Slashdot Mirror
Buffer Sees Clear Benefits To Transparent Employee Salary Policy
An anonymous reader writes: At social media startup Buffer, a single leadership decision eliminated salary negotiation for new employees, preempted gender-based salary discrimination, and prompted a flood of job applications. The decision? Make all employee salaries transparent. "We set down transparency as a core value for the company," CEO Joel Gascoigne said in 2014. "And then, once we'd done that, we went through everything. And salaries was one of those key things that we found that [made us] question ourselves: 'Why are we not transparent about this?'" Years later, the policy is still in place (go ahead and calculate your salary as a would-be Buffer employee) — and it presents a fascinating case study for anyone interested in the ways open organizations approach a rather prickly subject: transparency.
No negotiation on salary basically means they are bottom feeders.
Did you look at their salary levels? In the SF area, they are offering $122k to entry level programmers. That is not "bottom feeding". It is ridiculously high. My company (San Jose) offers fresh "BS in CS" grads between $80-100k, and we have no problem getting people from SJSU or even Berkeley. Their problem is on the high end. As that employee goes from beginner to intermediate to advanced, their salary only goes up by $20k. That is a pittance. In the SF Bay Area, there is no way you are going to hang on to good experienced people for $145k.