#SalaryLeapStories: What was your biggest salary jump and how did you make it happen?
Hey there! π Looking to shake things up in my career and make a move toward a higher salary. My own biggest leap was from $80K to $120K, and let me tell you, it felt like hitting the jackpot! π€ Now, I’m on a mission to gather some intel on how others have managed to pull off these epic salary jumps. π
So, spill the tea! How did you go from rags to riches in the salary department? Did you negotiate like a boss, learn a new skill, or simply get lucky? I’m all ears and eager to learn from your success stories. ππ°
Whether it’s climbing up the career ladder, landing that dream job, or hustling your way to a higher paycheck, I want to hear it all! Share your tips, tricks, and success stories with me. Let’s inspire each other to aim higher and make those salary leaps together. πͺπΌ #CareerGoals #SalaryHacks #DreamJob #SalarySuccess #CareerAdvice
Now, it’s your turn! Ready, set, spill the beans… π¬β¨
For me it was school and soft skills. First degree-70 k, masters, 130 k. But have you ever job hopped back? My last job hop back to a job I had before got me to 230k
Imho job hop back.
Switched from aerospace leadership to tech company. Went from $190k to now a target of $425k. Since thatβs mostly stock based and stock is doing well, itβs closer to $520 this year.
Pretty much the same exact jump. It just took finishing my masters and moving to a new company.
Hoping to make the jump to $180k soon π€π»
Journalism to marketing. Pretty common leap. Marketing or communications or public relations. You give up a cause and a calling for safety and security–supposedly.
My biggest jump was due to getting a competing offer and using it as leverage at my current role. I get along really well w my current company and Forced their hand to scale me up to highest pay allowed for that role.
I was willing to walk away though, thatβs important when negotiating
Went from $89k to $115k a month ago. Went from reception in finance to Employee Experience in fashion.
Iβve left every job at 18 months. Iβm in NYC and my first job in reception started at $35k in 2016.
$15/hour – $75k and I’ve stagnated since then..
I want to do a salary leap right now .. aiming for $96k at the least..
About a $27k jump from $87k to $115k.
I went from a manager to a sr manager role. It was all timing and knowing someone.
Being willing to leave the company for another, and avoiding the sunk cost fallacy.Β
Every leap I have made resulted in a 20-40% increase in salary. Sometimes I negotiate.a starting bonus on top of that.
Promises are cheap, if the employer doesn’t show me something tangible, I leave.Β
I just accepted a new job, jumping up from 58k (first job out of uni, started at 52k) to 80k.
Honestly I just did my time. The job sucked, was insanely advanced for what it was supposed to be, no guidance whatsoever, boss had no idea what he was doing all the time, etc. I was applying lots of places with no responses, but a recruiter from a rival company directly contacted me asking if I was interested in a lead position (probably just a title) at theirs.
Did a few interviews and I was honest with them. I didnβt bad mouth my company or anything, but I laid out the risks and challenges I had working here, and they really liked how I could articulate and analyze situations. During my second interview they had some problems set up to where they just wanted to see how I think and I passed with flying colors. I high balled them at 80k (upper limit for the job was 82k) and they gave me that exact amount. Starting in a few weeks.
My advice? Donβt ever lie or go well-beyond the scope of your abilities. Be upfront. Donβt beat yourself up, but donβt undersell either. Good companies value honesty, I promise.
Job hopping. Went from $67 to $95 base(with bonus made $112 that year), it was a pretty big leap.
Job hopping every 2-3 years sucks for the 401k as most companies require a vesting period but if youβre maxing it out, youβll be alright in the long run.
50%. I had gay sex with my manager and black mailed him.
$55k in a VHCOL to $165k in a MCOL. Finished a postdoc. My spouse got a 30% raise at the same time.
I went from $100K to $200K overnight because I found out new hires were starting at the latter, and I called management out on it. Cautionary tale though: The βnegotiatingβ was brutalβand a year in, I was suddenly counted on to do more since Iβd been there longest. Ended up leaving for a $150K job elsewhere with more benefits and sanity. Nothing comes for free.
Consulting….
no insurance, no benefits, but you can pay for it all with big monthly pay cheques
went from 35 to 55 to 90 trying to get 150/hr eventually
I went from one grocery store making 25k to another one making under 20k. Iβm lazy and unmotivated to put in any effort to find better work
Went from a comp of ~ 116k (base $107k) to ~ 252k (base $162k). A part of that was due to moving to a HCOL area, but also due to switching to tech.
65k-110k was the biggest jump so far by switching roles with a new employer.
doubled twice, one was moving industries the other was moving companies.
Engineer. I got laid off during the 2008crash. I stayed out of work and got my professional engineering license. I got a 25% raise when I went back to work. It helped that my former client told the new company they should hire me. I worked there for about 6 years with minor but decent raises over that time. I helped win a high-profile project and learned a new skillset while managing the project. It put me in front of clients, other companies working on the project, governmental agencies, etc… this raise in profile and experience launched me to another level. I left my company and got a 40% raise at my next job. So licensing, experience, networking and not being afraid to leave your old company. I also did a stint in sales during my career. It changed my perspective on compensation.
I went from 16 an hr to 30 plus I. Less then three years. Learned hvac and the. Learned the basics of everything else in the trades.
Β£45,000 to Β£78,000. It was life-changing and felt crazy as a 23 year old
46k USD to 100k USD
Relocating originally employed in UK I got an internal transfer to the UAE where salaries are much higher.
Doubled my income while doing same position just for a different region of the company.
