How We Replaced Salary Negotiations with a Sinatra App

Presented at RedDotRubyConf 2016 in Singapore.

Transcript

1. How we replaced Salary Negotiations With a Sinatra App Konstantin Haase @konstantinhaase / @rkh_popcorn Travis CI travis-ci.com
3. There will be code. I promise.
4. @jocranford
9. What’s in a salary?
11. $1,000,000 per episode $100,000 per episode 10x actor?
16. “Why are the best programmers 10x more productive than mediocre programmers, but paid only 3x as much?”
17. “How do bootstrapped companies hire talent?”
19. ‣ bootstrapped ‣ 38 employees ‣ top talent ‣ base in Berlin, Germany Travis CI
20. ‣ 8 countries, 16 nationalities ‣ 54% women (50% in engineering) ‣ wide range of backgrounds ‣ we’ll keep hiring Travis CI
21. Salaries account for 46% of our spendings, making it the biggest cost centre.
22. We don’t negotiate salaries.
23. A Sinatra application tells us what to pay someone.
24. Negotiation skills don’t reflect your value to the company.
25. Negotiation skills don’t reflect your financial needs.
26. Salary negotiations harm underrepresented groups.
28. Source: Fortune Magazine
29. The Travis CI Salary Framework™
31. Developing the “Framework” took a full year. Everyone could participate.
32. We pay by value. We pay by needs. We use generalised rules that apply to everyone.
34. Value
36. How do you define a 10x developer (if they exist)?
37. Example: Software Engineer — Level 10
38. Shows an intuitive grasp of situations, analytic approach used only in novel situations.
39. Is self-motivated to the point that they create new work (for themselves and sometimes others) and has their own vision for what needs to be done.
40. Understands business requirements. Does not just understand but also shape the big picture.
41. Engineering Career Path defined up to level 17 at the moment.
42. Employees should level up about once a year.
43. If an employee doesn’t get a raise, that’s considered a bug, not a feature.
44. Needs
45. We use a generalised “needs” model based on location.
47. www.economist.com/content/big-mac-index
49. numbeo.com
50. rkh.im/move (outdated, does not work properly for Singapore)
52. glassdoor.com
53. payscale.com
55. Only compare data points from the same source.
61. Country base line based on how market rates* compare to Berlin. City adjustments based on how the living costs compared to national average. Income tax estimation is added on top. * Factor adjusted upwards for low income countries, for city states Consumer Prices and Rent Index will be used if higher
63. Rates calculated for 3563 cities in 209 countries Four countries also have 92 regions.
64. youtube.com/user/CGPGrey
66. Currencies are tricky.
69. © Lincoln Stoll
70. What’s important: Competitive, Comfortable, Fair, Feasible, Prospective
71. Everyone can participate in the salary discussion.
72. Thank you! Konstantin Haase @konstantinhaase / @rkh_popcorn Travis CI travis-ci.com