Salary: Competitive

[HombreLobo]

Why not let me be the judge of whether the salary offered is competitive or not?

Job searching right now and it's really starting to grate.

AIBU to think that at the very least there should be a salary range or starting point stated?

I think when you are earning a "normal" wage, and by that I mean anything from just above NMW to £45k ish, then the salary will be one of the most important things. People who aren't on megabucks have mortgages and childcare and other fixed costs that need to be covered. So it really isn't good enough to guess a wage and potentially waste all that time, or for an employer to say that someone is "only interested in the money". Unless you have a trust fund, a mortgage free house and no children, or a very wealthy partner, the salary matters.

Fred (I think it was Free., on phone, sorry) w,hen you say you wouldn't employ someone who just needed a job as once they were back on their feet they'd be off to a better job, I think that would only happen if you weren't paying them a fair market rate for their skills, or offering them enough benefits to make the discrepancy worth it. Therefore, of course they should go elsewhere.

The only thing you can tell for definite about a company that doesn't give an indication of salary in an ad is that for some reason they think their recruitment campaign is better in some way if they don't give that information.

-It could be that they genuinely have absolutely no idea what they'll pay the person, and are really that flexible about requirements and salary. Usually for more specialist roles, and the rest of the ad will usually indicate that as well if that's the case.

-It could be that they are concerned about the competition finding out what they pay staff, although giving a wider range usually addresses that.

-It could be that advertising a salary, or range, will give them issues internally with people who are paid less for similar work. In which case they don't have a fair salary system and I'd consider bypassing them anyway.

-It could be that they are inexperienced with recruitment and genuinely think saying something like that is more attractive to candidates even if the salary they are offering is perfectly decent.

-Or it could be that the salary or range they are considering isn't particularly attractive and they don't want to put people off applying.

The latter is the most common IME, and, unfortunately for employers who are doing it for any of the other reasons, most potential candidates will assume the latter is the reason and make their decision whether to apply on that basis.

I always thought competitive was a polite wording for minimum wage

Personally, [as someone who is in work] I would never consider applying for a job if the ad said 'salary competitive/negotiable'. [I realise people who are unemployed don't have the luxury of choice and that is precisely what some of these employers will be trying to exploit.]

I would also expect there to be big gender pay disparities within such organisations. As you know, there is a pay gap between men and women anyway and, in such situations, men tend to negotiate harder, value themselves more highly and get offered more. So, if you do end up working for one of these organisations expect to find yourself working next to a male colleague doing the same job as you but earning 10k more (although obviously you probably won't find that out because there is no pay transparency in the organisation...)

In my experience it means "as little as we can get away with".

I once did take a paycut for a nicer working environment, as it happens. The headline salary was higher, but based on a longer working week (37.5 instead of 35) so the hourly rate worked out slightly less. But I was moving because I was miserable, my new job was a breath of fresh air, and although I was working more, I was taking home more, too.

I think the next thing I'll need to vent about is employer's saying you are too experienced for a job that pays £6000 more than your current job!!

When DH was job hunting one agency tried to tell him that £7 an hour was really good money as some jobs pay less. It was only in 2012 too.

I think it means as low as possible too. I looked for a new job in November last year. I don't think there were any advertised without a target range of salaries. I think I have seen some on a company's own website without it. But the jobs were also advertised with an agency on a job board with a range. I didn't waste my time applying for anything way below what I was willing to accept. If they are looking for someone with an upper limit of £35k, they are looking for someone more junior than me. It is a waste of everyone's time applying anyone. They would think I am overqualified too.

I can understand a large range, and is usually reflected on the ad. I remember seeing some that says experienced team lead/principal engineer or senior developer looking to advance. Then as someone without team lead experience I know I would be shooting at the lower end. I won't be insulted if they don't offer me the top price.

And yes maybe if I earn mega bucks I won't care about salary so much. But I do need the money.

Yes it's silly to pay that you would consider someone who asked about the salary as "only being in it for the money".

