4 ms·

What is the social value of having negotiation skills be a large determinant of one's salary? Why not diminish this cause of variance (perhaps relatively disadv

by Chinjut 11y ago

What is the social value of having negotiation skills be a large determinant of one's salary? Why not diminish this cause of variance (perhaps relatively disadvantaging those who currently have anomalously good negotiation skills, but perhaps benefiting those who have not bothered specifically developing negotiation skills (or who have erroneously convinced themselves that they have))?

morgante 11y ago
> What is the social value of having negotiation skills be a large determinant of one's salary? Nothing in my comment said there was actually social value in having negotiation skills. I'm talking about my personal experience and the drawbacks I see. Do you think Buffer pays its employees fairly?
- Lazare 11y ago
  Your argument is circular. You're saying that we shouldn't talk about pay, because when we talk about pay we get paid like Buffer devs do, which you think is obviously low compared to other salaries, which we can't actually prove because we don't talk about pay. It's a bit like telling someone that you're giving them $100 in a box, but not to open the box, because if you open it, it'll turn into $20. "You can only have a high salary if you have no way to verify that it's high." Even if true, where does that leave us?
  - morgante 11y ago
    > which we can't actually prove because we don't talk about pay. Just because salaries aren't public doesn't mean you can't get any salary information. Just go on a few interviews, set up an auction, and see what you can get. > It's a bit like telling someone that you're giving them $100 in a box, but not to open the box, because if you open it, it'll turn into $20. It's a cute analogy, but the more complete version would include a box market, where other people with insight into the box market are interested in buying the box I've been given. In such a scenario, I could shop around my box to see what it's actually worth without having to open it up.
    - Lazare 11y ago
      I dunno, let's try the more complete version: "There's $100 in this box. You can't open it, or look inside it, but trust me, it's there. Now you need to go over to my mate George, and give him the box, and he'll give you $100 for it. But only if you haven't opened it!" Now it just sounds like you're being recruited as a drug mule. :) Okay, granted, in your scenario their are multiple box dealers who are willing to bid on your unopened-but-totally-contains-$100 box. If you work at it, it's quite possible that you might even get some semblance of a fair offer. But should you need to work at it? And this still feels like a system which lends itself to collusion, uncertainty, and unfairness. Nor is that even hypothetical; we KNOW that our industry suffered from a serious wage-fixing cartel which was only recently busted open. I feel like any argument against transparency has a high bar to clear.
balls187 11y ago
So discount the value of negotiating as a skill, simply because others aren't good at it? Seems just as biased as rewarding those with negotiating abilities.
- geofft 11y ago
  One hopes that you're being paid for value to the company, and it's not obvious that being good at negotiating your own salary is well-correlated with providing value / having valuable skills. Though I see that morgante disagrees, so maybe we should explicitly discuss this! I actually think it's not only rational but also good for the industry and society (long-term) for employees to push hard on improving themselves at the expense of their current employer. But many employers will act in what seems to be rational self-interest, and prefer candidates who won't prioritize themselves over their employer when it's close to zero-sum. (For instance, many employers require tracking and approval of expenses, instead of saying "We hired you to act in the company's interest" and dealing with abuse of expensing after the fact, as they would with e.g. abuse of root credentials.) I'm also not particularly convinced that being good at negotiating your own salary is well-correlated with things you might do on behalf of the company, especially for many non-management-track software engineering careers.
  - morgante 11y ago
    > Though I see that morgante disagrees, so maybe we should explicitly discuss this! I'd actually love to have a discussion about that, as I think it's an implicit assumption behind a lot of these anti-negotiation threads. For my part, I do think that negotiation skills correlate with ability to deliver business value. Ability to command high salaries tends to follow from: (a) understanding what businesses actually value, (b) understanding market dynamics, (c) strong storytelling and communication skills, and (d) confidence/risk tolerance. All of these are, to me, valuable skills for software engineers as they help to translate business strategy and market dynamics into functioning software. (Then again, I come from a place of believing engineers should have broad latitude and that software-driven companies should be more like law firms.)
    - 11y ago

by Chinjut 11y ago

morgante 11y ago

> What is the social value of having negotiation skills be a large determinant of one's salary? Nothing in my comment said there was actually social value in having negotiation skills. I'm talking about my personal experience and the drawbacks I see. Do you think Buffer pays its employees fairly?

Lazare 11y ago
Your argument is circular. You're saying that we shouldn't talk about pay, because when we talk about pay we get paid like Buffer devs do, which you think is obviously low compared to other salaries, which we can't actually prove because we don't talk about pay. It's a bit like telling someone that you're giving them $100 in a box, but not to open the box, because if you open it, it'll turn into $20. "You can only have a high salary if you have no way to verify that it's high." Even if true, where does that leave us?
- morgante 11y ago
  > which we can't actually prove because we don't talk about pay. Just because salaries aren't public doesn't mean you can't get any salary information. Just go on a few interviews, set up an auction, and see what you can get. > It's a bit like telling someone that you're giving them $100 in a box, but not to open the box, because if you open it, it'll turn into $20. It's a cute analogy, but the more complete version would include a box market, where other people with insight into the box market are interested in buying the box I've been given. In such a scenario, I could shop around my box to see what it's actually worth without having to open it up.
  - Lazare 11y ago
    I dunno, let's try the more complete version: "There's $100 in this box. You can't open it, or look inside it, but trust me, it's there. Now you need to go over to my mate George, and give him the box, and he'll give you $100 for it. But only if you haven't opened it!" Now it just sounds like you're being recruited as a drug mule. :) Okay, granted, in your scenario their are multiple box dealers who are willing to bid on your unopened-but-totally-contains-$100 box. If you work at it, it's quite possible that you might even get some semblance of a fair offer. But should you need to work at it? And this still feels like a system which lends itself to collusion, uncertainty, and unfairness. Nor is that even hypothetical; we KNOW that our industry suffered from a serious wage-fixing cartel which was only recently busted open. I feel like any argument against transparency has a high bar to clear.

balls187 11y ago

So discount the value of negotiating as a skill, simply because others aren't good at it? Seems just as biased as rewarding those with negotiating abilities.

geofft 11y ago
One hopes that you're being paid for value to the company, and it's not obvious that being good at negotiating your own salary is well-correlated with providing value / having valuable skills. Though I see that morgante disagrees, so maybe we should explicitly discuss this! I actually think it's not only rational but also good for the industry and society (long-term) for employees to push hard on improving themselves at the expense of their current employer. But many employers will act in what seems to be rational self-interest, and prefer candidates who won't prioritize themselves over their employer when it's close to zero-sum. (For instance, many employers require tracking and approval of expenses, instead of saying "We hired you to act in the company's interest" and dealing with abuse of expensing after the fact, as they would with e.g. abuse of root credentials.) I'm also not particularly convinced that being good at negotiating your own salary is well-correlated with things you might do on behalf of the company, especially for many non-management-track software engineering careers.
- morgante 11y ago
  > Though I see that morgante disagrees, so maybe we should explicitly discuss this! I'd actually love to have a discussion about that, as I think it's an implicit assumption behind a lot of these anti-negotiation threads. For my part, I do think that negotiation skills correlate with ability to deliver business value. Ability to command high salaries tends to follow from: (a) understanding what businesses actually value, (b) understanding market dynamics, (c) strong storytelling and communication skills, and (d) confidence/risk tolerance. All of these are, to me, valuable skills for software engineers as they help to translate business strategy and market dynamics into functioning software. (Then again, I come from a place of believing engineers should have broad latitude and that software-driven companies should be more like law firms.)
  - 11y ago