June 8, 2015 at 8:52 am
Jeff Moden (6/8/2015)
Eric M Russell (6/8/2015)
Jeff Moden (6/8/2015)
Andy Warren (6/8/2015)
Jeff, would you decline an offer from a company that publishes all salaries?Yes.
Even if the company were financially stable, the IT projects interesting, and the published salaries where 30% higher than what your current employer allows?
Yes. I've turned down a couple of offers for similar "cultural mistakes".
Even if the pay scale is published, as a manager you still have influence over what pay grade each employee is currently assigned to. Peter knows his own pay grade, and he knows what the next grade pays and the path of how to get there, but he doesn't necessarily have to know his co-worker Paul's pay grade. What I mean is; would you work for a company that posted pay grade salary ranges, but just not the pay grade of each employee?
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
June 8, 2015 at 8:54 am
Government work is definitely a different thing. Like any job, it has good and bad. Disclosure of salary would not be for me a factor in deciding.
Jeff, you have me curious now. I totally get the pain that suddenly publishing salaries could cause, but why would it be an issue if you're a new hire and you can see/believe you're paid fairly because you can see the pay scales and you're ok with the offer?
June 8, 2015 at 9:06 am
If you want to know the salary of a specific US federal employee, someone has created a user friendly website using public data.
http://www.fedsmith.com/2013/04/29/locating-the-salary-of-an-individual-federal-employee/
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
June 8, 2015 at 9:07 am
Andy Warren (6/8/2015)
Government work is definitely a different thing. Like any job, it has good and bad. Disclosure of salary would not be for me a factor in deciding.Jeff, you have me curious now. I totally get the pain that suddenly publishing salaries could cause, but why would it be an issue if you're a new hire and you can see/believe you're paid fairly because you can see the pay scales and you're ok with the offer?
I don't need to do a pay comparison with others in a given company to determine if I'm being paid fairly or not.
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
June 8, 2015 at 9:12 am
Jeff, maybe I didnt ask the question well. I'm not arguing with your choices - yours to make! Just curious to understand if/why joining a company that has published ranges would be a disqualifier?
June 8, 2015 at 9:26 am
Andy Warren (6/8/2015)
Jeff, maybe I didnt ask the question well. I'm not arguing with your choices - yours to make! Just curious to understand if/why joining a company that has published ranges would be a disqualifier?
Most companies do and will tell you the salary range for your job. That doesn't really mean much when it's say a 40K+ range.
June 8, 2015 at 4:07 pm
Eric M Russell (6/8/2015)
Jeff Moden (6/8/2015)
Eric M Russell (6/8/2015)
Jeff Moden (6/8/2015)
Andy Warren (6/8/2015)
Jeff, would you decline an offer from a company that publishes all salaries?Yes.
Even if the company were financially stable, the IT projects interesting, and the published salaries where 30% higher than what your current employer allows?
Yes. I've turned down a couple of offers for similar "cultural mistakes".
Even if the pay scale is published, as a manager you still have influence over what pay grade each employee is currently assigned to. Peter knows his own pay grade, and he knows what the next grade pays and the path of how to get there, but he doesn't necessarily have to know his co-worker Paul's pay grade. What I mean is; would you work for a company that posted pay grade salary ranges, but just not the pay grade of each employee?
No. How many DBAs do you think a company needs and how easy would it be to figure out what their pay grade is? Having been in the military and have worked for such a company for 15 years, I'll also tell you that pay grades are limiting to those who work hard and a form of protection to those that want to coast. I've also found that a lot of people do wear their pay grade on their sleeve much like people in the military do and attempt to control others with it or look down (or up) their noses at other pay grades. I gave up working for such companies back in 1995 and I see no reason to go back. Seriously wrong culture so far as I'm concerned.
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
June 8, 2015 at 4:15 pm
Andy Warren (6/8/2015)
Jeff, maybe I didnt ask the question well. I'm not arguing with your choices - yours to make! Just curious to understand if/why joining a company that has published ranges would be a disqualifier?
Like I said just above, I've found that companies that have such things in place are the wrong culture for me. And, it's not hard to figure out what someone's pay grade is if there are only 2 or 3 of you. I also won't work for a company that does intelligence or personality testing. Again, it has been a powerful indicator to me as to what the culture of the company will be. It's kind of like having a DBA claim to be a query tuning expert and then not be able to correctly describe Clustered and Non-Clustered Indexes never mind the relationship they have with each other. Because of experience, you just know that person isn't going to work out.
