July 22, 2011 at 8:30 am
Rod at work (7/22/2011)
Good question for a Friday, Steve. My short answer to your question is, no. I don't really know my market value is in my local area. A large part of that is because I work for a university; have for the last 15 years. Universities always pay less than the private sector. I'm sure that I could probably make more in the private sector.
I used to work for a university (University of Nebraska-Lincoln) and we were always considered "public" because a fair portion of our funding *did* come from state taxes, etc.
July 22, 2011 at 8:40 am
cengland0 (7/22/2011)
Rod at work (7/22/2011)
A large part of that is because I work for a university; have for the last 15 years. Universities always pay less than the private sector. I'm sure that I could probably make more in the private sector.Universities are in the private sector. Elementary, Junior High, and High Schools are in the Public sector. My taxes pay for your children to get an education even though I don't have any children of my own. However, my taxes do not pay for your college education. Yes, you can get some government grants but the state still recognizes the institutions as private. They make a profit, right? Do they give all their profits back to our government? Nope!
I work for a state university. Our budget is very largely set by the state legislature. Yes, there are funds from other areas, but that is the significant minority of our budget.
Kindest Regards, Rod Connect with me on LinkedIn.
July 22, 2011 at 8:53 am
@DBA_ANDY (7/22/2011)
Rod at work (7/22/2011)
I used to work for a university (University of Nebraska-Lincoln) and we were always considered "public" because a fair portion of our funding *did* come from state taxes, etc.
That's wonderful. I'll have to move to Nebraska and get a free education without having to pay anything out of pocket.
July 22, 2011 at 9:07 am
cengland0 (7/22/2011)
@DBA_ANDY (7/22/2011)
Rod at work (7/22/2011)
I used to work for a university (University of Nebraska-Lincoln) and we were always considered "public" because a fair portion of our funding *did* come from state taxes, etc.That's wonderful. I'll have to move to Nebraska and get a free education without having to pay anything out of pocket.
Ha! Let me know how that works out for you! 🙂
July 22, 2011 at 9:21 am
PayScale.com has many inputs (including experience and employer type for determining salary ranges).
July 22, 2011 at 9:44 am
I wish I found salary surveys more reliable, but for an awful lot of people, they are still just a bit too generic.
If you're in a fairly big technology center, and have a very standardized job description (SQL server DBA), you might be able to get a good snapshot of what people are being paid. But as you get into areas where fewer people have the job, and jobs that are a bit more flexible (programming jobs on small team especially fall into this category), finding comparables is very difficult.
Then there is the problem about how salaries are arrived at in the first place. The initial salary is negotiated and then raises often happen through varying HR policy.
So you'll get some people who stay at the same job, doing essentially junior job duties, but creeping into the senior salary band. But if they had to find a new job, that's not what they could command. Likewise you can have someone developing great skills, but who negotiated badly for their first salary and stuck in a lagging review process, and making far beneath what others would pay.
Beyond that, salary surveys are backward looking. How much a company would truly pay to get you comes down to a supply/demand question. So even if a typical Orange County DBA makes 90k, the amount you can expect changes a lot if there is one DBA job in the area and 20 unemployed DBAs vs if there are 20 companies looking, and all needing to recruit currently employed people to attract talent.
July 22, 2011 at 9:51 am
Nevyn (7/22/2011)
If you're in a fairly big technology center, and have a very standardized job description (SQL server DBA),
I used to have job title of DBA/Consultant but since I work for HR, they standardized all our job codes into HR job codes. I'm now considered a Process Design Consultant (whatever that means). I still do the exact same job but with a weird job code.
July 22, 2011 at 9:51 am
Interesting (and timely) topic for me! I relocated recently from Australia to Vancouver, Canada. I knew my market value in Australia, but when i started discussing salary with recruiters and employers in Vancouver, I had no idea of my market value. Wages in Australia seem to be around 20% higher than an equivalent job in Vancouver (plus you get 4 weeks holiday). Contracting in Australia pays even more again. I found it really difficult to accept a job that paid less than what I was on in Australia, especially given the cost of living in Vancouver and the fact that the Aussie dollar is worth more than both the Canadian and US at the moment!
July 22, 2011 at 9:59 am
We have had some discussion on the Salary survey sites here in my office regarding how they don't take platform into account either - at least in our market Oracle DBA's and DB2 DBA's make more than SQL DBA's - so when you say DBA's make 70-100K it can be misleading.
July 22, 2011 at 10:11 am
Don't forget to factor in the salary multipliers in the footnotes for MS SQL, Oracle, etc. skills. I also like the job descriptions on the Robert Half site.
July 22, 2011 at 12:32 pm
I am on the upper end of the scale - not maximum but upper end for where i live. I am also mid aged immigrant. The problem with all this is finding not just a place that pays more but offers creative work, and respect for diversity and all of that. After a certain age it gets way way complicated. To me i dont' intend going anywhere unless i make a break somehow - in cloud/BI/virtualisation or somethign else that is really hot so that i can find what i need without humungous effort.Otherwise one DBA job is not that different than another, for a few extra $ might end up losing a comfortable niche. As techologists many time i have noticed also that the tide carries you whether you want to move or not, the workplace changes, technologies change, needs change..so if you are in a reasonably good position just keep sharp and learning and keep your eyes open, sometimes things can and will happen automatically.
July 22, 2011 at 1:07 pm
I would have to say that the range is somewhere between X and Y depending on the WDYL factor. Also i would say it depends on the company.:w00t:
July 22, 2011 at 1:11 pm
I have 41 years of experience, first database work on Cullinet in 1979, then IDMS, IMS, DB2, Informix, Oracle, and since 1997, SQL Server.
I am in Redmond, WA, and on the top of the scale.
July 22, 2011 at 1:59 pm
cengland0 (7/22/2011)
Ninja's_RGR'us (7/22/2011)
So what are your negotiation tips / tactics?I haven't been on the Market for a new job for 10 years. I have no desire to leave my current company regardless of salary.
If I was interested in going elsewhere, and I still have my current job, I would demand the salary at the higher end of the range. If they don't accept, I don't take the job.
On the other hand, if I was laid-off and was desperate to find a new one, I would probably accept whatever they offered the first time.
I'm kinda in the same boat. I know the market range and keep that in mind in negotiations. It also doesn't hurt to try to expand the market favorably since many employers try to expand it to the bottom end of that curve.
Jason...AKA CirqueDeSQLeil
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July 22, 2011 at 2:25 pm
SQLRNNR (7/22/2011)
. . . It also doesn't hurt to try to expand the market favorably since many employers try to expand it to the bottom end of that curve.
... and usually they get what they pay for.
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