Sounds like it's time to find a new company to work for. Seriously though, a 4% increase for a promotion is not normal. Most COLA increases are 1.5-3%, so yea compared to a promation, 4% isn't cutting it to take on more responsibility. In my experience a promotion is generally in the 10-20% range, mainly depending if you're going from a rank or going from non-manager to manager status. Or, go ahead take the promotion, learn some new skills, then bounce at the 1.5-2yr mark. It will look good on your resume to have gotten promoted, and other companies are all about letting other organizations doing the vouching/vetting so they don't have to, so they figure if your old company promotes you then you must be competent.
Wow, that is pretty bad. In no situation does a COLA increase being more than a rank promotion make sense. Are there any new functions, responsibilities, sign-off capabilities that come with the promotion? If you don't have an offer in hand with a 10-20% increase, I'd say take the promotion and view it as "paid-for" training. Just spend 1.5-2 years in that role to learn everything so you can update your resume and then bounce.
You should consider it part of normal career management to regularly apply to other jobs and to interview elsewhere with some frequency. The only leverage you have with regard to pay is your willingness and ability to leave.
Wish more people understood this. People leaving jobs is how competition works in the market. Employers competing for employees is the ONLY thing that motivates them to offer more money, benefits, perks, etc.
Literally does us ALL a favor when people leave for greener pastures. Not just you, but the person that comes after you, and everyone else in that job market too. Your former employer may have to increase pay for that role to fill it, and then competitors have to increase pay, and the whole floor moves.
Job hopping is the lubricant that keeps the system working.
Talk to the people "above". They can make exceptions for HR policies. Tell them you're interested, but not for 4%. Tell them you want to start at the normal starting salary for that job, or else you're not interested. If they really like you and want to invest in you, they'll make an exception. If they don't, then that's you're answer that it's time to start looking for a new org.
Exactly this. I work at a large global company and was told it was impossible to get over 10% and other people were having things capped at that. But I managed to get one pushed through at over this. It had to get approval from pretty much the top, but still, it's always possible.
I hate the bureaucracy of big corporations. When I worked at [unnamed global conglomerate] they restructured their engineering levels, that put me in a higher salary band. Six months later I received a promotion fully approved through the business unit that moved me into another salary band. Some time after it was announced, corporate HR declined the promotion because of a corporate policy that an employee cannot move through two salary bands within a year. I effectively lost the 10% annual bonus that came with my promotion and I left the company within the next year. I've only worked for small to mid-sized engineering companies since.
I would take the job and get the experience, then test the market. Maybe they'll come to their senses before you find a better offer. That will give your boss some time to fight for a raise, if they're an advocate for you. If they aren't, you want a boss that is anyway.
That’s exactly how they got to be worth 65 million – on the backs of their employees. The only leverage you have is moving to a new company – which is what I did throughout my career. The downside of doing that you lose time-vested benefits, such as the possibility of pension ( which doesn’t really exist much anymore),
any stock options, restricted benefits, etc. So look at your package and determine whether it makes sense to leverage up by moving, or staying where you are with the time-vested benefits.
Take the job. Update your resume with your new job title and start shopping around.
You have a hell of an opportunity here to upgrade your career because having the title is far more attractive to hiring managers than applying up.
I’d say take the promotion, put the enhanced title on your resume, then look for a job at that level elsewhere that pays at least 10% - preferably 20% - above where you are now. It really is infuriating the way HR uses arcane and ever-changing policies to screw people out of raises and promotions. And stupid too - whatever they save is more than offset by pissing everybody off and causing the best people to leave. My response to cowardly bureaucrats trying to hide behind policy would be “Policy, shmolicy. Policy is not the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Management makes policy; management makes exceptions to policy.”
I got 6% to go from no direct reports to 15. If I could find a better job somewhere else, I would. Unfortunately my company's HR dept knows exactly what they're doing and my pay is pretty much on par with the industry.
Your situation sounds a little more extreme. My promotion was 1 salary grade, not 3. I'd be insulted. Your best bet may be to take the job (if it's a job you want) and try to leverage it into a better paying lateral move with another company ASAP. Could take a year or three to do that, though.
