How Not to Bomb Your Offer Negotiation(haseebq.com) |
How Not to Bomb Your Offer Negotiation(haseebq.com) |
Source: https://www.highstakesdb.com/2375-haseeb-qureshi-admits-to-c...
http://www.cardrunners.com/blog/internetpokers/the-girah-sca...
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.
I think it's pronounced "self-promoter."
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.
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.
Businesses will "underpay" if possible, but also readily "overpay" if the person brings in certain skills and if makes sense from a business perspective in that very moment.
I have not noticed underpaid people getting more respect or better opportunities than the others.
Where is this place where such info is hidden? Because I definitely don't want to work there.
In big companies, the managers don't have too much input, and no skin in the game. Plus, it isn't a "trick" and negotiating isn't unprofessional - it's just business.
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.
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.
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...
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.
http://haseebq.com/farewell-app-academy-hello-airbnb-part-ii...
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.
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.
Wondering if you guys have experienced the same.
In his words, he could never split the difference in a hostage negotiation. When you enter the process understanding this, you do things differently.
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.
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.
No, they are your bosses. They might be colleagues, but that is secondary.
Glad I'm not the only one who thought this :)
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.
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?
>If you're really good, you can easily negotiate up to 400k/year real money(cash + stocks).
It's funny how early stage startups talk of hiring "the best" and most can't even come close to affording that level of compensation.
This whole thing is a joke.
That's not what I said, but thanks for your contribution all the same.
Airbnb offered him less to start. So I'm curious if someone in similar shoes (say, similar level of experience) used his expanded offer as a point of negotiation.
Coming back to negotiation room, often, basic benefits are already included (e.g. healthcare, although this seems to be true in the US, too). But 35 hour weeks, more holiday, longer lunch break to go to the gym, working from home twice a week, these are all things I've negotiated.
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!
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.
And yeah, with a big hype from VCs and investors tweeting about startupX, Y, Z, engineers get fooled and join a startup and work for 4 years and later figure out it was a bad idea.
It's a very bad idea to join a startup for money unless you know the founders really well who have a track record of selling themselves to Google/Facebook/Oracle/MSFT.
I work in product company with high profits in billions. It's common for new grad engineers who join as L3 and become L5 in 3-5 years in all the above companies.
I don't know what Facebook, Amazon, Google etc. pay, but from what I've heard I'm guessing it's about in the same £70k-£100k bracket as the financial firms.
Actually, that sounds like a great reason to volunteer my current salary. As long as I'm not desperate I don't want to work for a company that maintains such an idiotic policy, because it tells me something about how they view and value their employees.
If HR is that bad, and the organization gives HR that kind of power, how can you say the organization is "quite good"?
Salary secrecy can't really extend to managers unless you want your managers to do a poor job rewarding people. How's it supposed to work when someone comes to their manager and asks for a raise? "I think I'm underpaid and want a 10% raise." "Well, I don't know what you or anyone else makes so I have no idea if you're underpaid. Deal with it I guess."
>How's it supposed to work when someone comes to their manager and asks for a raise
Every where I worked, you (as an individual contributor)go to the higher up, who knows your salary with the recommendation from your manager, saying that you're doing excellent job or whatever.
I'm saying that you're wrong. I know what my direct reports make. So does every other manager at my company and every manager I know who works at any other company.
> Every where I worked, you (as an individual contributor)go to the higher up, who knows your salary with the recommendation from your manager, saying that you're doing excellent job or whatever.
That sounds really dysfunctional and bureaucratic. Now you're asking the manager to stick his neck out and ask for a raise for one of his reports when he doesn't even know what his reports make.
I imagine in some large companies depending on how top down there, they don't do it. But I wouldn't present it as a rule.
So how does asking for a raise work. You work with you manager all year. Then all of the sudden you go over his head at the end and talk to his boss about wanting a raise? I have never seen that. Sounds a bit strange.
Anyway, original point still stands. The lowest level boss which does know what you do and sees that you have a $50k higher salary and yet do work that not really $50k extra worth will put a target on your back.
Bingo! He's joking.
Offers i had got, Uber, Airbnb, Snapchat, Google, Robinhood, Netflix, Salesforce, Affirm, An investment bank in NYC, Two stealth startup in SF.
