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Hi all, recently in touch by Spotify recruiter for a Sec Engineer position for remote EU and was told that range was 60-80 out of base salary and equity. Had 2 years of security experience out of my 4 years. Was also told that there is no bonus scheme or no sign in bonus 😕 Not sure how I feel about this tbh.
What do you think?
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Understand the issues you’ve had to deal with, however, this is a business like it or not. If you want to get paid, you need to bill and generate fees worthy of a raise.
I would ask for a 6 month review/check-in and if you are on track to hit, then try to negotiate a raise then without having to wait another full year.
Ask for the raise. It should trigger someone to look beyond the lockstep increases and determine if there is merit there. The response will give you a tremendous amount of information either way, and you can make career decisions based on that information.
Remember, when in doubt, act like a lawyer negotiating for a client. What would you counsel them to do next?
Appreciate that perspective and advice. Thanks.
How far off from your hours goal are you this year/were you last year?
I’m not expecting anything. I’m asking for advice and perspective. I also don’t think I’d characterize 1800 as “really low.” Maybe in insurance defense or when the bulk of work is doc review and research. I have a decent amount of cases where I am the primary attorney with minimal oversight and those particular matters are for smaller clients that require a fair amount of hand holding and administrative work that isn’t necessarily billable. I also think an important factor is that my realization rate is 98.5%. Most other associates, even those hitting the hours, are 85-90%.
I always thought that raises were based on years (because results in increased hourly rate) and bonuses were based on hitting your hours…🤷♂️
Only way to force a raise is to update your resume…
There’s also an element that every year your quality and synergy within the firm goes up and the cost to replace you would be much higher.
I think yearly raises are pretty standard even without hitting hours (unless you were so far away that you’re lucky to still have a job).
It is strange to me that you went two years without any raise - especially when the cost of living has risen faster than usual.
Unfortunately they are taking advantage of the situation and are maxing their own profits. Tbh if they don’t give you a raise then you should probably leave anyway because it’s a shady move in my opinion - especially with the whole family leave.
That being said, it’s just a firm and it’s only a business.
Are you a woman by any chance? This seems like the kind of thing they’d do to a female associate, and unfortunately female associates are statistically less likely to be aggressive when it comes to salary increases. You’re a lawyer and should be advocating for yourself either way.
They vaguely said they had their first child - many firms do shady shit to female associates who gave birth. And it’s also true that women are less likely to negotiate salary.
That said, OP being a man, there is also discrimination by many older attorneys against men who use parental leave. So that’s one element that may not garner a lot of sympathy with older partners who probably used 0 time off for the birth of their children.
Why don’t you run an analysis of the increase in profitability for the firm based on your billing rate increase and ask for 1/3 of that? Ie., if your 1600 x $350 = $560,000 (making up your billing rate at hire), and now 1600 x $440 ($350 + $90) = $704,000. The difference is $144,000, one third of which is $48,000. The billable expectation is a bit B.S. when compared to the real numbers, in my opinion. Especially when you’re doing good work and the firm is relying on you. You could communicate it in a respectful way that leaves the final decision to them since you don’t know all the considerations that go into comp decisions, but just want a fair outcome
I had some personal issues after returning to work after leave. I communicated that to managing partner because they noticed the dip in hours and asked if everything was okay. I suspect that I will not get a salary increase again this year as a result. That said, the firm has increased my hourly rate by $90 since I started (resulting in more revenue for them) and first year associates are making $180k. Only $35k less than me. While I understand needing a carrot and stick approach to incentivize associates to hit hours, I can’t help but feel slighted a bit. On the one hand the hours are on me, but on the other hand I do good work (told this often) and I’m making only slightly more than first years. I am tempted to ask for an increase at the year end review regardless of my hours and prepared to leave if I don’t receive some type of increase. That said, I’m not sure if that is reasonable though and would like to get others’ thoughts.
When you bring comp up focus on the overall revenue that you are generating now vs when you started (should be substantial given $90/hour rate increase) to demonstrate that your salary should increase.
A good rule of thumb is that 1/3 of the revenue you generate should go to your salary, 1/3 to overhead, and 1/3 to partners as profits. If your salary is below 1/3 of your revenue, they can afford to pay you more.