"Why I hate high house prices"

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

So this proves that for Mr Average, they earn more now than they did 10 years ago

And that significant increase is purely from wage inflation, if they sit in the same job, and never progress their career.

I was referring to career progression, where people expect to develop in their career, take on more senior posts/grades, get promoted, etc.

SingleSue

PasturesNew wrote: »

Au contraire. For a lot of people, wages are the same now as they were 10 years ago or more.

In fact, I can state that in about 1990 I was earning £6.60/hour to do a job; if I were to go and do that job again today I'd get £6-7/hour. No wage inflation.

In 1997 I started a new job on £17,500 - I looked up on their website at what that job pays today and I think (from memory) it is about £18,500.

In 1994 I was paid £14,000 as a Centre Manager for serviced offices. I suspect a similar job would attract a similar salary today.

Many salaries have literally sat still - and waited for minimum wage to catch them up. Paying WTC to part-timers with families who work only 16 hours a week has helped this to happen. Employers now have a raft of cheaper people whose salaries are topped up by benefits, rather than paying a living wage and taking somebody on full-time.

It's the same here PN.

Going back to my old sector, doing the same job and my hourly rate would be the same as what I was being paid in 1991.

In fact, I was earning more in 1991 than what is being offered for those who have worked through children and not taken a break....I would have had to take a salary reduction at some point.

Even looking at career progression, if I had stayed in the same job and moved up at the rate I had been moving up, my salary now (with the joys of only at rate of inflation pay rises which has all that has been happening in this area for years), would only be a smidgeon above what I got with basic and overtime in 1991/2..and I would still be expected to do the same hours but not get paid the overtime.

Graham_Devon

Just on a side note, I wonder how many "average" people, which is what I believe we are talking about, are actually on a "career progression" ladder?

Most I know are all in the same jobs, or at least the same type of job. Though I appriciate I do not live in the city.

PasturesNew

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Just on a side note, I wonder how many "average" people, which is what I believe we are talking about, are actually on a "career progression" ladder?

Most I know are all in the same jobs, or at least the same type of job. Though I appriciate I do not live in the city.

I think that not many are.

Even those that are trying to career progress, look at the odds. It's got nothing to do with working harder, being brighter, most often - it's about who you know, chance, being in the right place.

If you have an organisation with 1000 people working in various jobs from £12-18k - and 100 managers - and 10 bigger managers - and one big cheese ....

When the big cheese dies/leaves, only 1/9 of the bigger managers will get his job. That leaves 1/100 managers moving up to the bigger manager job and 1/1000 who will progress up to the manager job.

So, how many big cheeses have to die before you get to progress?

People tend to move around an organisation, not up it. You get moved and take on more responsibility - usually for no extra money - just hoping it'll end up paying more at some future point. But it rarely does as organisations continually churn and change and the people just move desks.

I nearly moved up once, big promotion to Head of IT planned for me ... £35k or so salary in 1998 .. company got shut down and whole department closed instead. You lose some - and some you just lose.



In 2000/2001 I was earning £50k. The market changed. Jobs all disappeared overnight in the dot com bubble burst.

Once jobs go, that's it. Look at all those car engineers - will they ever achieve their engineer salaries again? Most won't.

Graham_Devon

Good post pastures.

I'm never sure what career progression means to different people. To me it means working up the company, so the company has to be pretty large. It also means to me, going to uni, studying to be something, then waiting till your 50 to finally get there and have all the previous experience. Know a couple of people like this.

But most people I know train to be a nurse, and the furthest they get is head nurse. Or they train to be a solicitor, teacher, or car mechanic, or something else. Theres not that far you can go in these jobs!

I would guess others would talk about it as re-training to get a better job. But again, I have issues with this, as I don't know that many people who re-train for different careers. Maybe once, twice at a push, but that's not what I would personally class as progression, more of a change?

PasturesNew

Graham_Devon wrote: »

I would guess others would talk about it as re-training to get a better job.

I've tried this. I've never had an employer pay for any of my training. Training is expensive.

I did MCSE in 1998, then the next job I took didn't need it - but I did it because I didn't know what the next job would need. £2500

I did Prince2 in 2006, not managed to use that yet either. £1500.

If somebody is in one industry all the time, then they might be able to see where training would benefit them. But in IT, as you know, the skills change so rapidly - and employers want experience - that it's still "luck" if you happen across a job that wants your exact skillset.

I actually did the MCSE to gain a deeper understanding of how NT fitted together, rather than to actually use it, so I could perform better in project management - and it worked as I was often working with people who were putting together security profiles, but had no idea of what NT was capable of, so I'd look at the overall plan and then scribble down the profiles they needed to achieve the job and pass it back to them as their blueprint for the build. It wasn't necessary for the job, but stuff like that improves your credibility (especially as an older female).

