
Recruiting Strategy: 100% Bonus Over 10 Years - lionhearted
http://www.backpocketcoo.com/blog/people/best-recruiting-strategy-ever/
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supercanuck
We actually have a system like this, except it involves someone creating a
company and bringing in some H1-B's for 5 years while they work for a Green
Card, then skim 50-70% off their rate. I guess one of the differences between
our arrangement and the article is the quality isn't as high.

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slg
This could spiral out of control in both good and bad ways. The good ways are
mentioned in the article, everyone wants to keep everyone else happy so they
all continue earning their bonuses. But what happens when someone does leave?
The person who referred them will suddenly have their compensation drop. That
could destroy morale and send that person looking for other employment. The
problem could then possibly ripple throughout the entire organization.

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rizzom5000
How many people calculate a bonus as part of their base compensation? I tend
not to count my chickens before they're hatched and don't see how something
like this would negatively affect the morale of anyone who understands the
difference between base pay and bonuses.

Additionally, a 10% of annual compensation referral bonus is generous; even if
it can only be collected once.

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wikwocket
If you've recruited 2-3 new hires, and their salary is similar to yours,
that's a 20-30% raise a year, a not-insubstantial amount.

I could easily see people coming to expect these bonuses, starting to rely
upon them to pay for their holiday shopping, etc, to the point where politics
and drama could result.

Of course on paper, even one 10% referral bonus would be better than most
existing ones, but people don't behave rationally about money, and we quickly
get used to our "bonuses"...

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bjterry
Not only that, but the company negotiates future salary increases knowing the
bonus exists, so you can't be guaranteed that it will actually be on top of
what you would otherwise get paid.

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beat
Ten years at the same company sounds like a nightmare to many of us. I don't
ever want to do that again (I hit nine years once), and I don't ever want to
inflict that on people I like.

I'll happily take that $12k over the usual $1k, however.

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michaelochurch
_Ten years at the same company sounds like a nightmare to many of us._

I'm pretty unapologetic about job hopping. Most companies just don't have
enough interesting work or the right culture to make it worthwhile to stay if
you're a genuine fast learner.

That said, I'd love to find a company and job where I could stay for 10 years.
That would be ideal. I'm one of the first ones out of a crappy situation, but
I'm also tired of this world in which one has to keep changing jobs to get a
chance at the interesting work.

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Joeri
I don't quite understand how the work can be interesting when you start out
but lose interest after a year or two, unless the project itself ends or goes
into maintenance mode. To me, either something is interesting or is not, from
day one.

Just to give a different perspective: personally I've only had one employer
since I started working 9 years ago, so I'm nearly at that 10 year stretch.
I've changed technology several times while there, usually by proposing the
change myself. I've also changed what sort of product I've worked on many
times. Whenever the work becomes boring because a project goes into
maintenance mode, I decide I want to work on something fresh and make it
happen.

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georgemcbay
"personally I've only had one employer since I started working 9 years ago"

I think your experience is an anomaly. I'm nearly 40 and I've had a couple of
jobs with something like the freedom you describe (and these [eg. chumby
industries] ended only because the company went out of business, not because I
left willingly), but the vast majority of jobs, even the supposedly exciting
start-up (non-founder) jobs are much more restricted than that.

There's a fairly predictable cycle that occurs at many employers where if
you're lucky enough to find a job working on a completely new product (which
is ideal for a lot of top developers), you work on that for a year or so, get
the first versions out, and then go into a trickle maintenance mode where
you're mostly dealing with adding small, mostly unexciting new features. If
you were instrumental in helping developing that product, the company will
usually be reluctant to let you off of it even if they have other cool things
to work on. You tend to get trapped by your early success and become defined
by the first project you worked on despite the fact that everyone would
probably be better off if you were assigned to the new thing and less
experienced developers were put on your maintenance tasks.

To be fair, there _are_ companies out there that don't fall into this trap,
but they are few and far between.

Like Michael, I've become pretty blase about job-hopping because of this. If I
join your company, I'll give you at least a year and I won't leave you hanging
between important release dates, but if you aren't giving me an environment
where I am being challenged on a fairly regular basis, don't expect me to be
there 3+ years down the line.

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renegadedev
In other words a system for non-ambitious dinosaurs to get in their cronies
and milk the system while almost being assured of a job for the next decade

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hollerith
I do not get it. How does the referral scheme described in the OP cause anyone
to be almost assured of a job for the next decade?

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renegadedev
The point being a referral based system incentivizes people to bring in
quantity to stack the odds in their favor. Quality gets sidetracked, not
necessarily maliciously.

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rm999
I actually kind of like the system, but doesn't this involve publicizing other
employees' salaries? A possible workaround is to just have classes of bonuses,
like 5k a year for entry-level, 15k for senior-level, etc.

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tptacek
A workable variant of this system is to assign bounties based on the value of
different roles; instead of bonusing precisely 120k, you can assign a 100k
bounty to the role; the bounty doesn't have to have any direct relationship
with the salary.

The core idea is to make the recruiting bonus recurring.

Similarly, I'm not sure that the 100% over 10 years rule isn't arbitrary.
Someone who stays with a company for _ten years_ is incredibly valuable. Why
not pay in year 11, and year 12?

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sehrope
Yes role based bonuses for referrals are common in the financial services
sector. For example at one firm an AVP referral that was hired would be a $5K
bonus whereas a VP referral would be a $10K. Unsurprisingly there is quite a
push for for VP and above as a starting title for referrals. I've never heard
of a firm that offers a recurring bonus though.

AVP: Assistant Vice President

VP: Vice President

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amalag
Is anyone actually doing this?

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lightblade
Agreed, I like to see some success stories than theory on paper.

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ubi
The first line of text on your post bleeds into the sidebar and is not
readable.

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3pt14159
Devide all numbers by 2 and it starts to look reasonable. 5% per year (with a
fuzz factor or something) for 5 years.

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motti_s
This is a great idea (assuming that the budget exist), because it takes care
of retention, not just recruiting.

I'd split the bonus between the two employees, and have it stop if either
leave the company. This way both employees (who might have some influence on
one another) have an incentive to keep each other happy at that company. This
can boost the retention effect of this strategy.

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michaelochurch
I'd like to see a per-year (or even per-month) compensation scheme for
recruiters, because it would give them an incentive toward more successful
placement. The current system seems to encourage churn.

That said, the "both must stay" provision here will cause people to stay
longer than they should. Paying people to stick around when there really isn't
anywhere for them to go doesn't make a lot of sense. Perhaps that recruiting
bonus should be independent of the salaried role (and therefore continue to
recur) since it is a separate job.