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
June 8, 2015 at 5:37 pm
I gave that website a quick look and asked for salary for a particular job title that I held 8 years ago in the location where I held it - and it came up with significantly less that I was paid way back then (and I was working on a job that as interesting and accepting significantly less than the going rate just because it was so interesting), so I don't think I'd want to rely too heavily on what that site says.
Tom
June 9, 2015 at 7:50 am
Jeff Moden (6/8/2015)
Andy Warren (6/8/2015)
Jeff, maybe I didnt ask the question well. I'm not arguing with your choices - yours to make! Just curious to understand if/why joining a company that has published ranges would be a disqualifier?...
I also won't work for a company that does intelligence or personality testing. Again, it has been a powerful indicator to me as to what the culture of the company will be.
...
Is that the same type of company where one shows up for an interview and there are like 20 other candidates locked in separate rooms answering bubble fill questions like:
"You can't cook an omelet without breaking a few eggs."
- strongly agree
- somehat agree
- somewhat disagree
- strongly disagree
Five hours and 500 questions later, the candidate finally ends up in a face to face interview with one guy who has no managment role in IT and seems to have prepared his questions based on another person's resume.
At the end of the day, the candidate is left feeling as if the company has wasted his time.
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
June 9, 2015 at 8:27 am
Eric M Russell (6/9/2015)
Jeff Moden (6/8/2015)
Andy Warren (6/8/2015)
Jeff, maybe I didnt ask the question well. I'm not arguing with your choices - yours to make! Just curious to understand if/why joining a company that has published ranges would be a disqualifier?...
I also won't work for a company that does intelligence or personality testing. Again, it has been a powerful indicator to me as to what the culture of the company will be.
...
Is that the same type of company where one shows up for an interview and there are like 20 other candidates locked in separate rooms answering bubble fill questions like:
"You can't cook an omelet without breaking a few eggs."
- strongly agree
- somehat agree
- somewhat disagree
- strongly disagree
Five hours and 500 questions later, the candidate finally ends up in a face to face interview with one guy who has no managment role in IT and seems to have prepared his questions based on another person's resume.
At the end of the day, the candidate is left feeling as if the company has wasted his time.
Yep. That pretty much describes it. Those and a couple hundred "what's the next pattern" bubble questions, which anyone can be taught to pass in about 5 minutes without knowing anything about programming or SQL Server. I won't even bother with such a company because, from personal experience, it's a very powerful indication of the bureaucracy and how people are going to be in the company.
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
June 9, 2015 at 8:30 am
Jeff, I agree on finding a culture that fits. I won't do the all day interviews, and I look around a lot while I'm there to see dress code, hardware, etc. I'm not a big fan of personality tests either, but haven't had that come up so far.
June 9, 2015 at 8:32 am
Tom, I hear you on accuracy. I've seen some right on the money, others not, and of course most I don't know if they are right. For me it's one more place to look. I do think it points to the hunger for knowledge about pricing. Here in Orlando I have a decent idea of salaries, but if I moved to Birmingham I'd have to try to figure it out, along with the cost of living difference one way or the other.
June 9, 2015 at 8:51 am
Jeff Moden (6/9/2015)
Eric M Russell (6/9/2015)
Jeff Moden (6/8/2015)
Andy Warren (6/8/2015)
Jeff, maybe I didnt ask the question well. I'm not arguing with your choices - yours to make! Just curious to understand if/why joining a company that has published ranges would be a disqualifier?...
I also won't work for a company that does intelligence or personality testing. Again, it has been a powerful indicator to me as to what the culture of the company will be.
...
Is that the same type of company where one shows up for an interview and there are like 20 other candidates locked in separate rooms answering bubble fill questions like:
"You can't cook an omelet without breaking a few eggs."
- strongly agree
- somehat agree
- somewhat disagree
- strongly disagree
Five hours and 500 questions later, the candidate finally ends up in a face to face interview with one guy who has no managment role in IT and seems to have prepared his questions based on another person's resume.
At the end of the day, the candidate is left feeling as if the company has wasted his time.
