Not All Offers Are Created Equal
Criteria to Evaluate Your Opportunities
One way to frame leveling up your career is as continually upgrading the types of problems you’re facing. Ground floor problems might look something like:
· Am I employed (or do I have an offer of employment that will start soon)?
· Am I adjacent to the industry I would like to be in?
· Am I/will I be making enough money to cover my needs?
These questions surround securing an opportunity. This article assumes that you have these bases covered. (If not, no worries! Keep an eye out for articles on job hunting, salary negotiation, etc.) So, what do the next level of problems look like? During this level up, you might start asking questions more along the lines of these:
· How fast am I learning?
· Does my work align with my values?
· Is this helping meet my short and long term financial goals?
You probably notice a trend here. The next level of questions is less about securing an opportunity, and more about evaluating opportunities. That is because a major inflection point in your career is when you have more opportunities than you have time or bandwidth to engage in, and need to start assessing and choosing between them. The young STEM professional might be tempted to look at base salary and use it as a single criterion to rank order opportunities. I would argue that it’s not that simple. Here seven more metrics to consider.
Total Compensation: Base salary is only a portion of the compensation picture. Total compensation includes things like 401k match, bonuses, commission, stock options, LTIP (Long Term Incentive Plan), deferred compensation, tuition reimbursement, and the vesting/payback schedules for all of these. When reading your offer materials, don’t just go to the number at the top. Look for these other values, as well as when they vest/the conditions under which you need to pay them back. Golden handcuffs, or incentives employers offer that you only get or get to keep if you stay for a certain length of time, aren’t always a bad thing, but you do need to be aware of them.
Benefits: Healthcare, dental benefits, vision benefits, 401k match, paid time off, parental leave, life insurance, other types of insurance coverage, tuition reimbursement, gym reimbursement, travel perks, employee resource centers, and more are all factors to take into consideration. If you’re torn between two different offers, look into what else your employer is offering. Your HR point of contact should be able to answer questions about these items.
Location: This one is pretty straightforward. I spent three months in the heart of the Mojave desert for an internship. The work rocked, the return offer was great, I loved my coworkers, but the location ended up being a dealbreaker. Consider whether or not you’d be willing to live in the location of an offer, if it has an onsite component.
Nature of Work: Will the work be engaging? Will you be learning? Does it align with your passion and values? Is there a path for advancement? What does day to day tasking look like? Even if the previous three points are all looking good, the actual nature of your work will have a huge impact on your experience.
The Team/Leader: How did you enjoy speaking to your potential team/leader during interviews? Are there potential mentors available? Did you have a good or bad gut feeling interacting with each contact during the interview process? The people around you have an immense influence on what kind of experience you’d have there.
Risk: How long has this company been around? Have there been a ton of layoffs? Are they a startup and only have funding for three more months? Is the nature of work a little drier but it’s a surefire check every two weeks? Depending on where you are life wise, your risk tolerance might be different from what it has been in the past. Every time you have a new opportunity, it’s a good idea to check in with how much risk you’re willing to tolerate versus how much risk a new opportunity is presenting.
Culture Fit: This is an exceptionally important piece of the puzzle, and probably the hardest to evaluate. You can’t exactly waltz into your onsite, corner existing employees, and ask how the vibe is. I do think that spending time onsite during the interview process, in person interviews, and asking the right questions can help you evaluate this. Looking through the company website, LinkedIn page, and reading Glassdoor reviews can help with this as well. Other factors that give clues towards culture include average tenure/turnover rate, degree of confidentiality (classified, proprietary, public), size of company/facility, tone at the top, and proportion of onsite versus remote work. Once you have all the information you can get, you just need to go with your gut on this one.
What factors are most important to you? Did I miss any big ones? Let me know at YourSTEMentorBlog@gmail.com!