When a developer friend of mine recently left his job after 7 years with his company he told me his starting and ending salaries, and I was a little shocked. He started at $50,000 and ended at $80,000 (averaging roughly 7% per year raises).
During the same time frame, I averaged 18% per year salary increases as a result of frequent job-hopping, shrewd salary negotiation, and some cut-throat tactics such as using counteroffers as leverage and engineering a bidding war.
I think that developers spend a lot of time building their coding skills, but they have a lot to learn about getting ahead in the business world. I might be more of a mercenary than most when it comes to salary, but I think a lot of people could benefit from my knowledge.
I could put the soundbites in a blog post, but the full story of the 10 year journey really could fill a book. Would you guys read that book?