Yep. That pretty much describes it. Those and a couple hundred "what's the next pattern" bubble questions, which anyone can be taught to pass in about 5 minutes without knowing anything about programming or SQL Server. I won't even bother with such a company because, from personal experience, it's a very powerful indication of the bureaucracy and how people are going to be in the company.
That particular experience was with an insurance company. I think it's based on the theory that they can use data, anaytics, and psychology to predict which candidates are the best fit for the job. From their perspective it makes sense, because they successfully use the same methodology to predict risk level for things like auto and life insurance rates.
They don't ask too many technical or experience based questions, because the jobs are compartmentalized and not very challenging or interesting from that perspective. They're maining looking for folks who follow directions and "fit in". Federal contracting, insurance, and healthcare are three industries that I'll tend to avoid going forward.
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
June 9, 2015 at 5:38 pm
Jeff Moden (6/9/2015)
Eric M Russell (6/9/2015)
Jeff Moden (6/8/2015)
...I also won't work for a company that does intelligence or personality testing. Again, it has been a powerful indicator to me as to what the culture of the company will be.
...
Is that the same type of company where one shows up for an interview and there are like 20 other candidates locked in separate rooms answering bubble fill questions like:
"You can't cook an omelet without breaking a few eggs."
- strongly agree
- somehat agree
- somewhat disagree
- strongly disagree
Five hours and 500 questions later, the candidate finally ends up in a face to face interview with one guy who has no managment role in IT and seems to have prepared his questions based on another person's resume.
At the end of the day, the candidate is left feeling as if the company has wasted his time.
Yep. That pretty much describes it. Those and a couple hundred "what's the next pattern" bubble questions, which anyone can be taught to pass in about 5 minutes without knowing anything about programming or SQL Server. I won't even bother with such a company because, from personal experience, it's a very powerful indication of the bureaucracy and how people are going to be in the company.
I suspect that if you ask scientists who have looked seriously at personality testing they'll tell you that anyone who uses a set of 500 meaningless multiple-choice questions for personality testing to determine suitability of senior STEM employees is a charalatan. I've seen claims that proper question design can make these things work, and (along with come colleagues) I've demonstrated that many of the questionnaires which claim they have proper question design can easily be gamed, provided they are aiming to determine something that's a relvant aspect of personality for such jobs. I don't object to personality testing when it's done effectively, by people who know what they are doing, but I wouldn't trust the average person in an HR department to have a clue how to do it or how to tell a charlatan from a competent person.
Oddly enough, I do personality testing myself when interviewing - and you do too, although perhaps you don't realize it.
The first thing I want to know is whether the applicant has lied in his CV/resumé or elsewhere in his application, exaggerating his knowledge, skills, and experience in an unreasonable manner. So if someone claims 18 years of experience as a DBA in MS SQL Server including all versions from 6.5 to 2014 inclusive, expertise in writing T-SQL queries, disaster recovery, tuning, schema design including normalistion and choice of indexes, and security I will want to ask some questions that tell me whether he is lying - for example, I might start by asking him how to get the current date and time in T-SQL, and follow up by asking what data types are avialble in T-SQL to represent dates, times, and combinations of date and time and how that's changed over the years, maybe something about what are the advantages of a CTE over a subquery, and a few more fairly trivial SQL questions. The object of these questions is to discover quickly whether this is someone who goes in for out-and-out lying so that I can't rely on anything in his CV. If he's not an out-and-out liar I can ask some less trivial questions about SQL, about disaster recovery, about permissions, and so on, and maybe go on to questions aimed at discovering whether he made significant contributions to the things he claims to have done or was just a tea boy or a technical clerk or something equally junior who didn't contribute much at all. That's still trying to discover whether his CV is designed to mislead, contains unreasonable exaggeration of his knowedge, experience, or track record, so it's still testing "is he truthful or is he dishonest?". Only when that issue has been eliminated will I move on to questions which try to discover more about the depth and breadth of knowledge and experience of a genuinely competent and experienced DBA than can be deduced from a 2 page CV and assess what he can contribute to my team and what is his likely value to the company.
Everything mentioned in the forgoing paragraph except the last sentence is personality testing, as it's testing for truthfulness. It's also what people have told me is the best method of personality testing for engineers/scientists (including software and hardware developers and DBAs).
The multiple answer question set can be made effective for some jobs, but not for highly technical jobs.
Tom
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