People have bills to pay, life's not free.

I'd go as far as to pay that someone who didn't need the money would be more likely to walk out when things got tough as they would have no reason to stay.

Pay=say.

It's usually a euphemism for 'we're too embarrassed to publish it' IME...

^ Spot on. A DF of mine works in recruitment and told me when companies advertise jobs with them and the salary is below market rate they use this phrase instead.

Recruitment agents are fast overtaking estate agents as my most hated profession.

London is quite a large area and refusing to specify any further than that is ridiculous.

Recruitment agents are forever emailing DH about "great opportunities" on "competitive" salaries that turn out to be half his current pay

He replies pointing out that he is very unlikely to be interested ... and also that he now has responsibility for hiring in a medium-sized department of a very large company, and will not be using their company for his future agency needs.

When we changed estate agents we went from the ones who sent us inappropriate listings as buyers, to the ones who only ever sent us details for houses we were going to be interested in, and those promptly.

Why not ring them and say my minimum salary I would be prepared to accept is £x - is it worth me applying for this job?

BakerStreet is absolutely right. It's appalling - though I'm not surprised - that any employer would "take against" a prospective employee who dared ask for an idea of the salary range a particular job would pay. It's arrogant and unrealistic to write someone off as "only interested in money" when fact is most of us work to live and not the other way round. We genuinely need to know if we can afford to consider a particular job - whether we'd still be able to pay our housing costs etc and indeed, whether we'd still be able to afford to bloody well get to work if a longer commute was involved. It's also common sense, as she pointed out, that someone for whom money was not a concern (I dunno - private income, well paid partner, significant savings - whatever) would probably be more likely to leave the position far sooner, especially if any aspect of the job turned out to be less than ideal - someone as fortunate as that isn't going to hang on to see if things get better are they.

Recruitment agents are on my list of unprofessional professions...

I've met more trustworthy estate agents, than recruitment agents.

Yes the "only in it for the money if they want to know the salary" stuff is nonsense.

It's well documented that salary is by and large not a motivator in the workplace, but is a demotivator. That means if someone feels their salary is not fair in some way, or not adequate for their skills/experience/the work they put in, they will become demotivated, even if they are not motivated by money per se.

It's not even about whether they can afford to work for nothing necessarily. Even if someone's partner was a millionaire, they may still find it demotivating to work for an employer who paid much less than market rate, or paid them much less for the same job than others, or piled lots of extra responsibility on without a suitable increase.

Also, although it's absolutely by no means the only (or even the most important) factor, what salary rates they pay does give at least some indication of how an employer treats it's staff, how much they are valued.

Lots more to it of course, and lots of other factors involved, but some employers pay as little as they can get away with, and some pay towards the higher end of the spectrum for any given role. It's not unreasonable to think the way staff are treated more generally might be better at the second employer than the first.

One of the reasons is to not puss of current employees if try are offering over and above. Often companies offer more to new recruits as they can't recruit internally but need to be discreet about it.

*It's well documented that salary is by and large not a motivator in the workplace, but is a demotivator. That means if someone feels their salary is not fair in some way, or not adequate for their skills/experience/the work they put in, they will become demotivated, even if they are not motivated by money per se.

It's not even about whether they can afford to work for nothing necessarily. Even if someone's partner was a millionaire, they may still find it demotivating to work for an employer who paid much less than market rate, or paid them much less for the same job than others, or piled lots of extra responsibility on without a suitable increase.*

Flowery, I think you read my mind about reasons for leaving my current job

Of course, sometimes there's just stupidity. A local employer has just been taken to court by a mate. Job was advertised at 600pw externally. Internal candidates were told it wasn't a new role but the same one they did for 450pw. And it was in the paper for 600 to "attract interest".

So: guy goes for interview, passes assessment, agrees start time and says nothing about salary. He is however recording. First weeks wage is short so its constructive wrongful dismissal with a grand for hurt feelings.

Heh heh heh.

Are recruitment consultants really professional? God, I hope not!