News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:I'm Begging for Work by Bonogongo on Thursday September 10, 2015 @03:21AM (#10196540)
As a manager if someone tries to blackmail me with leaving, I usually say "Then leave". Never let people blackmail you.

Would I hire someone who swears and uses f* in a conversation with his boss? No.

Would I hire someone who creates a blog to make his boss look bad? No.

All of this with 4 kids I surely would not trust on you any responsibibility acting so irresponsible.

So everyone here who wants to hire this guy, a have nice time.

My advice: Try to understand why your boss only wanted you give $45k and work on yourself.

Re:I'm Begging for Work by brokedev on Thursday September 10, 2015 @04:17AM (#10196741)
I understand your disagreement, but I never blackmailed him. When he told me my new salary, it was nothing like he'd indicated, and nothing like what other entry-level developers were paid. I understand that I'm self taught, but I was there nine months and haven't had any complaints about my work, only a few corrections like any other junior developer.

1. I didn't blackmail him. I had made it clear from the day I was hired full time that I wouldn't be able to afford living on that amount. And yesterday when I finally found out what I'd be making, it turned out he'd reneged on his side, and I called him out on it.

2. Technically I said fuck in a conversation with my ex-boss. This was after he fired me and called me disloyal. My conversations with him as an employee were more than respectful.

3. The blog was not about him, it was about my desperation. I don't care that he offered me the $45k, I care that he strung me along like it would be more. It might have been an overreaction, but if so I still feel like it's an understandable one given what state of mind anyone would be in, having the rug pulled out from under them like this.

And for what it's worth, I'm a really quiet, easy-going person. I don't blow up on people, but I also don't do weird passive-aggressive office politics. I work and generally get along with everyone.

Re:I'm Begging for Work by Adam89 on Thursday September 10, 2015 @05:06AM (#10196916)
Unfortunately you've just met a sociopath, I hope things workout for you, if not reply back to me on here and I'll try to onboard you to a remote ruby contract that I just landed. Even though this contract would help me, I don't mind giving it to you and helping you get used to the work.

Your BOSS sounds like a complete and utter douche bag and this experience may turn out to be a great lesson.

Re:I'm Begging for Work by fx85ms on Thursday September 10, 2015 @04:00AM (#10196682)
How about you calm down instead of spewing nothing but toxic comments at almost every single reply this post has? I fail to see how OP is in any sense blackmailing his boss. All he is doing is asking for a pay raise. Regarding your point about making his boss look bad, may I remind you that never has once did the OP mention the name of his boss or the place he works at? If OP really wanted to make his boss look bad, would he have gone through the trouble of hiding his identity?

I take great offense at "try to understand why your boss only wanted to give you $45k and work on yourself". You're pushing the blame squarely on the OP. He has clarified that this salary is even LOWER than his intern pay. Now, wouldn't it be more reasonable to ask the boss why the pay is even lower than his previous salary?

You have made yourself look like the very kind of obnoxious boss that OP is talking about.

Re:I'm Begging for Work by ryan-c on Thursday September 10, 2015 @03:43AM (#10196612)
Are you this guy's former boss? Saying "pay me $X or I walk" is not "blackmail", it's an ultimatum. Not the same thing.
Re:I'm Begging for Work by etchalon on Thursday September 10, 2015 @04:40AM (#10196828)
More than likely his boss only wanted to give him 45k because his boss thought he could get away with only giving him 45k.

As anyone who has ever set salaries would know.

When someone comes to you for a raise, you try and sort out what the absolute minimum amount you can give them is, and go with that. It's on them to come back for more.

And once they do, you either explain why they're only worth whatever your max is, or you raise your max, or give them a list of things they need to do to raise your max and a timeline upon which you will re-evaluate them.

What you don't do is shock-and-awe fire them cause they threatened to leave.

EVERY negotiation for salary is prefaced with "if we don't agree, I'm gonna leave." Cause that's what will happen.

And yeah, I'd hire someone who writes a blog post like this. Because shit happens to people, and sometimes they write about it online.

His blog post doesn't make hiss boss look bad. His boss' actions do.

Re:I'm Begging for Work by ohwaitnvm on Thursday September 10, 2015 @03:46AM (#10196616)
Please slow your roll, you don't need to comment on every single post in here. Also, your definition of blackmail is wrong. From Google:

noun: blackmail 1. the action, treated as a criminal offense, of demanding money from a person in return for not revealing compromising or injurious information about that person.

Re:I'm Begging for Work by Joeboy on Thursday September 10, 2015 @03:51AM (#10196642)
> Would I hire someone who swears and uses f* in a conversation with his boss? No.

Where are you based, out of interest? I don't think I've ever worked anywhere where saying fuck in front of your boss would be any kind of problem whatsoever (in the UK).

Re:I'm Begging for Work by ryan-c on Thursday September 10, 2015 @03:59AM (#10196677)
I'm in the US and in the (admittedly few) jobs I've had in tech swearing hasn't been a problem so long as it's in conversation. Losing one's temper and swearing at someone is a different story, however I'd argue that in that case the problem is the outburst and not the swearing.

In general, I would expect tolerance for swearing at work in the US to vary significantly by region, industry, and role.

Re:I'm Begging for Work by hhandoko on Thursday September 10, 2015 @04:15AM (#10196735)
Without any context, I might agree. But...

> As a manager if someone tries to blackmail me with leaving, I usually say "Then leave". Never let people blackmail you.

With the assumption that he fulfilled all his duties at work (i.e. good work performance), there is nothing wrong with asking to be paid close to / comparable to his peers.

Salary contention is the easiest to fix. If you let go everyone who asks for a raise, then either your company is paying way below market rate or it is simply an excuse to get out of the organisation.

> Would I hire someone who swears and uses f* in a conversation with his boss? No.

I agree, but what I get is that the conversation happened via email exchanges. It wasn't clear whether the f* was directed at the CEO / boss or something outside of the conversation (i.e. venting).

> Would I hire someone who creates a blog to make his boss look bad? No.

He's obviously desperate to find a way out of a bad situation, thus the cry for help.

Re:I'm Begging for Work by chrisbennet on Thursday September 10, 2015 @05:00AM (#10196895)
My advice: try to understand why you are getting down voted so often and think about changing.

While it is certainly possible that everyone else has the wrong attitude, on the chance that isn't the case, perhaps some introspection is warranted on your part.

Re:I'm Begging for Work by JungleGymSam on Thursday September 10, 2015 @03:46AM (#10196619)
It's not blackmail you nitwit.
Re:I'm Begging for Work by vellum on Thursday September 10, 2015 @04:02AM (#10196694)
ultimatum != blackmail
Re:I'm Begging for Work by onedev on Thursday September 10, 2015 @03:52AM (#10196647)
You seem really bitter for no reason.
Re:I'm Begging for Work by DanBC on Thursday September 10, 2015 @03:54AM (#10196659)
Probably because of the needlessly aggressive pile on heir getting.

They make a reasonable point: first stage of hiring is filtering out people; this blog post will to some emoyers be ideal signal to cause OP to be filtered out; it might be an good idea to try a different style when looking for work.

Re:I'm Begging for Work by anonfounder1980 on Thursday September 10, 2015 @04:29AM (#10196788)
I am sure the reason is he has employed people just like brokedev before and been burnt by them. He's likely taking out his aggression on previous bad experiences out on brokedev.