Don't count on quick raises from a very low salary unless you've explicitly discussed that with your boss or at your interview. In most places I've seen, they're happy to calculate raises using %, which means you get a whopping 20% raise on a £20k salary - which still amounts to peanuts (£24k is not much different from £20k).

Negotiate your starting salary as high as you can, and don't count on quick raises.

Here's a useful article on the topic from ever-helpful Rands:

http://www.randsinrepose.com/archives/2008/04/11/the_busines...

Daniel

haha ya... my first post grad programming job raise was smaller in $'s per hour than the raises I got as a lifeguard when I was 15 :(

Raises? It's called changing jobs.

I'm not sure what you're getting at -- should I change jobs when I feel like I'm due a better salary? Even if the job is awesome?

You don't need to actually change jobs. If you get a better offer, you can tell your company that you feel you're being undervalued, and ask for a raise.

It's just money, so don't be shy.

I've been working for over 10 years, and I've found that most companies offer 2% - 5% raises, a little more if you are a super employee. The only ways to get more than a 10% raise are to change jobs or to use another job offer as a means to extract a counter offer from your current employer.

yes. raises tend tp ne 2-3%, You can get 10-15% or more for changing jobs

Any significant 'raise' will require you to either change jobs, or to get a new position within the current company that suddenly takes on a lot more responsibility, and even that will limit you to maybe 10%.

Get a bit of experience and start shopping around, that's how you'll know what you're worth.

Note that the real value of a salary is almost entirely dependent on your location and cost of living.

As a new PhD grad, I got a raise after 6 months, and another (larger one) 6 months after that. Just ask for a performance review.