Mapgirl’s Fiscal Challenge

Last week, someone at work left. He’d been with the company for a while. He’s kind of left me up a creek without a paddle. It’s not horrible, but it was a little stunning. Folks are now looking at me for some serious leadership. It’s a big opportunity for me.

The bigger thing was that my project manager asked me to run the farewell pizza party for this guy. I kind of resented it since I’m one of the few women on the project so I viewed it as sort of sexist. But hey, whatever, I do like the guy and I’m sorry to see him leave the company after a long career.

I made sure to ask Mr. Departure to write me a letter for my file at work. I asked him to write one so that people at work would know what I was doing. Because he’s the high-end software architect, we end up in conference room for hours while I try to figure out what kind of requirement to write down from his Gallic shrugs and vague ideas. He’s actually a small pain in the keester, but very entertaining. I’ve learned a lot from him and he’s very encouraging, pushing me to take the role since it’s opened up. (Actually a lot of folks have asked me if I’m stepping into his shoes. I’ve just resigned myself to this now. With crisis comes opportunity.)

Mr. Departure gave out a lot of kudos and treats through the corporate gift/incentive system, but this recommendation he wrote to me is probably the most crucial thing he could have done for anyone. Corporate logo schwag is nice, but over the long-term, his impressions (as a superstar within the firm) will have lasting impact on my career with this company. A lot of people worship this guy. It’s very clear that everyone has enjoyed their work experiences with him since he does work with deep integrity, intelligence and humor. That was pretty evident from the happy hour that was planned for all of his former projects. A ton of people came out to say their last goodbyes. Good words from him are going to go far, plus the networking opportunity at the happy hour worked out well for me.

So if someone with whom you work closely is leaving work, ask them to write something for you before they go. Be sure to say thanks though and acknowledge the effort. (I joked that he owed me this for walking out on me mid-project.) In the end, he sent me a copy of what he wrote, and I got pretty weepy. It was very nice and extremely kind, reflective of his generosity. At the very least, I will have something for my happy file to read when I get discouraged.

BostonGal says, “Seeing how many people are on the Millionaire in the Making list due in part to secure state, government, or military pension plans is becoming a bit of a downer for me. Should I try to start a second career as a state or government employee? Just so I can get guaranteed income and heath benefits in retirement?”

Some of her commenters take issue saying that benefits are not guaranteed and changeable with the economic tides especially at the state level. I agree. It’s a risk and it has a lot of pros and cons. Living in DC, I can see that every day. The CNN/Money series has generally profiled federal government employees and if you ask me, a lot of them have been active military and I’m not sure combat pay is a great way to build your wealth up.

Check Office of Personnel Management if you really have questions. OPM is your best resource for general questions or else the HR office of your potential agency.

In terms of benefits as a full-time employee, you get:

FEGLI - Group Life Insurance: But you have to sign up for it when you are hired. No changing your mind later because you can’t sign up. OPM only runs a sign up period every few years, ‘few’ meaning ‘decades’. You can check their site for the open enrollment dates, they are very, very far apart. When you’re young, you don’t think you need it, so you think you’re saving money. Then you turn 40, have two kids and you want insurance and now you have to go get it on your own. Something to think about if you enter a government career at 25.

FERS-Federal Employees Retirement System: A three-part system consisting of
1. Social Security - Yes, they really think they’re going to pay it in 20 years.
2. Basic Benefits/Annuity - Pension benefit, an annuity payment of a portion of your salary.
3. Thrift Savings Plan - Retirement investments, which on the whole, are very generic and probably don’t chase a lot of risk for high reward. But it’s a little hard to tell from the available literature. The other thing is that the maximum match is 5% of your salary, for a total of 10%. The other good thing is that you vest in 2 years and they automatically give you 1% even if you don’t save anything.

Health Insurance: Health insurance, for your whole family, dependent children, adopted/fostered children.

I’m sure all that sounds great, but you have to work for the government for 30 years unless you are in one of several categories, all of which have stipulations.

1. Military or Law Enforcement: 25 years of service or Age 50 and 20 years of service.
2. Voluntary Early Retirement: Special retirement packages offered agency by agency, dependent on a matrix of age and length of service, determined at the time the packages are offered which could be few and far between.
3. Part-Time Employees
4. Members of Congress/Congressional Employees
5. Military Reserve Technicians

Frankly, I don’t like the idea of working for 30 years for anybody. At that point, I might as well be a company man for some large corporation or something crazy like that.