Prince2 wasn't to work AS a Prince2 PM, because most jobs don't really use it - but it did mean I could apply for 2x the jobs "in case" and might have something others didn't for the jobs I would still have applied for without it ... it just made me a stronger candidate.

But, with a single income (at best), training is prohibitively expensive on the whole.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

PasturesNew wrote: »

I think that not many are.

Even those that are trying to career progress, look at the odds. It's got nothing to do with working harder, being brighter, most often - it's about who you know, chance, being in the right place.

If you have an organisation with 1000 people working in various jobs from £12-18k - and 100 managers - and 10 bigger managers - and one big cheese ....

When the big cheese dies/leaves, only 1/9 of the bigger managers will get his job. That leaves 1/100 managers moving up to the bigger manager job and 1/1000 who will progress up to the manager job.

So, how many big cheeses have to die before you get to progress?

People tend to move around an organisation, not up it. You get moved and take on more responsibility - usually for no extra money - just hoping it'll end up paying more at some future point. But it rarely does as organisations continually churn and change and the people just move desks.

I nearly moved up once, big promotion to Head of IT planned for me ... £35k or so salary in 1998 .. company got shut down and whole department closed instead. You lose some - and some you just lose.



In 2000/2001 I was earning £50k. The market changed. Jobs all disappeared overnight in the dot com bubble burst.

Once jobs go, that's it. Look at all those car engineers - will they ever achieve their engineer salaries again? Most won't.

I would disagree.

Take for example, the job of teacher. I was surprised to learn there are so many grades of teacher. I knew there were different pay grades for seniority, but someone posted it in another thread, and there are steady, incremental advances in salary grades (beyond inflation) as a teacher gains experience.

And many, if not most, jobs also have different pay grades based on seniority and experience. Certainly most public sector jobs do.

With regards to private sector, promotion is more relevant, but even then your example isn't really common.

I work in a fairly senior management role for a large national company. I would say over 75% of our staff can expect to progress through different grades of pay and advance within their career as they gain new skills and experience, even without getting promoted.

We invest heavily in developing people and encouraging them to progress, as the better they are at their jobs, the more money we make. The incentive we use to get them to do so, is to offer a more senior grade and better pay as they progress.

Most large organisations work in the same way.....

IveSeenTheLight

PasturesNew wrote: »

So, how many big cheeses have to die before you get to progress?

Once upon a time it was viewed as a job for life.
Nowadays people change companies and move on.
You don't need people to die to open up positions.

Also, companies expand. I know many companies that operated with just a few workshop personell and expanded tenfold.

That in turn opens up positions for the experienced people to move upwards.

As I said from my average stats, people earn more now than ten years ago, fact.
As Hamish said, that's without career progression.

I've also agreed there will be exceptions to the rule, but clearly they are the minority.

PasturesNew

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

We invest heavily in developing people and encouraging them to progress, as the better they are at their jobs, the more money we make.

Do you? Or do you only invest heavily in those at the top?

Most companies don't train their office staff at all, leaving it to IT to pick up the moaning and slack when people don't know how to use simple software.

I read a recent report that said that most employers don't invest any money in the lower ranks. It's for those that are already qualified, to progress them.

Many jobs have been outsourced to freelancers and contractors - all who have to do their own training, or not. Those with money can afford to keep on top, those without money can't and slide behind.

I am speaking from the viewpoint of a single person without a degree. Most of my generation didn't have a degree - and now everything seems to need it. I bet even loo cleaners will need a degree before long.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

PasturesNew wrote: »

Do you? Or do you only invest heavily in those at the top?

We invest heavily in developing people. Our training budget is millions of pounds a year.

The top earning 25% of people in our company probably receive the least training. After all, why do they need it? They are already at the top of their game.

I attend about 6-8 days a year of ongoing training and development. My boss attends 2 or 3. Anything above that is Senior Exec/Board level, and it's more briefing sessions as required than training. People much further down the food chain can get up to 20 days a year.

Most companies don't train their office staff at all, leaving it to IT to pick up the moaning and slack when people don't know how to use simple software.

All our staff receive 2 to 3 days training on our office IT systems as part of their 2 week induction process.

I read a recent report that said that most employers don't invest any money in the lower ranks. It's for those that are already qualified, to progress them.

We invest heavily in induction training and role related training for all new starts. We then let them learn on the job with a mentor for a year or so, and then start to invest in developing them again to the next level. We probably spend the most on those in the middle of the company though.