Stupid employers; or: why I'm glad I have a decent-paying job

The BBQ Pit
1

Ladies and gentlemen, this is precisely why the IT industry shits me:

http://it.seek.com.au/users/apply/index.ascx?Sequence=45&PageNumber=1&ChannelID=4&SiteID=1&tracking=JobMail&JobId=4708574

Just in case this ad has been removed by the time you read it, the gist is this: They want an IT manager, responsible for 97 stores as well as head office. They actually think someone with 2-4 years experience will know how to do the job. But just in case this fools us into thinking that perhaps that means they want someone who’s relatively new to the job, they make it clear - this person needs experience supporting a mixed environment (Novell and Microsoft), supporting Lotus Notes, Cisco equipment and Peoplesoft’s ERP platform. How they think someone with 4 years’ experience will know all this, and know it THOROUGHLY, is beyond me. Let alone someone who can be an IT manager (a whole different bag of skills required for that). And of course, this person will need (though it’s not stated directly) project management skills. For the big rollout. And the relocation of head office.

How much, I hear you ask, are they willing to pay for an IT manager, who is responsible for 97 sites in the Asia-Pacific region, and is capable of supporting this platform, whilst also performing project management duties? Up to mid-40s. The mind boggles. But it’s OK… because they’ll give you employee discounts on their products! :rolleyes:

I feel like applying for the job, with a letter that states, quite simply, “What drugs are you people on?”.

For those of you out there who think $45K is good money, let me be clear: for this type of role, realistic money is anywhere between $100K and $200K. $45K is appropriate for someone who is NOT a manager, and whose responsibilities are first- or second-level support. Not for someone who has overall responsibility for the IS operations of the asia-pacific division of “the largest athletic retailer in the world”.

The thing that shits me about this is there are people out there who are so desperate for work that they’ll apply for this job. Foot Locker will either get what they’re paying for (ie a helpdesk jockey, who will fail terribly at the IT management stuff, and may even be fired because they can’t meet unrealistic expectations), or someone who’s an excellent IT manager, who will be exploited, and will eventually resign out of disgust, or continue to be exploited, or die.

I feel like writing to the CIO of Foot Locker and asking him how much he’s earning. Betcha it’s slightly more than $45K.
Max.

2

That is pretty fucked up. However, I have been asked some pretty screwed up things like that in interviews. It makes you wonder if they have been watching a movie in which the hero is found homeless on the street and just wants a chance to get back in the game no matter what the compensation. That reminds me of a conversation I had with my father-in-law. He wanted a personal assistant that could speak Spanish and Italian, with French as a bonus. The person should also know computers, import regulations, and be a good office manager. I asked him how much he wanted to pay and he replied 25 to 30k.

3

For US Dopers following along currently

1.00 AUD Australia Dollars = 0.790670 USD United States Dollars

So we’re actually talking about a position in the high 30’s (US dollars) to do what Maxxxie mentioned. Is the IT market that bad there? I thought your economy was doing pretty good.

4

And THAT’s why I went from IT to healthcare!

5

Yes and no. The IT industry here (as in the US) is full of barely-qualified entry-level people. People who went to MCSE/CCNA bootcamp and thought that would bring them the riches of the world. This means that there are a LOT of people competing for the same position.

Having said that, an income of between $30K and $40K is acceptable for an entry-level position, particularly if the applicant has little or no experience. It is NOT appropriate for a role that encompasses international responsibilities, and presumably reports directly either to the CIO, or to the President of the business.

I mean, really… who on earth really thinks that someone with four years’ experience will have the skills to run the entirety of the Asia-Pacific region’s IT operations??? And for a piddling 45 grand?? Honestly, what the fuck!?

Just so there’s no confusion - this job ad is an abberation. Most positions are advertised with salaries appropriate (or marginally under) for the role. But these people are nucking futs.
Max :smiley:

6

Hopefully either the ad or the wage are out to lunch. My boss just put together an ad to attract another programmer to the company I work for; listed requirements include real-time programming, advanced data compression and fuzzy logic. This would be okay except the closest anyone here gets to those is when one of us creates a .zip file.

Sadly, even at an entry level salary, we’re attracting impressive csvs from Phd level applicants. If Foot Locker is willing to hire someone from Russia, India or :confused: Australia, then I’m pretty sure one of these guys is a lock.

7

Hopefully, they get exactly what they are paying for, not what they are asking for.

But, who knows. Maybe they meant to post that in Hong Kong where they usually quote in HK dollars/month. That would be a more reasonable wage (although still a little light).

