Archive for the ‘Filthy Lucre’ Category

damn it feels good to be a gangsta*

Friday, November 17th, 2006

it feels good to be a gangstaYou know what feels great? Telling a problem client to take a hike.

Some of you all are quivering at the thought of telling a client to take a long walk off a short pier, but I suspect that most of you are grinning, just a little bit.

You see, it is my contention that if you are confident in the value you provide, you probably have some point at which the customer is not only Not Always Right, but at which the customer is in fact WRONG and you have more important things to do with your time than try to coddle them.

I had such a client today. The client wanted a fabulously experienced art director, with lots of conceptual and branding experience, to work on a long-term, as-needed basis. A freelancer, essentially, who would not work a typical 40 hour week and who would never have the opportunity to go permanent. The client is a high-profile national brand who would look great in a freelancer’s portfolio, and we happened to have an excellent candidate who is trying to start his own firm and was eager for the chance to do this work. His rate was substantial, but not out of line with the market for his level of skills and the requirements of the position. I submitted the resume and bill rate, and went about my day- this client is, shall we say, not known for prompt feedback.

This morning, I received a polite but not-very-friendly note from the staffing services manager. She won’t be passing the resume on because “as I discussed with your manager when I placed the order,” they aren’t considering any bill rates above X, because the full-time equivalent would make approximately Y per hour.

Let’s just say that X was insulting, and if that I were to honor that rate, I would have to pay this highly experienced art director something resembling junior designer money.

So I responded with my own polite but not-very-friendly email, explaining that a person making Y would have a bill rate of MUCH HIGHER than X, and that since they specifically requested a freelancer, they could expect that the person will make much more money per hour anyway to make up for the fact that freelancers don’t reliably work 40 hours per week and so the full-time hourly was not a true comparison. Furthermore, my manager doesn’t recall having any sort of bill rate conversation, and while she apologizes if she misremembers the conversation, we still don’t have any “quality freelance art directors willing to work a non-regular schedule at that pay rate at this time.”

In this case, “Please do keep us posted if your needs change,” is secret code for, “Please do feel free to call us if your budget ever lines up with reality.” (more…)

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How to ask for more money

Thursday, July 20th, 2006

I got a call from a friend today who has been involved in a protracted job search. He received an offer from his first-choice company today, but the salary was a little bit on the low side and he wanted to see if he could get them to raise it. He was concerned about how to ask for more money without losing the deal- even if they don’t come through with the increase, he’ll probably take the job and doesn’t want to turn this into a dealbreaker and have the offer rescinded.

My advice was to tell him that ultimately, a hiring manager wants to know that the new hire is happy to work there. So a good way to ask for an increase in the offer is to first express how excited you are about the opportunity. Then say that you were really looking to make closer to X and would like to know if that can be done, and then reiterate how pleased you are to have this opportunity to work with them.

Don’t be afraid to ask for a slight increase in the initial offer if you need it. As long as it’s not a huge percentage increase, and as long as you aren’t a jerk about it, it’s highly unlikely that the offer will be rescinded. (If it is, as I always say, ask yourself if it’s really worth working for a company which doesn’t respect your need to be compensated appropriately.) The company may or may not be able to offer you more money, but you’ll still have the opportunity to accept the original offer without damaging your relationship with your new employer before you even walk through the door.

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You’ll find SEO jobs at Oaseo.

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your recruiter hates games even more

Thursday, July 6th, 2006

Fantastic post by HR Guy about stupid salary games candidates play. He’s right on when he says:

You answer the question because I know you aren’t willing to work for minimum wage. There is some minimum level you will absolutely not work for. If I have posted a salary range for this position, then it shows your level of education about the position. If I have not posted a salary range, you should probably know the pay you would be looking at in the industry you are looking. If you don’t give a salary range and the interviewer doesn’t grill you, you probably lost the job and you should be prepared for that if you’re that stubborn of an ass.

This is doubly true when it’s a third party recruiter asking you the question. People, we ask these questions because we actually NEED TO KNOW. We’re dealing with multiple candidates for multiple positions at a variety of companies, and we need to know just how low is too low for you.

It is in our best interest to get you as much money as we can without screwing the deal. We are usually also in the advantageous position of knowing what the salary range is of the position, so when we also know what your expectations are, it makes it much easier to hammer out an offer with the client. After all, it’s part of our job to help negotiate the salary- we’re the ones with the industry and market expertise across multiple companies (can’t tell you how often the powers that be in a company just have no earthly idea what a fair market salary is), and when we negotiate on your behalf, it’s just a lot less likely to turn distrustful.

So don’t use your silly little evasion tactics on me- you’re wasting my time, and making it more difficult for me to work with you. I don’t expect a hard-and-fast rule- If a position is a good fit for you, I’m not going to turn it down on your behalf because they’re offering $5,000 less than what you were hoping for- I’m going to ask YOU about it. All you accomplish by dodging the question is to annoy the crap out of me and make yourself look like a pompous jerk who thinks he’s too smart for the jobsearch process.