In Facebook, it's very common for one high perfoming engineer getting discretionary equity of 1M+ if you do re-defines or create a meaningful impact.
I'm sorry i'm not going for any startup soon as it's hard for employees to make money now. People join startups thinking they are going to do 10X. But investors give equity to startup engineers at 4X inflated valuation. So outcome is probably 2.5x with very high risk.
You do exceptional performance at google/facebook/uber and get noticed by your director and he throws 1M worth RSUS on you in next review cycle. Do it twice and there goes `rest and vest`.
The worst part is if you think this is the best offer for the years of experience, then you're totally mistaken :D
Every compensation discussion on HN invariably brings out of the woodwork That One Guy Who Knows That One Guy Who Makes $400K at Google. The take-away from reading these threads should NOT be that this is an ordinary compensation.
http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Software_Engineer/Sa...
https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/san-francisco-software-en...
Why not go interview at a big company, then?
Not posting this to brag. I'd like to increase awareness among engineers to negotiate.
I can show you my W-2 at the end of this year.
My experience is that only outliers ever come out and talk about their compensation, leaving the audience with the impression that most everyone is either a $400k/year Googlecorn or a $40k/year code slave.
Your aim to "increase awareness" does nothing for a normal or even above average software engineer negotiating their offer at a non-outlier company. How does this help them? "I think $200K is reasonable because somebody on the Internet told me that some people at Google make $400K?" Is that really going to fly, basically anywhere?
EDIT: Another source:
God do I need to get out of the startup world and start working for one of the unicorns....
But what happens is I talk to my manager and they they'll go find out and make a case for me if they are not authorized to do it themselves.
> If he is then, again, there shouldn't be a problem since you both agreed that your compensation is fair for both sides.
Well that was the original premise of the post. If negotiating like one negotiates buying a car, showing counter offers and so on. They might feel like you tricked them, if you then don't do the job to the level of your salary.
This will also be a problem if you do worse job than expected and your manager does not know your salary. Simple solution - don't do a bad job if you don't want to be fired.
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.
He wasn't just a graduate of a hacker bootcamp, he was hired on by App Academy after he finished and was quickly promoted up to Director of Product. He spent a lot of time teaching people how to pass whiteboard interviews. He was probably better prepared for an interview than your average Stanford CS grad, and already had prior experience as Director of Product and a portfolio of side projects.
He didn't bluff any company. He went through Triple Byte, the trendiest new tech recruitment startup. He got an offer from Triple Byte themselves even though he didn't even apply for them, got an offer from Google, and when word about the Google offer got out every other company started bidding for him.
He's also just a really smart guy in general. If you spend 15 minutes talking to him, he'll leave an impression. It's not a bluff or a con, he's just a really smart, really analytical guy.
"He didn't get a 250k salary, that was total compensation, largely RSUs on a standard vesting schedule."
Yes, and he purposefully chose (as he describes) the more "illiquid" of two offers.
"He also donates 1/3rd of his pre-tax income to charity."
Admirable and very commendable (I can't stress how much I really respect this about him), but irrelevant.
"If you spend 15 minutes talking to him, he'll leave an impression."
-- the definition of "charisma"
I agree with a lot of what you say (and in fact, I work at a company that doesn't allow negotiations at all and has an open salary calculator: http://stackoverflow.com/company/salary/calculator ) but I wouldn't call it sad at all, I would call it playing the game.
I'm saying without any attempt at being rude: You're thinking way too much like a programmer.
One thing that struck me, that location adjustment for high COL cities isn't nearly enough. If I was working for SO, I'd definitely want to be remote.
From his about page:
> I quickly rose to the top of my class, and after two months into the three-month bootcamp, I was asked to join the instructional team. Three months later, I was promoted to Director of Product.
That wouldn't have happened if he wasn't good at what he does. Clearly he is doing something that is more than just the right charm.
Also, letting go of whatever opinion you have about his technical skill, absolutely everyone should negotiate their salary. I never have though, for many of the reasons outlined in his first post. Thanks to his writing I will definitely negotiate whenever my next change happens and apply his techniques - his writing has provided a huge amount of value to engineers everywhere in the same position.
