Update: I walked away after 5 days of making zero progress during negotiation. —— I’m currently a team lead (managing 3 people) and technical lead role in my current company. 9 YoE My CTC: • 140k base • ~40k in unvested shares (preferred, 11 months left) from the acquisition of my previous startup The Shopify offer: • Toronto • 125k USD over 3 years as RSUs • 115k base • 5k / year lifestyle spending (numbers in CAD unless noted) —— A while back, a recruiter reached out to me to ask if I’d be interested in joining Shopify as a senior mobile developer. The process has been pretty relaxed and not rushed for almost 2 months now. Fast-forward to today and I was just contacted by the recruiter to inform me that the team was really excited to meet with me and that I got a thumbs up from everybody who I spoke with during my interviews (they were 2 pair programming exercises, a technical discussion over lunch, and an application architecture discussion). The recruiter told me they’d like to extend an offer, but wanted to share some feedback from the interview and get a sense of my salary expectations. They ‘placed’ me at senior level after a discussion with the interview team: • The recruiter said there was a lot of back and forth between me and the interviewers about the technical approach to take, which would have placed me higher (at staff engineer level). I mentioned I was deliberately trying to involve the interviewer in the process because the exercise was a collaborative pair programming session. (I didn’t want to come off as a know-it-all, or make the exercise seem like a university lecture) • They said base of 140k was high for a senior position, more in line with a staff engineer role • I asked if Shopify includes any sign-on bonuses in their offers, they said no they don’t offer candidates that to keep it fair across offers • I explained in my current role that I’m currently translating requirements from stakeholders and other technical teams into features we need to build, and architecting that in a way that would scale to support the project as it evolves. • I also mentioned I’m currently leading and mentoring a team of 3 developers. They replied that they start weighing team leadership experience once you’ve been at it for 2-3 years —— To me, the responsibilities (and comp) of my existing role matches up best with their staff role, and senior @ Shopify would be less than what I make and am hoping for. I’m pretty excited to join the team, but more than surprised at the somewhat low base offer. How do I navigate this?
Is there any COL difference?
Shopify base pay is pretty meh, the value is in the RSUs if you believe the stock will keep growing like it has. You may be able to squeeze an extra $5k or so out
You should ask them for a re-level. If they are really excited about you they’ll be willing to negotiate. Otherwise you can just stay at your current job.
What would you expect a re-level would involve? Not keen on the idea of going through their interview process all over again...
Right, I agree another round probably wouldn’t be worth it. I just meant you should try to appeal their decision and threaten to reject if they don’t like it. Your leverage is staying at your current job. Not sure how Shopify negotiates but IMO it’s worth a shot.
How many YoE? This base is pretty standard based on Canadian standard. If it's in Ottawa ,I would say good salary in comparable to living expenses.
175k CAD all-liquid TC for even Toronto is decent for 3-6 YoE ish. Google, Amazon here all pay pretty similar. You can probably try to push for 200k (please do and stop accepting those low salaries). I believe these companies all target p85-p90 of the market. For reference, my current comp at Amazon is 180k but no food. SDE2, fairly new to the company, 3.5 YoE in total. I have a friend who was in the same boat but jumped to Google Kitchener for lower comp at L4, but not by a lot and their perks must have offsetted the difference. Private companies are more likely in giving you top of the market comp (p95+), in partially illiquid form ofc. (The so called paper money)
I absolutely agree with that sentiment. It’s frustrating to say the least to spend this amount of energy ensuring I do the best interview possible, only to to end up here. Updated with YoE
Yea, 300k software dev jobs exist in Toronto, but options are limited. Heard Shopify has great culture though and is still expanding. Have fun there, if you do end up joining. Money is just a part of the equation. Also 200k is like p97 of all employed Torontonians (2016 data), for some perspective.
Correct
Damn, too bad you were forced to walk away. We really need mobile devs in Toronto. 115K is essentially the begining base for senior devs here. The value is really in the stock but a generous base still goes a long way. Sounds like you were placed at the wrong level
I have applied for mobile dev and had initial phone screen call and told to expect tech interview. It's been a week now and I feel the recruiter ghosted me. What do you suggest me doing? YOE 7
Is there much Native work or is it largely React Native now?
If it makes you feel any better. I applied and interviewed at a hosting company who asked for engineering and logic tests before even a call. Only to find out the salary they were offering was ridiculous. 60k in Seattle lol. Less than half my salary now. I was polite with declining of the offer but wow. It’s really hard to understand what an average is these days
The hosting company is a scam organization probably.
It was hostwinds lol. They seemed nice but the pay is just out of touch for seattle
Damn, didnt know shopify tc is this low. Also, what is lifestyle spending?
That was explained to me as a pro-rated amount that you can choose to spend on stuff like a house cleaning service, or purchasing a fitness tracker.