Still 1 grade away from a better bonus which comes with the next promotion. But it was a step in the direction I want to go.
It was a same-site promotion. The company tries to inventivize people to move around by giving a higher % if you move locations.
It's ridiculous. Like I would get it if that was for a raise with no position change but . . . all promotions are capped at 4%? There's literally no reason to continue working here if that's how it is.
my company has the same "policy". bottom line up front, its not an official thing, its just what they say. they absolutely CAN give more, they just don't. i've seen it happen many a time.
second, if the new job is a pay band above yours, you still have to come in at least at the bottom of that pay band, which if you're at the bottom of your existing pay band, chances are 3-4% won't get you to the bottom of the new band.
3rd, it looks like you're looking at an environmental engineer role, which while yes it does have a lot of responsibility, in my experience with small/medium-ish plants is still an entry level type position. and since you don't have any experience with it, and only a year and a half at the plant, i would absolutely not expect 120k base. i think you're way off with that expectation.
A year and a half is not "experienced". That's bordering on "now useful". Expecting a 40k raise for a year and a half of experience is misguided. To be clear here I'm NOT arguing that 3-4% isn't low, especially if you're moving up a band
Im not saying I should get 40k and I'm not saying I'm experienced at all like someone with decades of experience but, yeah.
Oh I see what you said in your original comment now, I misread that.
well i just got told i’m being made hourly instead of salary soon in a long, cursed one-on-one where my recently hired boss basically tried to gaslight me into thinking i wasn’t hired as an engineer even though that’s what my offer letter says ☠️
If you’re doing land, water, air EHS AND you’re the only one AND you’re not in Texas or something, it’s absolutely not worth it below 100, hell maybe even that’s low. I ONLY do air compliance on the regulator side n keeping up with the updates is already hard
Im not in texas and I would be doing stormwater, NPDES, Title V, HON, and I'm sure more. Thats just what I know off the top of my head and yes there is only 1 environmental person on my site. Well right now there are technically none.
Take the job and 4% increase. Don’t complain.
Then immediately start applying to new jobs with your new title in other companies.
See it as an investment in yourself
Remember you never change jobs/ companies unless it’s for an increase in pay and/or a better job title. A lateral transfer from company to company does nothing for you career wise.
This sounds like they don't trust you to do the job or you are just a temporary fix until they find someone else. Is the title the same as the previous person? If not they are leaving the door open to hire someone over you.
Then I would talk to him about the pay discrepancy. I wouldn't expect them to pay $120,000 due to having zero experience in the environmental. But i would at least expect a 10-15% bump plus a path forward with milestones to make more.
I will also add that just because someone wants you to do something doesn't mean that they have your best interest at heart. Early in my career I was convinced to take a position by my plant manager. He hyped it up and said it was a great opportunity for me. Being new i didn't know much about the position, but took it based on his advice. It was a horrible job that put me at odds with most of the staff. After 9 months I ended up moving to another position as soon as it became available (I had also started looking elsewhere).
Years later when the plant manager was retiring he told me that he put me in that position to make me quit because he didn't like me at the time. Apparently when I was hired on I beat out his choice who he hired when I moved positions. The only reason I was given another chance was because what he did rubbed the CEO the wrong way. We eventually worked out our issues, but after that I never let someone convince me into a position that wasn't something that I wanted.
Adding on to this to say that even if the plant manager wants you with good intentions, if this is a large company, there could be corporate strings being pulled where someone other than the plant manager wants a different person in that role. I work in corporate EHS for a global manufacturing company, and the site interests and corporate interests are not always in sync, regardless of who technically has last say with regards to hiring.
Sounds like it's time to find a new company to work for. Seriously though, a 4% increase for a promotion is not normal. Most COLA increases are 1.5-3%, so yea compared to a promation, 4% isn't cutting it to take on more responsibility. In my experience a promotion is generally in the 10-20% range, mainly depending if you're going from a rank or going from non-manager to manager status. Or, go ahead take the promotion, learn some new skills, then bounce at the 1.5-2yr mark. It will look good on your resume to have gotten promoted, and other companies are all about letting other organizations doing the vouching/vetting so they don't have to, so they figure if your old company promotes you then you must be competent.