Never underestimate the immense power of bullshit. I've seen people rise through the ranks fueled by nothing but it. I know senior software engineers who cannot write code, but can look great TALKING about code. I know engineering managers who cannot manage, but can self-promote and dazzle you in an interview. It's truly an art.
http://haseebq.com/farewell-app-academy-hello-airbnb-part-ii...
Excerpt:
... many people are drawing the conclusion that I primarily got a job at Airbnb by being really good at negotiating, or gaming the system, or something like that.
If you have ever done a software engineering interview, you would know that this is completely absurd. There is no way to negotiate or charm someone into passing a software engineering interview. Much less 8 of them.
If you don’t know the ins and outs of object-oriented programming, database design, asymptotic analysis, binary search trees, or how to improve the cache efficiency of an algorithm, then you’re not going to pass a computer science-heavy interview at a top company. You don’t even have a shot at it.
The moral of my story is not “get really good at negotiating and you’ll get a great job.” Negotiating is important, and I certainly encourage everyone to negotiate!
But first, get good at the thing you’re doing. Then worry about negotiating.
I moved to San Francisco from Austin, Texas about a year ago because I decided I was going to earn-to-give. Since then I’ve been relentlessly trying to build a new career for myself, so I could earn more and donate more to charity.
Entering into App Academy, barely knowing the basics of Ruby, I came into the office and grinded every day, spending 80+ hour weeks just coding and studying. I’d come in at 9AM in the morning and leave around midnight, 7 days a week, sleeping in a bunk bed in SOMA in a 200 square feet shared room.
It’s certainly true that I probably have a mind that’s well-suited for coding. But it’s also true that I outworked almost everyone who was in my cohort. And when I was hired by App Academy to help teach the course, I continued working as hard as I could to get good at this.
I still stayed late in the evenings, I still came into the office on weekends alongside the students just to continue coding and learning more. I started an algorithms study group in the evenings where I taught students new algorithms that I had read about, and wrote specs and instructions to guide them through the implementation. I took over our entire algorithms curriculum and taught well over 100 students the basics of data structures and algorithms.
And of course, I was scared that none of this would matter. That having been an English major, having a non-traditional background, being 26 and too old to transition into tech, competing against 20 year olds who’d been coding since they were 10, I thought I must have no chance.
Thankfully, I was wrong. And I’m very, very lucky that I was wrong, because I was almost right.
I'm sure the author is sufficiently qualified to pass such an interview (or 8), but I find this statement pretty bizarre. "Charm" might not be the right word, but under-qualified candidates pass software engineering interviews all the time.
So, does one keep the recruiter waiting and apply for other companies telling everyone that you have an offer with Google? How long of a leeway does one have in such negotiations? How long can you keep the recruiter waiting before they close the gates? Is it a good job search strategy?
Hold up, by this logic does this mean that people who don't have these things (no advanced math, no top-tier 4 year school) should receive salaries that are even less than half of that?
Or will it make you feel worse to feel that he was denied the position at AirBnB but made some phone calls?
Its cool, learn how to play your cards, and this guy already had a track record of successfully doing that
The computer details aren't the hard part of software jobs.
Here's why I'm concerned:
1. The grandparent links to two articles as "sources." One's a guest blog by the subject. The other's a self-quote of the subject extracted from a full interview, which is linked but both the site and the link are dead. And the grandparent's only comments on the account are in this thread, supplying the "sources." Here's a 2013 non-HN thread accusing him of smurfing accounts for publicity [0].
2. His publicity and claims seem intentionally difficult to prove.[1] (Note: another low-credibility source.)
3. His LinkedIn profile lists 99th percentile standardized test scores (LSAT and GRE). Normally, this isn't notable, but my "BS" pattern-matching is flagging this within the context of #1 and #2.
[0] http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/29/news-views-gossip-spons...
[1] http://www.thepokerpractice.com/poker/haseeb-ashton-griffin-...
At least for me, the dude is insightful and his long form articles about tactics are worth his "self-promotion".
I have come to believe that getting a job is either luck or accident.
Qualification is just the other half of the whole story. And by qualification I mean not just the scale/standard by which I would be measured during the interview but also formal educational endorsements.
Am I qualified to get a job ? Maybe. Am I lucky ? I'll find out. Same holds for any job seeker out there as well. Will I do anything meaningful at work or release more bugs than anybody else out there... Time will tell.
[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/how-biz-stone-became-a-twitte...