8

You’re my hero! :slight_smile:

9

I interviewed for and was offered a programming job last summer. Now, I know this area is economically depressed, and high tech jobs are pretty much nonexistant. But this place wanted a Web developer (HTML and php/C#), someone who could watch over their servers, plus knew Photoshop. After two interviews - one of which involved writing C++ code on the white board - and multiple assurances that their salary was competitive within the area, they offered me $30K and a measly benefit package.

To put it in context, common laborers - the guys who run errands and push brooms for my uncle’s construction company - make around $40K a year, and have a nice benefit package.

I turned them down.

10

There is no link between technical skill and ability and salary any more, and hasn’t been for some time, it’s all supply and demand. Case in point that I know well: journalism. About a decade ago I was working for a trade magazine publishing outfit that paid assistant editors $13K a year. To make it clear, this is less money than a halfway decent waiter or waitress makes it my area. But wait … it gets better. The management then said that they were going to have to cut assistant editor salaries to $12K a year since times were rough, y’know. (Salespeople at these same magazines made $50-$150K a year, depending on how good they were and what their market was like).

I later read that in about that time frame, journalism and some obscure health care profession were the only ones to see entry-level wages REDUCED in absolute terms.

One of the editors actually did quit to take a job as a waitress. She said it paid better and it was less degrading. She was probably right.

On the bright side, the experience gave me to write a novel about an enterprising and ruthless publisher who turns an entry level editor into a sex slave. So, there’s always a silver lining.

11

I thought salaries in publishing were always ridiculously low, because of the stock of bright young English majors who’d kill to work for a real publisher. Don’t they all dream of being Max Perkins some day?
As for the OP: I’m sure $45K is too low (a manager after 2 - 4 years?) but $200 K for a first level manager is way too high. Average salaries for engineers with lots of experience is about $100K tops in Silicon Valley. That kind of job would be probably $50 - $60k. Look, no one can support 97 sites unless the sites need support very rarely. I suspect people overspecify a job, looking for a miracle, and take what they get. If this opening is for a manager, how many people are in the group. (I know, you don’t know that.)

BTW - the site doesn’t work for me. It complains that Firefox is not set up for cookies, which is not true.

Anyhow, if low level IT jobs pay $200K, I’m heading your way. What I do must be worth $1 million!

12

Umm, maybe I wasn’t clear in the OP. It’s not a low-level job. It’s the IT manager for the Asia-Pacific division of a multinational company. If this company is like any other multinational, this person would answer to the CIO. I don’t call that low-level. The ad didn’t say how many staff report to this person, but I find it difficult to believe it’s a staff consisting only of the IT manager.

Also, please don’t forget that we are talking Australian dollars. So $100K AU == $79K US (or, if you prefer, $100K US == $127K AU).

Evil Captor, I love your silver lining! LMAO!

Max.

13

Could it be that they are intending to promote someone internally, but have a legal requirement to advertise the job?

14

Y’know, that hadn’t occurred to me… and I think you might be dead on. Ring-a-ding-ding, folks, we have a winner!!

Max :smiley:

15

Precisely what I was wondering. If they’ve already got an internal candidate they like, but are forced by either statute or HR policy to advertise, then I can see exactly why they’d post an advert that’s unlikely to get a great deal of interest.

16

Yeah, but – that was in 1995 dollars!

[d&r]

17

I got an email the other day targeted at PhD students in my department (Computer Science). It was written in shit english, in MS Comic Sans, and the upshot of it was that they wanted a PhD student with his own Apache server and broadband pipe to develop a fairly significant web application for an unspecified purpose for a non-existent company for free over a 6-month period in exchange for a stake in the company as and when (and if) it existed. Apparently in their minds “student” = “unemployed and desperate”.

So, much as I’d like to think that the “statutory ad for an already-filled place” theory is true, it’s just as likely that they really think there are people stupid enough to see that as a good offer. There are some morons out there, and moreover they are cheap morons.

18

Well, there’s another possibility that I can think of, and that is that they’re making use of the strategy that my former employer used to use when hiring. That strategy was:
[ol]
[li]Ask for the sun, moon, and stars in the ad.[/li][li]Offer absolute shit for pay.[/li][li]Hire the best thing that shows up.[/li][/ol]
They did this all the time. Invariably, what turned up was someone underqualified for the job described in the ad, but normally that was what they really wanted anyway. Why they didn’t just list honest requirements, I’ll never know. It probably scared away many perfectly qualified people.

19

And you think that the wage for entry-level editor has gone up … why, exactly? The only way I see it bumping up is if the Senate eventually raises the minimum wage ceiling above it – not at all an unlikely occurence, IMHO.

20

This is nothing. I regularly saw ads when I was job hunting that was looking for a CCIE with 8-10 years of experience. The offer was $35k-$40k a year…

-Joe