as much as SV engineers make, excluding those with debts like children's schooling and loans), that makes me really sad. Jumping to the opportunity that will pay more solely because they pay more seems like a shortsighted, materialistic view of life. I'm not saying you see it that way, but there are certainly a not insignificant amount of people who view money as more important than challenges. Thats not wrong, of course, just saddening to me.
- testingonprod 11y ago
  I think you're misinterpreting what he said. He simply stated "Do not underpay me". No one deserves to be underpaid. It's not an outrageous demand, in fact, he is just demanding baseline respect.
- pnathan 11y ago
  Don't underpay me; value me at an appropriate valuation. Do challenge me; do provide me with opportunity to grow. The total compensation is a somewhat viscous[1] weighted combination of tangibles and intangibles. Barring economic disaster, there are financial levels I won't go below, in part to maintain future-valuations, as well as to just keep my financial situation in order. [1] Buying a house, for instance, would increase my baseline need for cash. Raising a child would increase my baseline need for managing healthcare and other cash needs. A few years down the road, I will be looking for new challenges, increasing intangibles. :-)
- floppydisk 11y ago
  I think the logic train the parent is espousing goes like this. Works on challenges (intrinsic) --> gets new skills + generates increasing value for the company Repeat this cycle for many moons and the worker now has a significantly upgraded skillset that has and continues to produce significant value for the corp. All that is asked is that the salary grows with respect to the skill set being utilized and the value being produced for the company. If you end up in a situation where skill sets and value are increasing substantially but compensation is stagnating, you end up in a situation where people will eventually take a look around at the market and realize other people with similar skillsets who provide similar value are getting offers at a substantially higher rate (even assume inflation increase of 3-5% for several years, that adds up). Yes, the work might be challenging and the worker might enjoy the work intrinsically but extrinsically they're now asking whether pursuit of the intrinsic challenge is worth it given the disparity in how they're valued compared to their peers. Pay isn't necessarily about the tangibles but more about how the company values you (scorecard). If your salary gets out of line with market by a substantial amount relative to skills, experience, and value generated, that indicates the company doesn't necessarily value you as much or isn't willing to expend the capital necessary to keep their employees satisfied. The other angle one could take with this argument is that while intangibles are nice, they cannot offset the increase in price of other things like housing, and food. Without pay raises over time, the percentage increases in basic cost of living will eat into the paycheck more and more. Induced pressure from external sources can undermine intrinsic motivation, especially if there are dependents, and increase the importance of the paycheck amount.
fredkbloggs 11y ago
In line with these points but more nuts and bolts: if you want people who won't leave within at least N years, give them N-year guaranteed contracts that can be terminated only for cause/good reason (these are terms with specific legal meaning). Since I will have agreed in advance to the pay rate for each year, you can't undervalue me unless I'm complicit, and you can't lay me off just because your company is doing poorly. At the same time, I can't pick up and leave "right when I become most valuable". If both sides want greater security than an at-will termless contract offers, the solution is in the contract, not the interview.
- tomjen3 11y ago
  Who in the world would sign such a contract? The only employee would be one that couldn't get a better deal elsewhere and the only employer would be one you wouldn't want to work for.
  - sanderjd 11y ago
    To me, that's sort of the point – you can understand why it's hard to keep employees for N years by thinking about what the terms of an N-year contract would have to look like, and whether anyone would sign it.
  - crpatino 11y ago
    These are standard contracts in many places of the world with stronger labor laws than the US. It does not mean you have tenure, or any non sense like that. It means there are specific, objective causes to terminate your contract, which include but may not be limited to: gross incompetence, contempt for workplace discipline, frequent absenteeism, criminal/delinquent activity against or otherwise involving company assets, etc. If the employer cannot or will not prove this kind of behaviors from the part of the employee, he still can terminate the contract, but there's a minimal severance mandated by law, which depends both on current monthly salary and on seniority.[1] i.e In my country, you are supposed to get 3 months salary, plus 20 days per each full year you held the position. Some employers will still low ball you if they think they can get away with it, but they will still give you more than what you'd get after suing and paying the lawyer's commission.
groby_b 11y ago
And let's not forget point four: If you want me to stick around, getting more responsibilities (usually via promotion) should be easier to achieve within than without. I know more than a few engineers who work at larger companies who have climbed up the ladder by switching outside and back. And no, they've not acquired magical properties in a short stint elsewhere, outside of the "working elsewhere" property. You can't complain about missing loyalty if you enforce it as a career path.
x0x0 11y ago
Bajic sounds... special. He both expects people to be very loyal, but for people like him or Mark Suster loyalty flows upwards only. I looked through the whole article for how he rewards loyalty, but couldn't find anything. He claims he wants people who are productive day one -- " hires need to be able to do their jobs on day one", then admits that early engineers don't need (won't?) to be your future cto or coo. So basically he's whining that it's hard to find skilled engineers who need no training and want to stay at companies for long periods of time in order to be underpaid and who don't demand promotional opportunities. Weird. From personal experience, the thing ctos and hiring managers miss is this: if you want me to be at your company for the long term, particularly if I have options, I expect you to come through for me. That means demonstrable company growth on a regular basis. If you spend 1.5 - 2 years frittering away a B round with little to show for it besides headcount growth, I'm out. And even after the company growth requirement, and growth in value of my options, I demand raises. We all would love an ipo, but in the meantime, my landlord takes cash only, and rents go up 10%/year. Sandwiches near the office now go for $9-$10 before tax.
limeyx 11y ago
Not only that (point3?) Treat employees like you actually want them to be around for five plus years. Don't start counting "accrued vacation days" in .01 hourly increments to get you "two weeks per year" allow flexible work hours / work from home Allow for movement between different departments ... Dont simply look at employees as an interchangeable unit of resource to exploit ...this street has to go two mays...

