How do you convince people that you are worth millions?

[beam]

I was reading an article and it got me to wondering as I do about 4 times a year....how do you convice an employer, board, whatever that what you do for the company, organization, whatever is worth mulitmillions in salary, bonuses, one-time payouts, etc.? I just have a hard time believing that a person's contributions are THAT much more beneficial.

Someone enlighten me here. Athletes are sort of the same way, is what they do really worth the millions they earn? I think there is a difference between the athletes and corporate execs who make obscene amounts. Or is there?

[jdev]

it more or less comes down to what they can do for the company/team.

take an athelete for example. lets say tom brady. come from behind 3rd string QB. why does he make lots of loot now? because fans come out to see him at a field. he makes appearances at events and interacts with fans, not only "selling" himself, but the team as a whole as well.

while the same may not apply to the corporate world, look at it from my point of view.

i work in tech support for a webhosting company. if I were to leave, the company would be up sh*ts creek without a paddle.

heres why:

i manage over 1700 IP addresses assigned to several unix machines here.

nobody but myself is involved/immersed into the management of this as I am, not even the owners.

ontop of this, I am responsible for the setup of new unix virtual accounts on these servers. while there are others that know the procedure to do this, they do not have the knowledge to troubleshoot problems when things dont go right on the server.

and finally. the servers i manage are unix. nobody in the building that shows up on a day to day basis, knows unix as well as I do. the owner of the company is the only person who does, and hasnt been in the office in almost a year now to do actual work.

so.. it really depends on the situation and what you provide for the company/team

maybe i went in the wrong direction here.. in that case, i apologize for wasting your time.

[beam]

No, you didn't waste my time. So what you are saying is...due to your importance at the company you work for, you are making over a million a year?

[jdev]

heh, actually, no. i think what I was trying to say is that you have to present yourself as an assett to the company that they really need.

i do on the other hand wish i was making a million a year.. unfortunately, im not sure the company I work for even generates that in *gorss* revenue... let alone what they have after paying employees and other misc. expenses.

*ill go back to my corner now *

[Albinonewt]

Well, at my old brokerage house where I did the bulk of our SEC and NSAD reporting as well as our financials to the board of directors I had a massive problem with my bosses, who were convinced I wasn't worth even market value. I was convinced I was worth a whole lot more then that, since I literally was the sole reason the financial reporting department even functioned (I also maintained the general ledger and our server). Anyways, we were haveing an arguement one time and my boss yelled at me something to the effect of "You're worth what I say your worth, and unless your independently wealthy you're out of luck". I went over to his PC and pulled up my personal account at the firm (where all my trading and holdings are) and showed him the value of my account. When he realized that I did in fact not need his pittance of a job to maintain my lifestyle he was pretty shocked.

Then I quit, and we had to negotiate a price for me to teach them how to run their department.

And then I moved my account from the firm, which got my broker a little annoyed

[beam]

See the thing of it is in both examples that you guys shared, you were very valuable to the company for which you worked, but for some reason you didn't even make a piddly $1M a year (note sarcasm). So then, what allows a CEO, Board of Directors, or whatever to earn MultiMillions a year PLUS Bonuses that make you want to puke PLUS fringe benefits PLUS stock options PLUS PLUS. Is that individual really THAT valuable? I think in most cases the answer is an absolute NO.

Take the article I listed as an example. The dude is getting a one-time sum of $140 M. Now the three of us, joey_d, albinonewt, and beam would need to work for 140 years at $333,333 a year EACH to equal that amout combined! Do either of you guys make that? Not me. But even if you did, we don't have 140 years to work, so let's make it realistic. Let's say we combine our salaries for 40 years worth of work. We would each need to make $1.16666666 MILLION a year to equal what this guy is getting in a one time deal. So this guy is worth more in one year than the three of us will be for our entire working lives. hmmmmmmm I don't think so.

So, I want to know what the secret is to fool someone into paying me a million a year. Because eventhough I know I'm not worth that, I also know that very few who make it probably are. grrrrrr.

