What’s the best way to ask for a pay rise at a Taiwanese company?
Do you get offers from other companies and ask for your current employer to match? What if they refuse? I don’t actually want to leave.
Do you show them how much they’d waste on freelancers if they didn’t have you doing the work?
I’d be interested to hear how you guys have gone about doing this in the past
Ideally I’d like to ask for a 10-15% pay rise, but it will be hard because I’m probably already the best paid person in my department (at my seniority level). Saying that, the whole department’s projects would be massively delayed if I left since I’ve made myself a key person in all of them, and they wouldn’t find someone to replace me easily (they were looking for over a year before finding me).
I don’t actually have a contract in that sense, there is no expiry date on the documents I signed. However, I’m now coming up to a year at the company, and now is a better time than ever to negotiate a better salary for my second year.
I do this and they never match exactly what I can get elsewhere. They usually offer something a bit under what I’ve asked and I accept because I don’t want to quit either.
But I’m still a cram school teacher and it’s easy to find better offers to show. I even quit once for 3 days then came back after they gave me very close to what I wanted.
I wouldn’t bring up what your colleagues get paid. Just what you think you are worth. If they bring up other people’s wages, that’s pretty unprofessional of them IMO.
I think 10-15% increase is a very reasonable amount to ask for. I’d recommend asking for 15-20% because there is a 99% chance they will give you a counter offer less than your asking.
My next pay rise conversation is going to be to ask my employer to increase my pension contributions from 6% to 12% with no change to my base salary. (Then I will stop salary sacrificing 6% and increase my take home pay). But this is a strategic move on my behalf as I know my boss doesn’t want me to go into the next bracket for NHI.
They asked me to be patient while they look for a solution. If they don’t find a solution then I’ll just straight up threaten to leave anyways. Today is one week since they said that so I’m hoping for a response soon. The fact that they didn’t immediately say no is hopeful though.
It’s impossible for them not to find one. It’s their choice. This sort of rubbish is one thing that I really can’t stand in Taiwan. Good luck with it all!
Maybe your solution should be that they make up the difference with a raise? That way, your monthly pay is the same as it would be now without the tax withholding. Yes, your annual pay goes up as well, but you tried to solve it a different way and they were unable
If you really a key person, not simply a middle manager, your boss will say something along the line of, ”Name the number that you want and we are gonna take it from there.”
But, of course, when I am ask/confront this, I know for sure, I won’t stay.
Then his next move will be, “Could you stay until the end of the year?”
Again, at this stage, I have other better offers at hands and that offer only wait a month max.
Personally, i wish you all the best and good luck in getting a raise.
Professionaly, let me chime in as a manager and give you a few points to think about before you go and ask for the raise:
Is the company making money? Raises are easier when the company is profitable. If you are losing clients and not making money, no one will give you a raise so don’t waste your time. Look for something else outside.
Are you really that indispensable? from my experience, very few are, so saying you will leave might not shake them as much as you think .
Are you helping the company make money? If you can show clear connection between your performance and the company’s top or bottom line, you can make a point. Otherwise you are just “nice to have”. the company doesnt mind wasting money on freelancers, they did it before and managed somehow (even if the position was open for a year, work didn’t stop, right?) so unless you show substantial earnings or savings, you quitting won’t shake anyone’s world.
How is your general attiude at the work place? Are you an A player? or a trouble maker? Attiude goes a long way, sometimes more than performance. I will compensate a top performer that doesnt complain and gets the job done before a top performer who is a wet blanket and complains about the company all the time.
Most organizations that are managed correctly shouldn’t have any indispensable person at all. Because if someone is truly indispensable then if something should happen to him/her then the organization is in serious trouble. People get sick, accidents happen, etc… So any organization worth their salt will make sure no one is truly indispensable.
It depends how much you are asking for doesn’t it.
Big difference between asking for 20% or a raise at the rate of inflation. One is just a kind of business expense and the other is something that is going to be justified and also gets the business manger thinking can I get cheaper even though it’s a headache to switch them out.
yes, it depends on many factors:
How much you are asking, also the company size (giving a 3% raise to 500 employees vs giving a 20% raise in a company of 10 employees). But at least in our company, the first criterion is are we able to afford it at all. We did a lot of business with China, and Covid has put a big dent in our earnings, so the company flat out told us there will be no pay raises.
after that, we look at the contribution of the individual to the company, do they deliver good results that deserve recognition. Individual personality, though not a criteria in deciding pay raise, also plays a part. If we have 35 employees, but can only raise the salary of 5 of them, the nicer ones have an advantage.
I would be really, really careful about bringing up another offer if you weren’t willing to leave.
yep. I’ve had this conversation over the years with a few more junior folks who thought they were indispensable. I always ask them what they think would happen if they asked their boss for a 300% raise or they’re leaving.
There are very, very few people for which this would happen. Key is not indispensable.
Even in poorly run organizations are people rarely indispensable. if it’s an ongoing concern, even if poorly run, the company existed before you joined, and will exist after you leave.
Even Apple continues to make money hand over fist without Steve Jobs and Jonny Ives.
Yeah the place I work in has gone through a number of CEOs over the years. Massive pay, greatly overrated in terms of their individual impact, they are basically joining a well oiled machine, their job is not to f it up and hopefully improve on it a bit here and there.
As for the ultimatum on leaving, yes it’s a high risk strategy. It’s better to say I need a pay hike due to x/yz/ and by the way competitors keep calling me offering me higher money. I think we have a great thing going here but feel like it’s not been keeping up. And leverage the time when your numbers are going great.
It’s always best to really have that offer rather than bluffing. Also seen many people leave and come back, don’t burn bridges.
As for ‘Taiwanese’ companies, some are really stubborn and they will never give in because they see staff as a cost and nothing more. And they don’t want the other staff to know about or see others get a pay rise if at all possible, some of these family run companies would often rather lose a high performer than upend the pay scale.