by pnathan 11y ago

killface 11y ago

All great points. I work with a consulting company, and we have a lot of really great people. They come to us because we pay fair (good hourly rate on w2 (paid overtime) + benefits), we work with a wide variety of companies and industries, and we're not looking to sell out or get acquired.

clavalle 11y ago

Don't forget to build a culture of expectations that one can last 50 years in. Constant crisis mode is a sure way to lose good people.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

borski 11y ago

Are these hard rules for you? Do certain harder (more challenging) challenges make up for lower pay? Are there culture benefits or actual benefits that can make up for lower pay? I ask because I hear things like this all the time, and there seem to be two schools of thought: 1) intangibles matter, 2) tangibles (money) is all that matters. If the latter is true for you (or anyone in a position to be making as much as SV engineers make, excluding those with debts like children's schooling and loans), that makes me really sad. Jumping to the opportunity that will pay more solely because they pay more seems like a shortsighted, materialistic view of life. I'm not saying you see it that way, but there are certainly a not insignificant amount of people who view money as more important than challenges. Thats not wrong, of course, just saddening to me.

testingonprod 11y ago
I think you're misinterpreting what he said. He simply stated "Do not underpay me". No one deserves to be underpaid. It's not an outrageous demand, in fact, he is just demanding baseline respect.
pnathan 11y ago
Don't underpay me; value me at an appropriate valuation. Do challenge me; do provide me with opportunity to grow. The total compensation is a somewhat viscous[1] weighted combination of tangibles and intangibles. Barring economic disaster, there are financial levels I won't go below, in part to maintain future-valuations, as well as to just keep my financial situation in order. [1] Buying a house, for instance, would increase my baseline need for cash. Raising a child would increase my baseline need for managing healthcare and other cash needs. A few years down the road, I will be looking for new challenges, increasing intangibles. :-)
floppydisk 11y ago
I think the logic train the parent is espousing goes like this. Works on challenges (intrinsic) --> gets new skills + generates increasing value for the company Repeat this cycle for many moons and the worker now has a significantly upgraded skillset that has and continues to produce significant value for the corp. All that is asked is that the salary grows with respect to the skill set being utilized and the value being produced for the company. If you end up in a situation where skill sets and value are increasing substantially but compensation is stagnating, you end up in a situation where people will eventually take a look around at the market and realize other people with similar skillsets who provide similar value are getting offers at a substantially higher rate (even assume inflation increase of 3-5% for several years, that adds up). Yes, the work might be challenging and the worker might enjoy the work intrinsically but extrinsically they're now asking whether pursuit of the intrinsic challenge is worth it given the disparity in how they're valued compared to their peers. Pay isn't necessarily about the tangibles but more about how the company values you (scorecard). If your salary gets out of line with market by a substantial amount relative to skills, experience, and value generated, that indicates the company doesn't necessarily value you as much or isn't willing to expend the capital necessary to keep their employees satisfied. The other angle one could take with this argument is that while intangibles are nice, they cannot offset the increase in price of other things like housing, and food. Without pay raises over time, the percentage increases in basic cost of living will eat into the paycheck more and more. Induced pressure from external sources can undermine intrinsic motivation, especially if there are dependents, and increase the importance of the paycheck amount.

