People with Jobs in Network Administration/IT/Information Systems (United States)

Take ownership of something or many things, such as me. I own all telecom, networking and PC's; basically all the technical devises, they couldn't get rid of me if they tried.

If you do your research and compare your pay rate with other companies that have similar positions in the same job market and area. If the pay rate is higher, run that by your boss, often times they will match for fear of loosing you. It is easier to increase pay on existing employee than train a new employee.

Tried to negotiate when joining, but they said salary was non-negotiable.

Remind your immediate boss of the value you bring to the table outside of your immediate job responsibilities....what you have added to your resume...internal and external courses, what you have done within the community to enhance your company's name with the public....in advance of your next Performance Review. Give your boss the tools to justify a larger than "normal" company increase.

My advice is to not work for county governments until they can bring their payscales up to median range. There are 6 people who run the whole computer department for the county who have a total workforce of over 650 people and growing. We have to constantly wear multiple hats and we work hard only to be paid up to half of what the median salary range is for our job description. It's very disheartening when you are an expert in the IT industry and you can't even be paid enough to afford a home, car, insurance, utilities, groceries, and have some on the side to keep you from being miserable. When are government entities going to wake up and logically look at what they are doing to their employees and they wonder why they have such a high turnover rate and not enough people to train these cycling individuals. It's pitiful.

I have worked for three different agencies. The first two I worked for I simply asked for a raise after the end of the first year stating I had been there for a year, the company I was working for was happy with my work. In both cases the bill rate had not changed but the agency took a smaller percentage and gave a raise out of profit margin. This only happened on the first year. I am currently persuing a raise on the same basis with the agency I am currently working with.

Focus on serving your instituion. Work on ways to improve your instituition or achieve institutional goals.

Set personal goals and work to achieve them.

Be patient.

Build genuine relationships in the organization.

Work hard.

Critically assess and ask other to assess your value in your role.

Ask carefully, humbly, but firmly for what your desire.

Don't be afraid to ask. Just have ammo to back it up. The best ammo is day to day performance that leads to benefits your working group and company.

I had a good relationship with the CEO of my last job, and I was still in college at the time. So after I was done with school, I asked for a raise and made a pretty decent argument for it, and I got it!

If you show that you have the desire to learn and take on new(er)functions that may stretch your own abilities and the drive reach that goal then your employer is bound to look at that and reward you for your efforts. Within the past two years I have taken on task that in my prior 10 years worth of experience I had not encountered. I took on the new challenging areas and to my suprise I not only enjoyed those extra areas of work, but it paid off as well. So if you show the desire to go the extra mile and you have the drive to persue those goals you will benefit in the end. Today those two extra areas of knowledge are highly sought after people with my particular skill set, so in getting my raise I was able to use my new found skills as a counter measure and show my value and you can too. Best of Luck LS