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Background checks for companies worldwide are the specialty of Background Information Services, Inc.

Posted in Filthy Lucre, Interviews | 3 Comments »

She works hard for the money, so hard for it honey

Friday, February 24th, 2006

At the recommendation of one of the guys over at Recruiting.com I’ve been reading Gurus, Hired Guns, and Warm Bodies by Stephen R. Barley and Gideon Kunda. I’ve been finding it pretty interesting so far, though I haven’t gotten that deeply into it yet.

Something I noticed, however, as they were talking about their “itinerant experts” who work with staffing companies, was that there were several sort of offhanded digs directed at the markups charged by staffing companies, as though we somehow “hijack” people’s earnings.

To Barley & Kunda’s credit, they do address this question more fully later in the book and do begin to explain exactly what service the agency provides that justifies the markup. Now, realizing that I am biased, it seems to me that they don’t fully understand what it is that the markup pays for, and the comments from some of the workers interviewed for the book indicate that a lot of candidates don’t really understand it, either. That’s regrettable, because it causes a lot of distrust between candidates and recruiters, which isn’t in anyone’s best interests. So let me explain a little bit about markups and staffing generally in hopes of clarifying it.

A word about how pay/bill rates are figured. I generally determine what the pay rate is based approximately on what someone would get to do the same job as a regular full-time employee. Ideally, I’ll base it on what the client would pay per year for that job, but if the client doesn’t know, I’ll use whatever the approximate market salary would be. If it’s a $50,000 per year job, I divide $50,000 by the number of hours worked in a year, and that’s the hourly rate I offer the talent. From there, I have a standard markup that’s based on all the costs I have to cover, and I charge it to everyone. Only rarely do I deviate from it, and then only in special circumstances. It seems to me that if a talent working on a W-2 for me is making approximately the same amount of money that he or she would be making in a full-time position, I’m not “hijacking” anyone’s potential earnings with my markup.

I realize that there are plenty of agencies out there which place less of an emphasis on paying talent a fair rate. That’s generally because they compete with other agencies on price, and my particular company tries not to play that game. If my client gets rate-shock, I’m pretty confident about the value of both the talent as well as my own work, so while I can usually provide a few dollars of wiggle room, I don’t participate in “how low can you go” contests. After all, if I’m paying my talent fairly, there’s less chance of them getting offered significantly more money somewhere else since they’re already being paid well, and talent who feel like I’m taking good care of them aren’t just going to jump the first time someone offers them another $2 an hour. So if you think you’re working with an agency that doesn’t care about paying you fairly, I encourage you to shop around for another agency.

Now let me address the question of how I earn the markup I charge.

(more…)

Posted in Filthy Lucre, For Employers, Tales from the Field | No Comments »

a jobseeker and her money…

Tuesday, December 20th, 2005

Recruiting.com’s post about paying for the employment process reminded me of something that comes up occasionally in my recruiting efforts.

A reputable recruiting firm will never ask a jobseeker to pay for the firm’s services in representing her. Recruiting and staffing firms make their money by charging fees to the companies looking for candidates, not candidates looking for companies. If you meet with a recruiter who asks you for money, get up and walk out. I don’t trust anyone who wants to take money from people who don’t have jobs just to help them find one- it reeks of taking advantage of people’s desperation.

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What’s that offer really worth?

Friday, July 29th, 2005

A fairly common mistake people make when deciding whether or not to accept an offer is to only think about the number printed in their offer letter. When evaluating whether an offer is fair or not, they only think about the actual dollar amount of their proposed salary.

This is very short-sighted. Employers have become very creative in finding ways to compensate their employees as part of comprehensive packages of which the salary is really just the most noticeable part. When thinking over a job offer, try to see it as a complete package. What other benefits are being offered, what is their monetary value, and what is their value to you?

Health, dental, vision, and prescription coverage have become fairly standard offerings, but what are the details of the plan? Will you pay less in copays for office visits and prescriptions? Is the coverage better?

And what about time off? Are you getting more time off than at your previous position? Employers have to count that as part of your compensation, because if it’s an accrual system, then they have to pay you for any unused time accrued. What kind of sick and personal time do you get?

Contributions to an IRA or 401(k) are also a high-value component of compensation, and one of the easiest to value. If an employer makes a 5% contribution to the retirement account of an employee making $50,000 per year, then they are actually paying the employee an additional $2500 per year.

And then there are all the other perks and benefits that a company might offer. In a major metropolitan area, a lease in a parking garage costs $3000/year, and many employers pay for them. There might be a gym in the company’s building that employees can use- Gym memberships are often worth $500/year.

When all the benefits are taken into account, they can raise the value of a compensation package by 25-35% of the value of the salary component. Don’t make the mistake of only looking at the number printed next to the $ on the offer letter. Dig a little deeper and find out what they’re really offering you.

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