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Comment by ptero | Hacker News Reader

Just my 2c -- I'm in the US and I disagree. For example, many of the jobs allow for a very broad experience.

For example, in my current job, we are often looking for a smart, energetic people to work on X. Someone with a BS just out of college? An engineer with 10 years of matching experience? Tech lead wo just built X elsewhere? We will take either (if we like them) and adjust responsibilities instead.

This approach requires either creating multiple postings (a pain; we do not need so many people; it confuses the heck out of HR on why a single hire needs 3 postings), posting ridiculously wide salary range or saying "salary commensurate with experience" (which nowadays says nothing at all). My 2c.

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What the hell is wrong with posting a wide salary range and stating you are looking at all sorts of people then? We're trying to prevent people wasting their time chatting to people when the remuneration will never be sufficient.

Honest question: Is a salary range of $50 - $100k really valuable to you as a job seeker?

If you're after a salary greater than $100k, then yes, absolutely. Some (factual) information is always better than no information.

Yeah, because then I know to ignore the listing.

If I came from a place that paid $50k, I'd expect them to be able to give me a small bump but likely land me in the low-to-mid part of the range and I'd apply. If I came from 75k I'd expect higher end of the range, and I'd apply. That could be unreasonable depending on how they place different tiers of engineer on that range, but if it is then it's better to split out the jobs by title (Software Eng Jr./Sr/Staff/Principal). If I came from over 100k I'll pass because I don't think they can afford me regardless of title.

Because the second you post a wide salary range, people assume they are going to land on the mid-upper end of it no matter what the range is. If somebody lands on the lower end of it, they are going to feel slighted or insulted for just about all cases aside from new grads.

If I post a salary range of $50,000-$150,000 most people are going to look at it and decide that it probably pays $100,000-120,000. If somebody applies for that job and you offer them $60,000-70,000 they are going to be insulted just by the offer because of how much was left on the table (even if it's a perfectly good salary for the job).

Nobody wants to hear they are on the lower end of anything. That's why most people view themselves as "middle class".

If you post something that wide we're either looking at a sales position or at a company that does not differentiate between a Jr. and a Sr. Developer and lumps them all into Developer.

In itself it might be enough of a red flag not to work there.

Why can't a project just need developers? Maybe you need 2 or 3 across many skill ranges.

I think the best option is different posts with different salary ranges... but I do see how that can be a pain to copy paste data around (say 3 postings x 10 job sites = 30 copy pastes of the same data with a few different skills and a few different numbers)

>people assume they are going to land on the mid-upper end of it no matter what the range is

Well who's fault is that? And that statement in itself is a (factually incorrect) assumption.

> Someone with a BS just out of college?

> An engineer with 10 years of matching experience?

> Tech lead wo [sic] just built X elsewhere?

Sounds like you have three job postings crammed into one listing. Y'all on that tight of a budget?

Some of the reasons below are somewhat artificial constraints, but that's just our environment. I suspect they are not that infrequent either.

We cannot post three postings with intent to hire one person: Our group works on X. There is a group working on Y across the hall (and a bunch of others) and if we advertise three postings they will go to top management and HR and argue that one of our postings should be theirs.

Competition between groups on lab space, office space and good employees is friendly but extremely tough. Hiring someone who is a good fit and will likely work in our group for at least a few years is a huge benefit. Thus we would rather spend extra time trying to find a person who is smart, likes what we do and is genuinely interested in working on X, at whatever experience level, and snag him. This makes us open the "skills" window pretty wide.

It also makes it very easy to suppress wages...

It sounds like an unappealing place to work and I think you've put yourself in the market for lemons. Low paid lemons.

You know the easiest way to find smart and interested people? Pay above market wages and advertise it. You'll have your pick.

Your internal open positions need not match your external open positions.

We all get that you really are saying "salary is dependent upon experience". The argument made above is simply that each of those ranges ought to be called out explicitly.

It sound weird to me that a company that has a role to fill will take anyone from "just graduated and can type" to "experienced tech lead". Doesn't sound like a role that is clearly thought out.

If you have stuff for a junior hire to do and stuff for a senior hire to do, and you end up hiring the junior hire, what happens to the "senior" work? Same question if you end up hiring the senior guy.

We work on applied R&D and the seniority boundaries are fuzzy. In practice if we take a junior engineer we can get a senior engineer or two off lab work (who in principle should not be spending any time in the lab, but does a little). If we hire a lead it frees folks doing high level concepts (and powerpoint) for more hands on stuff.

> posting ridiculously wide salary range

why is this wrong?

if your actual, real wide salary range is not acceptable, people won't apply. if it is, and they agree with your philosophy, they will.

I tend to agree, but I think the argument against is basically that when you put a range, candidates' eyes go toward the high end and employers' eyes go toward the low end and then nobody ends up happy.

Then don't put a high range and put what you are actually expecting to spend on your new hire?

It sounds to me like the argument for not putting a salary is because the business doesn't actually know what they are looking for.

But the OP is saying that they might genuinely consider a huge range depending on who applies.

Honestly I think he'd be better off just listing multiple positions in this case.

But if you don't provide a range, I also won't apply as a general rule (I'll make exceptions for the big tech companies, but they probably contacted me via a recruiter).

I don't want to waste my time going through the now pretty much standard long and grueling interview process for a company that's likely going to give me a lowball figure, which seems to be what 'competitive salary' really stands for on most of these job postings.

If I'm going to apply, I want to know there's at least a chance I'm not wasting my time.

How does that apply in this case, in a job posting for "old geeks"?

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