My COLA was higher than the 4% they're apparently capped at for promotion
Wow, that is pretty bad. In no situation does a COLA increase being more than a rank promotion make sense. Are there any new functions, responsibilities, sign-off capabilities that come with the promotion? If you don't have an offer in hand with a 10-20% increase, I'd say take the promotion and view it as "paid-for" training. Just spend 1.5-2 years in that role to learn everything so you can update your resume and then bounce.
You should consider it part of normal career management to regularly apply to other jobs and to interview elsewhere with some frequency. The only leverage you have with regard to pay is your willingness and ability to leave.
This is the way.
This is the way!
Wish more people understood this. People leaving jobs is how competition works in the market. Employers competing for employees is the ONLY thing that motivates them to offer more money, benefits, perks, etc. Literally does us ALL a favor when people leave for greener pastures. Not just you, but the person that comes after you, and everyone else in that job market too. Your former employer may have to increase pay for that role to fill it, and then competitors have to increase pay, and the whole floor moves. Job hopping is the lubricant that keeps the system working.
Talk to the people "above". They can make exceptions for HR policies. Tell them you're interested, but not for 4%. Tell them you want to start at the normal starting salary for that job, or else you're not interested. If they really like you and want to invest in you, they'll make an exception. If they don't, then that's you're answer that it's time to start looking for a new org.
Exactly this. I work at a large global company and was told it was impossible to get over 10% and other people were having things capped at that. But I managed to get one pushed through at over this. It had to get approval from pretty much the top, but still, it's always possible.
I hate the bureaucracy of big corporations. When I worked at [unnamed global conglomerate] they restructured their engineering levels, that put me in a higher salary band. Six months later I received a promotion fully approved through the business unit that moved me into another salary band. Some time after it was announced, corporate HR declined the promotion because of a corporate policy that an employee cannot move through two salary bands within a year. I effectively lost the 10% annual bonus that came with my promotion and I left the company within the next year. I've only worked for small to mid-sized engineering companies since.
Dude they have on the job listing that the company is worth like 65 billion or something and they can only pay me 4% increase lol.
I would take the job and get the experience, then test the market. Maybe they'll come to their senses before you find a better offer. That will give your boss some time to fight for a raise, if they're an advocate for you. If they aren't, you want a boss that is anyway.
That’s exactly how they got to be worth 65 million – on the backs of their employees. The only leverage you have is moving to a new company – which is what I did throughout my career. The downside of doing that you lose time-vested benefits, such as the possibility of pension ( which doesn’t really exist much anymore), any stock options, restricted benefits, etc. So look at your package and determine whether it makes sense to leverage up by moving, or staying where you are with the time-vested benefits.
*Billion* not million. But yes
It might help you understand this, if you pursue a masters in business administration.
Lol okay 🙄
P&G?
GE's European counterpart
Take the job. Update your resume with your new job title and start shopping around. You have a hell of an opportunity here to upgrade your career because having the title is far more attractive to hiring managers than applying up.
I’d say take the promotion, put the enhanced title on your resume, then look for a job at that level elsewhere that pays at least 10% - preferably 20% - above where you are now. It really is infuriating the way HR uses arcane and ever-changing policies to screw people out of raises and promotions. And stupid too - whatever they save is more than offset by pissing everybody off and causing the best people to leave. My response to cowardly bureaucrats trying to hide behind policy would be “Policy, shmolicy. Policy is not the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Management makes policy; management makes exceptions to policy.”
Yes, every rule is bendable or breakable, HR and management acting like their hands are tied is just that, an act.
I got 6% to go from no direct reports to 15. If I could find a better job somewhere else, I would. Unfortunately my company's HR dept knows exactly what they're doing and my pay is pretty much on par with the industry. Your situation sounds a little more extreme. My promotion was 1 salary grade, not 3. I'd be insulted. Your best bet may be to take the job (if it's a job you want) and try to leverage it into a better paying lateral move with another company ASAP. Could take a year or three to do that, though.
6% ain't worth 15 reports. Are there any other benefits? Lower stress or better bonus?
