Another Look at Salaries -- sorry, long

["Dana Worley" <dana -at- campbellsci -dot- com>]

Hello,

It's that wonderful time of year where my boss and I have sat down 
to negotiate a salary. I arrived armed with the latest salary surveys, 
industry studies, etc., and a good idea of what I feel I am worth to 
the company. 

We have a very different compensation plan. You have an annually 
negotiated wage, but you are really only guaranteed 80 percent of 
that wage -- the remainder is made up in profit sharing. Nice idea 
when profits are up, not the greatest when profits are down (at least 
from an employee's  perspective). We also get paid 80 percent of 
our calculated hourly wage for any time worked over 40 hours (yes, 
it's weird, it's technically illegal, but who's to complain? the 
alternative is to work OT for NO pay...).

When evaluating my "real" wages, my boss has come up with an 
amount that I don't agree with, which includes +5% of my salary for 
profit sharing and an assumption that I work 20 hours per month of 
OT for which I'm paid at the 80% rate (which results in several $K 
more than my negotiated salary). He feels that profit sharing 
(which, BTW, over the past year or two has not been 5%) and 20 
hours/month of OT should be used when comparing my current 
salary with that of the industry, since traditional salaried 
employees get paid on the basis that they'll work about 45 hours 
per week. I've tried to argue that, yes, I get paid OT, but I would 
also get "docked" or my vacation account hit if I were to work under 
40 hours per week and a traditional salaried employee does not get 
docked, so in the end, it is, for the most part, a wash.

So... now to the questions... 

When negotiating your salary, do you consider any profit sharing 
and bonuses as part of that salary?

Is your compensation based on the assumption that you will 
typically work 45 hours or more per week on a regular basis (I've 
always been under the assumption that a salaried employee is 
paid to get a job done. If it takes 38 hours -- great. If it takes 48 -- 
great.) I am particularly in disagreement with the assumption that 
OT pay should be considered when negotiating my salary, 
because, my argument is, I could work slinging burgers and if I 
worked enough hours, I could make $100K/yr (well maybe I 
exaggerate a bit, but you get the idea).

I would just like to get a feel for what others look at when 
comparing their salaries to the industry (I am excluding benefits, 
because from all the surveys I've read, it seems that 85 to 95 
percent of TWs get dental, health, life, etc. -- unless you're self-
employed.) I'm sure many of you will argue that you _wish_ you 
could only work 45 hours per week, but I'm also sure that many of 
you likely make $30-$50K more per year than I. 

Dana W.

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