GRcade

My new job seems to be going okay. Bit disorganised but interesting. Oxford is nice! Bit surreal walking to work through all these old buildings and stuff. I work half with academics and half with the police force, and the police are by far the easier to get on with.

This is the view from my office, which is a bit different to a run-down industrial estate in Nottingham.

I sometimes prefer the shithole view from offices, with a sight like that I'd want to be outside. Not so much when you're in a dingy scheme somewhere.

Found out we're All getting a 14% bonus for 2016's company performance when we get paid on Friday.

Bloody taxman will be getting a large slice though

Had someone in today to help us with teamwork which as expected turnedninto a group councilling moaning session as anything like this does in our office. I suggested people should open up much more to each other, because everyone has issues with how things are and nobody talks about them.

KingK wrote:Found out we're All getting a 14% bonus for 2016's company performance when we get paid on Friday.

Bloody taxman will be getting a large slice though

I get my bonus tomorrow and the tax man's taking just over 1K!

The Switch is looking tempting.

Slayerx wrote:

KingK wrote:Found out we're All getting a 14% bonus for 2016's company performance when we get paid on Friday.

Bloody taxman will be getting a large slice though

I get my bonus tomorrow and the tax man's taking just over 1K!

The Switch is looking tempting.

I wish the tax man was only getting £1k! He's getting over £2.5k

I wish I earned enough to get enough of a bonus that the tax man could take that much of it.

I wish I actually got a bonus.

I've only ever had 1 and that was £100.

We get one every three months. It varies between £80-300. This depends on how much has been spent on paying agency staff to come in and cover for us. Which is total bullshit as recruitment is nothing to do with us. Stop penalising the hard work we put in when management and head office leave posts vacant for months at a time and can't fill the bloody rota.

What the hell is a bonus and how do I get one?

The only job I was ever in where I got a bonus was when I was working I retail and helped to set up a store because the owner didn't pay to hire professionals. I got $75 I think

Christ on a bike. Last year we got £400 which was much less after tax.

Edit: although having said that they've changed the methodology on how they award the bonus now to reflect personal performance as opposed to company performance. So I might be able to get a bit more.

Just sent a design document to get peer reviewed and its has just landed on my manager's, boss's desk.

Lets see what he thinks.

Biggest bonus I've ever got was about £3,500, although that was when I worked in sales (kind of), so it was actually not much in that context.

On another note, does anyone here deliberate about how senior to go in a company, or their career in general? The general expectation seems to be to just keep rising to the top as much as you can, but then you get into people management, higher stress, higher responsibility, etc. I'm just wondering when the point comes of saying "yep, this is senior enough". All my career so far has been about progressing and getting higher up the ladder, but what happens when you reach the point where the negatives outweigh the higher salary/status etc? I wonder what the motivation would be then if you're gone as far as you want to go.

We found out about our bonus the other day, lowest ever at just over £1k but that'll get taxed too. Couple of years back we got £5k.

Lotus wrote:Biggest bonus I've ever got was about £3,500, although that was when I worked in sales (kind of), so it was actually not much in that context.

On another note, does anyone here deliberate about how senior to go in a company, or their career in general? The general expectation seems to be to just keep rising to the top as much as you can, but then you get into people management, higher stress, higher responsibility, etc. I'm just wondering when the point comes of saying "yep, this is senior enough". All my career so far has been about progressing and getting higher up the ladder, but what happens when you reach the point where the negatives outweigh the higher salary/status etc? I wonder what the motivation would be then if you're gone as far as you want to go.

I've been thinking this lately.

It's starting to piss me off already as it is, with my 20 minute commute and lack of dependents. When we move out of the city, (hopefully) have children, parents get older etc am I really going to be dedicated enough to want to deal with the soul-destroying gooseberry fool that comes with the territory the further up you go? I doubt it.

But I also want more money.

Oblomov Boblomov wrote:

Lotus wrote:Biggest bonus I've ever got was about £3,500, although that was when I worked in sales (kind of), so it was actually not much in that context.

On another note, does anyone here deliberate about how senior to go in a company, or their career in general? The general expectation seems to be to just keep rising to the top as much as you can, but then you get into people management, higher stress, higher responsibility, etc. I'm just wondering when the point comes of saying "yep, this is senior enough". All my career so far has been about progressing and getting higher up the ladder, but what happens when you reach the point where the negatives outweigh the higher salary/status etc? I wonder what the motivation would be then if you're gone as far as you want to go.

I've been thinking this lately.

It's starting to piss me off already as it is, with my 20 minute commute and lack of dependents. When we move out of the city, (hopefully) have children, parents get older etc am I really going to be dedicated enough to want to deal with the soul-destroying gooseberry fool that comes with the territory the further up you go? I doubt it.

But I also want more money.

My dad and I work in the same industry. Hes been at it for over 20 years or so, Ive been doing it about 6. He is now a director of a kind of area that I am a tech. He gets a load of money, loads of respect etc, recently got recognised at some industry awards for being the best in the country etc. He has from day one worked to move up and up and get to the top. He reaps the rewards but also has to (and has had to) sacrifice a lot for it. He loses free time, inherits a shitload of stress, deals with a load of bullshit and wankers. I started on the same track as him with rapid promotions and moving up and up until I hit the place I am now. I decided that I didnt want to deal with all of the extra shite for the foreseeable and am happy to grow where I am.

It would be nice to have more money but that isnt achievable without either taking on a load of shite I dont want or becoming freelance which I dont want right now.

I suppose its kind of unique to be in a position where I can look at the kind of career trajectory I can achieve and the exact fruits of it and decide whether or not its for me.

If I path up at any point it'll be into a consultancy position and not a managerial position, and those kind of things are not frequent and wouldnt accept me with my current skill levels.

After over a year of looking for good jobs abroad, applying for work in Britain's an absolute dream; the majority of companies actually get back to me, for one thing.

I've been put forward for a position in London for which I didn't know the salary - I said I wanted 25k (+), whereupon the recruiter told me the range of the job is 20-38k so that it should be fine.

Now I'm beginning to wonder if I went in too low - not sure how acceptable it'd be to say, actually, I want 30k +, and I'm also wondering about that salary range. It's incredibly wide, isn't it? Seems slightly ludicrous to me that the same role could pay double depending on how hard you haggle.

I meet all the job specifications but my experience doesn't go way beyond them so doubt I'll realistically be troubling the upper reaches of that range to start with, am also wondering if 25k's even enough to live fairly comfortably in London.

The biggest bonus I ever received was a year's salary in 2000. As for the question of how high is enough, the point I'm at now (senior manager) is the furthest I'm prepared to go to maintain some sort of life/work balance. Remember kids, we work to live, not the other way round.

Rocsteady wrote:Now I'm beginning to wonder if I went in too low - not sure how acceptable it'd be to say, actually, I want 30k +, and I'm also wondering about that salary range. It's incredibly wide, isn't it? Seems slightly ludicrous to me that the same role could pay double depending on how hard you haggle.

I meet all the job specifications but my experience doesn't go way beyond them so doubt I'll realistically be troubling the upper reaches of that range to start with, am also wondering if 25k's even enough to live fairly comfortably in London.

What industry is it? What level is the role? For IT 25k would be complete entry level in London - a lot of grad roles would offer more than that also. I'd say crank your ask up to 30+ and if you're in any way competent you'll be fine.

In terms of living comfortably in London on 25k, that depends on where you want to live and how much socialising you do. After paying rent and train tickets I would probably struggle to afford my social life at that salary.