The other thing is that BostonGal might not like her pay grade and step. I know she’s in IT but some federal IT jobs in the DC area don’t pay well and frankly, they can truly stink. (I knew a sysadmin who left our company for two weeks and came right back because his FAA IT job wasn’t what it was billed to be.) You’re better off being a contractor if you ask me, but the government does pay for a lot of training, so you might be able to move your grade up a lot faster with an internal promotion, new degree, or an agency change.

At any rate, if you want to work for the government, check out USAJobs.com. It’s OPM’s website for recruiting. It works like Monster.com where you can set up agents and bulletins for new listings. That’s key since there are closing dates on postings which are very important. However, several agencies subcontract out to AVUE, like DOJ, USDA Forest Service, and TSA. (Get used to acronyms, that’s what government life is all about!)

There is much more to consider but these are some basics. Things like COLA, ‘danger pay’, locality pay, etc are more esoteric but can really make a huge difference in your salary comparisons. (For instance DC area pay is 30+% higher than published tables.)

First off, if you are not allowed to share your salary. DON’T. It’s usually grounds for getting fired so check your employee handbook before you do it.

After reading Jim’s story on salary sharing, and the accompanying NY Times article, I’ll give you a Marxist economic analysis of why you should share your salary. (I’m joking about the Marxist part. I read Das Kapital in college with a prominent Marxist scholar and it cracks me up that he makes a ton of money as a socialist.)

The main thing in a free market economy is the value of information. It’s possible to have any kind of arbitrage simply because of a gap in information where the buyer has no knowledge of the seller’s cost.

In the case of salary, it’s a little different, but still the same. You are the seller of labor (a Marxist view of the world) and the buyer of labor is your employer. However, you are in a marketplace of labor providers (other job candidates) and you need to differentiate your labor on the basis of quality to command a better price. But you also have to price yourself within a reasonable range. Tools like Salary.com, salary surveys, published annual ranges, etc will help you set the range, the best way is honestly to talk to your peers in the field about what they make.

Like Jim, I work in IT consulting with the Federal government. (Of course I do. I live in DC!) I nearly kicked myself when I found out I should have asked my company for $100K. But honestly, I don’t think I can command that price. My friend who was advocating that kind of money could justify his asking price with the kind of skills he possesses. I don’t have that same skill set so I lowballed myself slightly, but not embarrassingly. It would have helped me set a better price had I known my friend was applying to the same company I was and discussed our strategies for our starting salary figures. I might have squeezed out another $5K from it, but I think I did just fine.

More than anything, knowing your current market value is the key. Sure, it’s good to know what the company is willing to pay. But you really have to know what you are worth as an individual provider of labor. If you are worth $50K and the company is only willing to pay $45K, then find another employer because there is someone out there who is willing to value you appropriately. I learned this the hard way while working technical support. Support jobs are bottom of the barrel and full of stress. But some companies pay better than others and are willing to promote people out of support work. I had to have a client toss a reality brickbat at my head and tell me that my skills were worth $20K-35K more than I was earning in support. And he was willing to pay me that!!!

The Man keeps us down by obscuring salary information. We’re usually not allowed to know what our peers make in the same job function. They hide things with unpublished pay grades. (Private companies around DC love ‘pay grades’. The government uses them and it seems like it’s fair to have grades till you find out that you don’t know what ranges they represent in the private sector because they are in no way correlated to the government’s published GSA pay grade schedules.) You have to guess if your grade is a managerial one and if you’re going to get a manager’s bonus or a regular employee bonus. (In my case, 10% vs $1500. Uh, that’s a huge difference at a $50K salary.) Shop job postings to see what places are willing to pay for jobs like yours or the jobs you want to have. Frequently there are ranges added to ads to entice candidates or give them a realistic view of what the employer will pay. Use it to your advantage.

I’m not a big advocate of having poor manners. Obviously be judicious in your sharing of a salary and whom you ask. Make sure you trust your friends when you share this information. I usually don’t discuss this sort of thing in-house with fellow employees. The one time I did, the guy had moved out of my department and received a promotion. I didn’t think it hurt to tell him because we were both pretty unhappy with our company. I also tend to discuss salary with my manager because I expect him/her to go to bat for me or help me get to my salary aspiration.