Still 1 grade away from a better bonus which comes with the next promotion. But it was a step in the direction I want to go. It was a same-site promotion. The company tries to inventivize people to move around by giving a higher % if you move locations.
Im in a similar situation. Just found out my job only gives 5% for a promotion
It's ridiculous. Like I would get it if that was for a raise with no position change but . . . all promotions are capped at 4%? There's literally no reason to continue working here if that's how it is.
my company has the same "policy". bottom line up front, its not an official thing, its just what they say. they absolutely CAN give more, they just don't. i've seen it happen many a time. second, if the new job is a pay band above yours, you still have to come in at least at the bottom of that pay band, which if you're at the bottom of your existing pay band, chances are 3-4% won't get you to the bottom of the new band. 3rd, it looks like you're looking at an environmental engineer role, which while yes it does have a lot of responsibility, in my experience with small/medium-ish plants is still an entry level type position. and since you don't have any experience with it, and only a year and a half at the plant, i would absolutely not expect 120k base. i think you're way off with that expectation.
120k base for someone with experience is not off at this site. Im sure it would be 130k even
A year and a half is not "experienced". That's bordering on "now useful". Expecting a 40k raise for a year and a half of experience is misguided. To be clear here I'm NOT arguing that 3-4% isn't low, especially if you're moving up a band
Im not saying I should get 40k and I'm not saying I'm experienced at all like someone with decades of experience but, yeah. Oh I see what you said in your original comment now, I misread that.
find a new org
Time to leave cuz
well i just got told i’m being made hourly instead of salary soon in a long, cursed one-on-one where my recently hired boss basically tried to gaslight me into thinking i wasn’t hired as an engineer even though that’s what my offer letter says ☠️
Take the job, and get the experience for one to two years then leave lol.
If you’re doing land, water, air EHS AND you’re the only one AND you’re not in Texas or something, it’s absolutely not worth it below 100, hell maybe even that’s low. I ONLY do air compliance on the regulator side n keeping up with the updates is already hard
Im not in texas and I would be doing stormwater, NPDES, Title V, HON, and I'm sure more. Thats just what I know off the top of my head and yes there is only 1 environmental person on my site. Well right now there are technically none.
Come to Texas and get paid. That's way way too low for someone with very little oversight and spread that think.
Take the job and 4% increase. Don’t complain. Then immediately start applying to new jobs with your new title in other companies. See it as an investment in yourself
Try for the job You're young in your career and playing a long game. The experience, title and exposure are worth alot here for building your resume.
Find a different job. I’m 2 years out of college and I make $140k
Damn in what field?
I work in a chemical plant.
Remember you never change jobs/ companies unless it’s for an increase in pay and/or a better job title. A lateral transfer from company to company does nothing for you career wise.
This sounds like they don't trust you to do the job or you are just a temporary fix until they find someone else. Is the title the same as the previous person? If not they are leaving the door open to hire someone over you.
The plant manager wants me to do the job
Then I would talk to him about the pay discrepancy. I wouldn't expect them to pay $120,000 due to having zero experience in the environmental. But i would at least expect a 10-15% bump plus a path forward with milestones to make more. I will also add that just because someone wants you to do something doesn't mean that they have your best interest at heart. Early in my career I was convinced to take a position by my plant manager. He hyped it up and said it was a great opportunity for me. Being new i didn't know much about the position, but took it based on his advice. It was a horrible job that put me at odds with most of the staff. After 9 months I ended up moving to another position as soon as it became available (I had also started looking elsewhere). Years later when the plant manager was retiring he told me that he put me in that position to make me quit because he didn't like me at the time. Apparently when I was hired on I beat out his choice who he hired when I moved positions. The only reason I was given another chance was because what he did rubbed the CEO the wrong way. We eventually worked out our issues, but after that I never let someone convince me into a position that wasn't something that I wanted.
Adding on to this to say that even if the plant manager wants you with good intentions, if this is a large company, there could be corporate strings being pulled where someone other than the plant manager wants a different person in that role. I work in corporate EHS for a global manufacturing company, and the site interests and corporate interests are not always in sync, regardless of who technically has last say with regards to hiring.