Raising the bar

Okay. So, part of the reason I took this job in the first place was that it was sold to me as having a lucrative and attainable incentive program that could add as much as $12k per year to my salary. Shortly after I came, I found out that the target numbers we had to reach in sales were not based on anything, they just pulled a number out of the air and made that the deal.

For example, say the most sales they had online in a month in 2004 was $250k. They would take that number and make it the base of the incentive plan for 2005 so that if you made it again, you wouldn't get any bonus until you exceeded it by quite a bit. Forget that the $250k month you had was in December and forget that was the only time you came within $100k of it -- that's your new base for the whole next year.

I thought I had expressed to my boss that I didn't find that even vaguely fair, I thought that we had an understanding and that we could be more reasonable this year. Then Franz dropped the proposal on E and I today. Let's say that Mike and I busted ass and actually managed to make the impossible goal 5 times in 2005, and 3 of those times we actually managed to make it all the way to the top tier of the bonus plan -- $350k.

So guess what. Guess what the proposed $0-bonus-level tier is this year. Take a wild stab at it. $350k. Yeah. A 40% increase to get to the $0 bonus level. Who does that? Who's boss came to them this year and said with a straight face, "We've decided you have to do no less than 40% better sales this year or we're going to cut your salary. We think its a lucrative and attainable goal." Don't even raise your hand. I know your lying.