Transparency is key though. If you want to stick it to The Man, then share your salary. Find out what others make in your field and make sure you get yours!

Well, I’m sure y’all all know by now, the Washington Capitals lost in sudden death overtime to the Philadelphia Flyers, 2-3 on Tuesday. It kind of sucked to watch that, but it was an exciting game nonetheless.

But the real kicker was in the morning at work. First, you have to understand that I work for a consulting firm. Second you have to understand what ‘being on the bench’ means and how it’s basically death for consultants. Being on the bench is when you’re not working on a client’s project. You’re not being productive and your billable hours goal for the year will be missed, so you want as little bench time as possible during the year.

Tuesday morning, I get to work, run get a little breakfast with some of my teammates, and return to find out that my project has come to an untimely end, a bit like CleverDude in the link above. Next thing I know, I’m laughing mildly hysterically at the situation and at the slight edge of panic in the room.

I find it damned ironic that I need to find a new engagement at work in a hurry because the day before, I was at an internal corporate event trying to network so I can line up the next gig in a few weeks at the planned close of my project. A friend of mine who’s been at the firm for almost a decade introduced me to someone who needs staff in the next 2 weeks. but I won’t be released till midsummer so that isn’t going to work for me.

But how much do things change in 24 hours. You can bet your bippy the first person I called after being axed in the morning was the one staffing up soon. Although I probably won’t end up on that particular project, I was hugely relieved to have a place to turn right away for help.

The moral of the story is to seize your opportunities to network, internally and externally. I can’t say that enough. It’s the reason I guess why us DC PF bloggers like to meet for happy hour. We try to do what we can for our network. It’s a bit of a quid pro quo though. I mean, if I’m willing to take someone’s resume and pass it along, then hopefully they would do the same for me, right?

To elaborate a little more about my job and what I hope it will be:

1. I wanted to reduce my carbon footprint. I know it sounds cheesy, but I will be able to commute via public transport for my first engagement with this consulting firm. I find that pretty exciting to get a portion of my life back so I can read or knit while commuting. My corporate offices had moved in the last year and the new drive was killing me, especially when it takes two hours to drive past Tyson’s Corner at Christmastime. I wasn’t going to do that again next year. If you want to know more, listen to this Diane Rehm show episode about Happiness. The number one thing that destroys happiness is a long commute to work.

2. I hope that I can stay and grow with this firm for the next 5 to 10 years. I really loved my team at my old company, but to stay there for 5 years would have meant a transfer to the Midwest in a place where I would only have co-workers for friends at the start. (One of the reasons I spent so much on holiday presents for my teammates was because I knew I was leaving and I wanted to give them a token of my appreciation for their friendship over the last 4.5 years through the thick and thin times with our previous totally sh*tty employer to the awesome team we built at the new place.)

3. I am excited that there are great benefits with my new company. My old firm doesn’t even compare. Tuition, training, health insurance, 401k plan, corporate social clubs, everything. Discounts on cars, cell phones, computers, EVERYTHING. I bet I can join a warehouse club at a discount even. Hm. Must look into that.

4. The money is great. It’s a 6% raise over my total compensation from my last firm, but I know that I am more likely to become a 6-figure employee with the new employer. Whereas my old employer wouldn’t give my senior manager a 6-figure salary, though he deserved it, they’d never give me one as a technical minion. It’s actually more like a 16% raise over my base salary, and though I am losing my bonus money for 2007 and a tiny bit of 401k vesting, the present value of money on the checks between January 1 and bonus season payouts have more value. No, really. I can do the math on that since we were notified that we weren’t going to make our targets to get the full 10% bonus. So why should I have waited till bonus season.

That is all. Really, are there any other better reasons to change jobs? Someone asked me about changing jobs and the job hunt. Hang on. I’ll get to that later this week.

Do you ever spend time networking within your own company? If the answer is no, ask yourself why not?

Two stories:
1) My sibling was working in the R&D group of a software company when they happened to be chatting with the Development Lead for the core application they built at that firm. Turns out they were short staffed and hard-pressed to meet a deadline. My sibling says something about being slightly bored and underutilized at the moment. Next day, my sibling’s desk is moved to the core application team and they meet their future spouse. Go figure. All that from a conversation they had by the water cooler.