fredkbloggs 11y ago

In line with these points but more nuts and bolts: if you want people who won't leave within at least N years, give them N-year guaranteed contracts that can be terminated only for cause/good reason (these are terms with specific legal meaning). Since I will have agreed in advance to the pay rate for each year, you can't undervalue me unless I'm complicit, and you can't lay me off just because your company is doing poorly. At the same time, I can't pick up and leave "right when I become most valuable". If both sides want greater security than an at-will termless contract offers, the solution is in the contract, not the interview.

tomjen3 11y ago
Who in the world would sign such a contract? The only employee would be one that couldn't get a better deal elsewhere and the only employer would be one you wouldn't want to work for.
- sanderjd 11y ago
  To me, that's sort of the point – you can understand why it's hard to keep employees for N years by thinking about what the terms of an N-year contract would have to look like, and whether anyone would sign it.
- crpatino 11y ago
  These are standard contracts in many places of the world with stronger labor laws than the US. It does not mean you have tenure, or any non sense like that. It means there are specific, objective causes to terminate your contract, which include but may not be limited to: gross incompetence, contempt for workplace discipline, frequent absenteeism, criminal/delinquent activity against or otherwise involving company assets, etc. If the employer cannot or will not prove this kind of behaviors from the part of the employee, he still can terminate the contract, but there's a minimal severance mandated by law, which depends both on current monthly salary and on seniority.[1] i.e In my country, you are supposed to get 3 months salary, plus 20 days per each full year you held the position. Some employers will still low ball you if they think they can get away with it, but they will still give you more than what you'd get after suing and paying the lawyer's commission.

groby_b 11y ago

And let's not forget point four: If you want me to stick around, getting more responsibilities (usually via promotion) should be easier to achieve within than without. I know more than a few engineers who work at larger companies who have climbed up the ladder by switching outside and back. And no, they've not acquired magical properties in a short stint elsewhere, outside of the "working elsewhere" property. You can't complain about missing loyalty if you enforce it as a career path.

x0x0 11y ago

Bajic sounds... special. He both expects people to be very loyal, but for people like him or Mark Suster loyalty flows upwards only. I looked through the whole article for how he rewards loyalty, but couldn't find anything. He claims he wants people who are productive day one -- " hires need to be able to do their jobs on day one", then admits that early engineers don't need (won't?) to be your future cto or coo. So basically he's whining that it's hard to find skilled engineers who need no training and want to stay at companies for long periods of time in order to be underpaid and who don't demand promotional opportunities. Weird. From personal experience, the thing ctos and hiring managers miss is this: if you want me to be at your company for the long term, particularly if I have options, I expect you to come through for me. That means demonstrable company growth on a regular basis. If you spend 1.5 - 2 years frittering away a B round with little to show for it besides headcount growth, I'm out. And even after the company growth requirement, and growth in value of my options, I demand raises. We all would love an ipo, but in the meantime, my landlord takes cash only, and rents go up 10%/year. Sandwiches near the office now go for $9-$10 before tax.

limeyx 11y ago

Not only that (point3?) Treat employees like you actually want them to be around for five plus years. Don't start counting "accrued vacation days" in .01 hourly increments to get you "two weeks per year" allow flexible work hours / work from home Allow for movement between different departments ... Dont simply look at employees as an interchangeable unit of resource to exploit ...this street has to go two mays...