[Albinonewt]

To be fair, I think you'd be suprised what goes into earning a salary like that. I know my boss makes about 1/2 a million a year for a fairly substanial comapany. The number of jobs that pay 1 million is few, and they are typically staffed by the top 1% in their field.

There are of course always exceptions, but these guys and gals tend to be extremely motivated and exceptionally intelligent people who have gotten ahead in the world by being the best.

[Jack_Dubious]

Once you see the ICE the BLING in my mouf, you know I got dollaz! Best believe dat.




JDub

[beam]

I don't doubt that a person who makes a high salary is usually intelligent, hardworking, motivated, etc. But are they THAT much more intelligent, hardworking, motivated, etc?!?!?! I mean really, look at the example I gave before, That guy will make in one year, what three of us combined would be worth in our life times if we made 1.16 million a year for 40 years!!! Here's another more realistic example: That guy will make in ONE year what 70 people being paid $50,000 for 40 years worht of work would make combined! And that's just his one-time pay-out. He will get his normal salary + benefits on top of that.

So is he really worth in one year what 70 moderately paid people could do over 40 years?!?!? It blows my mind.

[ShooterJM]

Do I think it's high, yeah. His salary is ok, and even low in comparison ($2.6M).

But there are a couple things in that article.

First grosso's been working for the NYSE for 35 years. That 140 million number is made up of retirement accounts, savings, deferred income and deferred bonuses.

Now factor in that growth of the NYSE (more then doubling in size) in his tenure and the fact that it represents over $13 TRILLION dollars in market capitalization.

You gotta really trust someone not to screw with the stock market.

[Albinonewt]

Plus, that is a kind of responsibility that the rest of us can barely conceive of.

Think about it, he has the responsibility to make sure that trillions of dollars in investments and the world's largest market don't break.

I Wouldn't take that job if I could make the same (or half) as much as a guy that painted the bottom of Honda Civics coming off the assembly line.

Like Spider Man says, with great power comes great responsibility. And, with great responsibility comes CASH CASH CASH

[MantisMag]

i was doing files for an HR department this summer. so in the course of my work i was reading the performance reviews and salary requests of some high ranking people in a pharmmaceutical company (which will of course remain unnamed ). i found that the guys in director positions with $200k and up salaries tend to like tooting their own horns every chance they get. "i'm highly motivated." "i'm responsible for this accomplishment." "look what i did this year." "blah blah blah" "i feel that i deserve a 20% increase in my salary." and they'd get it! what it really comes down to is having a strong personality and enough charisma where you can pull off outrageous stunts like that. humility goes right out the window. humility is for when you're making speeches. when you're doing performance reviews screw it. blow your horn till your face turns blue. then take a breath and blow some more. cause if the people you're working for don't know what you do for them, you're not getting any more money. if they think you're perfectly happy at your current salary, you're not getting any more money. if you don't tell them how great you are and ask for more money, you're not getting any more money. and that sadly is the way it works.

[gimp]

It's all about 'playing the game'. That's what I've always heard. My father runs a paper mill. For where we live, he does very well. Anyway, he knows a few big names in the paper industry. Sometimes they come over to dinner. One of the new owners of the mill was over, and he was giving me advice. He worked really really hard to be where he is, and he still does. He's no idiot. He knew enough to play the game. Brag to the right people, do whatever it takes. That's what he told me. Just to give you an idea about how much money this guy is worth, he gets about a penny every time someone buys a cheeseburger from mcdonalds.

[bornl33t]

it's all about sucking up.. .that's the down low of the matter. Ppl who are on top now had a valuable asset and with some sucking up they went right up the corporate ladder. Till they were president and when the president retired... thy became CEO.

[Pokaris]

Originally posted by Heat
it's all about sucking up.. .that's the down low of the matter. Ppl who are on top now had a valuable asset and with some sucking up they went right up the corporate ladder. Till they were president and when the president retired... thy became CEO.

I dont know, most master suck ups can only make it to middle management and then it becomes apparent they are under qualified.