To elaborate further, this put my sibling on the path to a senior development job within their company and positioned them well for future work. Otherwise my sibling might have ended up a research monkey writing white papers all the time and generally being an academic pinhead in Silicon Valley. Nice work if you can get it, but the money just isn’t there.

2) This week, I get a COMPLETELY random phone call from within my company. This is a really, utterly, most sincerely, random call. I only pick it up because it’s internal and I think they might have misdialed. I have never, ever seen this person’s name before. He says, “Hi! I was searching LinkedIn.com on Subject XYZ and I saw you have expertise in it. I’d love to talk to you.”

Next thing you know, he needs me to act as a consultant/resource on a development project he has going on. I’m referring him to my boss so we can nail down what kind of level of effort is needed and how much of my time my boss will allow me to use for this project. If all goes well, my team will have an additional high profile project and we will look like awesome team players within the company! That’s really exciting stuff. It’s what I like doing best and I am really looking forward to 2008.

I hope these two vignettes show how talking to other people within your company can create new opportunities for you. Sure, it helps to make friends, but what’s more important is to make allies who are on your side. I could have ignored the call that came in or said, “Sorry I really don’t think I can help you.” I admit, I did hesitate at the notion of being sucked into something in which I don’t think I am an expert. However, he was desperate for any information and it turns out by answering with “Let me see what I can do,” it gave me time to dig up some informational resources and brainstorm how I could help this guy out.

Let’s just say, I have a feeling that there are going to be some monetary rewards for this. Not only a one time Above And Beyond award, but my annual performance bonus as well. Having people all over the company say good things about you is good stuff. Your reputation is just as important as your actual merits and talents. Be sure that all of them are solid. You never know what kind of opportunities might come your way by talking to people within your firm.

Single Ma’s reputation as a valuable asset has brought her more work-life balance that she was seeking. If the right people think you are worth keeping, they’ll keep you. They’ll seek you out.

I had another opportunity this week to make a new friend at work. She’s working on a project with me and stopped by my cube to meet me in person. A long time ago she was told to send me a monthly email. But we never actually talked. Since she recognized my name, she came by my desk. She’s young and energetic. I think I could learn a lot from her about scripting and I can teach her a lot of Oracle stuff. It’s a two way street and I think because of it, our shared project is going to work better.

Talk to people in your company. Say hi. Don’t be a jerk and ask the CEO who he is though. I did that once at a company cookout. It was humiliating, but that’s what they get for not having corporate bios with photographs on our website. My only saving grace was that I was asking about waiting for the Redskins football ticket drawing and trying go back to work, thus signaling my good brownie behavior.

Sorry for rambling along, I wrote this very late at night, but I hope you get the point about professional networking within your current employer. There are benefits to it that can be harvested later if you sow the seeds now during the holiday party season!

Recently one of my readers IM’d me via the Meebo window on the left. She was asking me about job hunting and recruiters. I tried to answer her questions as best I could, because I’m really good at getting a new job. That’s not to say that I suck. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever truly been sacked for a job because I was a lousy employee. Most of the time, I hated what I was doing and departed for greener pastures when I was younger and much more antsy.

Anyhow, I came across an article at Yahoo on Salary Mistakes and some of the advice I gave this reader was contained within it.

The main things for younger folks are these:

1) Don’t Fence Yourself In: Don’t enter the salary negotiation too early. Save it till you know you are a serious contender. Somewhere in there, the HR person or recruiter will tell you what the compensation might be. If it’s too low, hold on till you find out more before deciding to walk away. Or they might ask what your current compensation is. If they ask what you are currently making, tell them on what you would like to make to focus them on where you want to be.

2) Be Honest and Accurate: DO NOT LIE on your resume. It’s a very ugly thing to do. (My point is completely different from the article’s, but still good advice.) Many years ago people would lie and say they went to Harvard. BAD idea. My friend worked at Transamerica as a temp in the PR department when an executive’s bogus resume was uncovered. Let’s just say he and I went to a long lunch that day so he could avoid the flak flying on the executive floor. Bottom line. Be honest.