I also went from $80k to $120k. Iβm in electrical engineering, specialized in space programs. I moved from the Midwest to LA to get in one of the big boys, and negotiated pretty heavily by leveraging all my offers. Ended up getting paid a bonus and relo, along with the raise and promotion. A few years later i got re-hired at my previous company, at $150k and full time remote. Currently at $160k and looking to move soon if i donβt get promoted here, because i have definitely earned one. Never get complacent, job hop. Be valuable.
I went from 42k to 72k. All I did was get a new job in a different industry. I really didnβt realize how low paying my previous company was and when I initially interviewed I asked for 45k like that was a lotβ¦ they said they donβt even pay less than 55k as a company. Lol.
Went from 23K per year to about 40K. Did it by working for the same company but 60-100 hour weeks. Instead of 40.
I went from 60k to 35k.
Oh you meant leap up!! I thought it was leap off of a cliff!
I went from military making $8450/yr to $30k at first job “adult” after college. 20 yrs later I only make $85k at primary job.
I went from 50k to 80k, then from 85k to 120k
This happened through a new job > promotion > new job
80 to 138
got an offer from another company & took a retention offer
I was ready to leave though & wasnβt necessarily thinking I would get a retention offer
$30k to $160k. Enlisted military to F500 gig. All it took was 8 years of school in between lol
Last month I made a leap from $85K to $150K in base salary.
How I did it: I got licensed in my profession, something not many do. Upon my recent licensure, I was not happy with what they financially gave me for my hard work. So I applied to a job opening that was offering 120k. I got the job offer and was offered 143K.
Long story short, when I put in my two weeks notice the partners at my current employment and I had some negotiation talks and talk about what a future for me will be like if I stayed. I was able to negotiate them to $150, extra vacation, and a plan for partnership. I decided to stay. Some say that was a bad move, some say it was a good move. Only time will tell. For now I get to keep my comfort while almost doubling my salary. Iβm pretty happy.
Doubled my comp in the same job by getting acquired.
Went from 50k to 119k
I just recently jumped from $100k to $137k. I’d been working at the same job for about five years and had never gotten more than a 4% raise (the year that inflation jumped up 6%). They tied salary to promotions, and the only position above mine had already been filled by the new guy (of course, they didn’t tell me this- I didn’t find out until I’d already gone over a year trying to *get* that position). My new job hired me on at the same position, but with a 30% raise.
Went from $58,000 a year to $79,000.
Same job, just started selling little things I 3D print online as a side hustle.
You need to change companies every 2 years or you will get left behind and end up loosing about 50% of your market salary over a decade. You will need a professional network, use pathports (free), ieee, speea.. they will get you where you want to go.
120k to 170k , went from being a lead engineer to an engineering supervisor
Went from ~$32K to ~$96K practically overnight. Working the same job for the same company.
It started out with a company doing inside sales. We didn’t do much cold calling. We sold equipment and software to go along with it. At the time, the equipment mfg owned 98% of the market share. And this was the type of equipment that every retail company/store needed. The equipment mfg was in the same city and would send us leads all of the time because the equipment mfg didn’t sell the equipment directly to the consumer (that’s where we came in).
Most of the time we would get a lead, then it would be assigned to the sales rep whose territory it was in and usually most of it would be handled over the phone. For bigger projects the sales rep would then actually make an on-site visit to talk to the prospective customer.
I was a new sales rep, right out of college in 2000. My base pay was $26K + commission and at teh time I was on pace to make about $32K for the year.
We have my bi-annual review and it goes well, but I hate the job (sales just wasn’t for me) and I was thinking of quitting. But my boss tells me that they just hired some consultants and that we’ll probably have another meeting about a month from now to discuss my future with the company.
A month goes by and we have the meeting and my boss informs me that the consultants have recommended that the company change its way of doing sales. Instead of only meeting customers on-sight if they have a big project, the sales reps need to be on the road more and do on-site visits even if it’s a moderate size project. And because all of these sales reps will be on the road, they need somebody at the office to get whatever the sales reps needs (basically serving as the assistant for all sales reps) and my boss thought I’d be a great candidate for the job.
My boss then tells me that my base salary ($26K) will stay the same, but now I’ll get paid a 1% commission of the dept’s *gross* sales at the end of each month.
At the end of each month accounting would print out a 5-7 page report of what sales reps made what sales and for how much. I think I was the only one that read the full report each month because I knew that the dept. was pulling in $500K-$600K per month. I then started to do the math in my head and started to see how big of a bump in pay it was and while my boss was talking I was just thinking about how I’m going to get the company locked into the deal.
After my boss stopped talking and asked if I had any questions I just asked him to confirm the new payment structure and then said we should just get it in writing so payroll has it down in their system correctly (fortunately at the time my gf was working in HR for the company and produced the written agreement for us)
And sure enough, I’m not getting $5K-$6K in commissions + my $26K salary each month. I was essentially on pace to make $96K that year.
About a year down the road they ended up giving me a new boss. They first tried to change the payment structure and I did my best to work around it. Then after they saw that I was still getting paid practically the same that’s when they laid me off.
Truth be told I was getting paid way too much. I was making more $$$ than most of the reps that actually were traveling and going on-site to meet with customers. But what they wanted to pay me after they tried to go back on the deal was too low. Truth be told, that was a job good enough for about $50K/year (this was 2001).
I donβt have the largest leap on here, but last year I went from 28k to 50k. Itβs been nice to finally not have to worry about paying rent on time.