3) Look at the Big Picture/Focus on Career Goals: These are really the same thing and tie back to #1. Your compensation is not the only reason to take a job. Trust me. I’ve been there. I’ve taken jobs to learn new skills. I went from a $55K/yr job in equity research to a $17K/yr job as a IT helpdesk technician. Yes, that totally sucked. But in the end, I am now well compensated as an Oracle database monkey and I wouldn’t have gotten here without that first entry-level IT job. (And I was 26 at the time.)

I have also moved jobs to get out of hellholes and taking only a blip in salary increases just to get out and get out fast. Because I was not focused on a long-term career goal but only the money and escaping, I didn’t like that job very much either. So take the time to really figure out what job you want next.

4) Timing Is Crucial: While the article ties back to being honest throughout the process, I find that if you’re always a straight-shooter, this isn’t going to be a problem for you. But I also live by Veritas vos liberabit. “The truth will set you free.”

Another way that timing is crucial is that while the time is not right now, it might right in the future. When I first moved to California, I took a job at UC Berkeley. While I was there, I got a call from someone about a job working in the semiconductor industry. They had received my resume from a referral and wanted to interview me. As I had just taken the post at UCB, I wasn’t interested in another opportunity. A few months later, as the Dean of our School was resigning, my department was on thin ice without our champion, so I decided it might be a good time to go and take a job within San Francisco. (The $40-60 monthly commuting cost didn’t help either.) The lady who had called me months before was still looking for someone and called me a second time. This time, because circumstances had changed, I was open to talking with her. So timing is crucial. Keep that in mind when you are in the job hunt. You might still be a great fit at a later date.

I hope everyone out there who is looking for a job gets one soon! Graduation season is coming to a close and jobs are starting soon. Those student loan bills aren’t going to wait much longer. If I recall correctly, my first ones were due in November after my May graduation.

Good luck if you’re looking for a new gig!

Status: April Net Worth will have to wait for now. Too busy with class to put it up.

I have changed my mind, and I will be taking the exam at the end of class, even though it’s not the official Oracle DBA certification exam. I figure I should take it should I decide to get the independent certification offered by the company/school where I am taking the course. Future rewards may follow.

The Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival is this weekend. I am limiting myself to $200 and NO MORE YARN or FIBER buying for now. I am only in the market for some spinning equipment, like extra bobbins or a lazy kate and nothing else unless I see some cute baby stuff for pending births. (But I am currently making stuff like crazy from yarn I already have. See? Isn’t that frugal?)

I just got handed some raw shetland this week. It’s about 2 lbs. To get it milled, I want to mix it with something light, like soy silk to thin it out so it’s not a really heavy yarn. I have something in mind to make for a friend, but men don’t like really heavy wooly stuff usually. So this is going to involve some research. But I love free stuff!

Things are going great for me at my job. I got a raise earlier this year. (Per Frank, it’s a compression raise.) I got a bonus for last year’s good work and overall company performance. To cap it off, I got another raise of sorts.

I asked my boss last year if I could take an Oracle course and he agreed it would be a good idea since we’re getting a new server soon. Since our company wants to keep us brownies interested in work, our entire team was approved to take more coursework. The education benefit at work is for $3000.00 per person per year. That’s not too bad. It’s about going rate for most companies in the area. That’s the cost of one week-long Oracle course at most places that offer fancy Oracle classes. (However, it falls exceedingly short of a top-flight MBA program at Georgetown.)

So I have just effectively given myself a $3000.00 raise this month. I am mucho excited about this class. I am excited that my company is opening the valves and letting some money flow to the places we need it. This is going to be a great year for my team. It’s part of why I’ve been so busy lately with work.

I forgot one night and had a beer. (That was because we were out to listen to a friend recount a tale of woe. I completely forgot and said, “Oh, just bring me one of those.”)

I haven’t had a french fry since Lent (and only some when I got fish and chips since New Year’s.)

I don’t know if I’m saving much money. I was really busy at work and ate out most of the time for lunch and for dinner. But I did make two active choices to buy groceries over dining out. The recent Target trip helped.

Since the start of Lent, I’ve had two no-spend days.

Other than that, work is picking up, so don’t expect a lot for the next few weeks. I really love my job right now. It’s interesting stuff and I’m really grateful for my team. We’re all co-workers from a previous employer and the work chemistry is fantastic. I spent a good chunk of last week on a collaborative project and the fruits of our labors are well-received.

Also, Happy Belated Birthday to Flexo! He’s a good egg.