Internal Microsoft Documents Detail Pay Scales (businessinsider.com) 41
Microsoft's internal pay guidelines show exactly how much the company will pay new engineering hires, according to documents obtained by Business Insider. The guidelines, updated in May, break down salary ranges, stock awards, and bonuses for every level from entry-level engineers to the company's most senior technical talent.
The documents come with an important caveat: recruiters can get approval to pay more when competing for exceptional candidates. At Microsoft's highest tier, Level 70 "distinguished engineers" can earn up to $408,000 in annual salary. But the real money comes from stock: these hires get up to $1.9 million in stock when they join, plus annual stock awards reaching $1.476 million.
The company uses different pay scales depending on location. Engineers in expensive markets like San Francisco get higher ranges than those at Microsoft's Redmond headquarters, where most hiring happens. For entry-level engineers at Level 57, Microsoft offers salaries between $83,000 and $108,000 in its main markets, with higher ranges of $95,800 to $124,600 in expensive areas like San Francisco. These new hires get modest stock awards of $5,000 to $13,000 and signing bonuses up to $9,000.
The company considers levels 57 through 59 as entry-level positions. The compensation jumps significantly as engineers advance. By Level 63, when engineers reach senior status, salaries range from $145,000 to $237,600 depending on location, with stock awards reaching $220,000.
The documents come with an important caveat: recruiters can get approval to pay more when competing for exceptional candidates. At Microsoft's highest tier, Level 70 "distinguished engineers" can earn up to $408,000 in annual salary. But the real money comes from stock: these hires get up to $1.9 million in stock when they join, plus annual stock awards reaching $1.476 million.
The company uses different pay scales depending on location. Engineers in expensive markets like San Francisco get higher ranges than those at Microsoft's Redmond headquarters, where most hiring happens. For entry-level engineers at Level 57, Microsoft offers salaries between $83,000 and $108,000 in its main markets, with higher ranges of $95,800 to $124,600 in expensive areas like San Francisco. These new hires get modest stock awards of $5,000 to $13,000 and signing bonuses up to $9,000.
The company considers levels 57 through 59 as entry-level positions. The compensation jumps significantly as engineers advance. By Level 63, when engineers reach senior status, salaries range from $145,000 to $237,600 depending on location, with stock awards reaching $220,000.
On the other hand (Score:4, Insightful)
You have to work in a huge bureaucracy driven by nonsense metrics and algorithms like stack ranking. I might not be getting those kinds of wages, but my life isn't hell. That's worth quite a lot to me.
Re: On the other hand (Score:2)
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You have to work in a huge bureaucracy driven by nonsense metrics and algorithms like stack ranking.
You just described pretty much every large corporation. Microsoft certainly isn't unique in this.
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It's true that every large corporation has its issues, but they are not all equal, there are degrees of bureaucratic nonsense, and ever company has its own flavor.
Very often, the person who is your department head or your boss, makes more difference than anything else, about how good or awful your job is.
Equal Pay for Equal Work! (Score:2)
Re:Equal Pay for Equal Work! (Score:5, Insightful)
If you're not offering prevailing wages, then you're not competitive, and you're losing talent.
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Why is location a factor in pay at all? Is an employee in SF inherently more valuable than an employee in Redmond?
No (or at least not automatically), but the cost of living of a location is always a factor in offered salary for the position. Even the federal government recognizes a location based adjustment for higher cost areas.
Of course, Microsoft could require all their employees to move to a lower cost (of living) area, but not everyone is willing/able to move, and that would mean losing out on some talent.
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As an interesting thought experiment, do you consider both of these locations to be overpaid. Microsoft can hire a developer in India for much less. Is an employee in Bangalore inher
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Why is location a factor in pay at all? Is an employee in SF inherently more valuable than an employee in Redmond?
Their real estate is.
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entirely different but same scenario. Newark Air Traffic Control couldn't pay people enough to work there. Pay was lower than other NYC area airports and nobody wanted to work there.
They had to literally move the Newark ATC to Philly to be able to staff it.
Cost of living absolutely requires higher pay in high cost markets.
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I think you have to look at a bigger picture for understanding why large companies might pay differently depending upon location. These companies aren't stupid and they do think about money (and how to pay the least) all the time. High-cost areas are high cost for a reason - usually because it is a desirable place to be (both for employees and employers).
Companies aren't just seeking out a single employee, they are seeking out a pool of talent so that they can hire more easily. If needs change or an employe
Re: Programmers are not Engineers (Score:3)
Actually I have a master's degree in computer engineering and my job (I say it without shame because I love it) is programmer, with some incursion in real software engineering (UML and things like that).
But I agree, for some reason, actual titles of a degree (engineer, architect) have been put in software for some reasons.
FWIW you can call me a software MD.
Re: Programmers are not Engineers (Score:2)
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I don't care how many times you say it they still have only high school levels of math and science nor an official engineering degree.
Janitors are now sanitation engineers. The ship has sailed on engineer being an earned title.
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Yep, my position title changed from Dev to Programmer to SW Engr and back perhaps a dozen times in 30 years.
The lack of qualified people made giving the few you could hire more 'impressive' titles as a minor non-monetary compensation.
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I don't care how many times you say it they still have only high school levels of math and science nor an official engineering degree.
SEs (usually) have 4 year Computer Science degrees, which is a lot more than was required to get your job flipping burgers.
What do they pay their H1B's? (Score:1)
That's the list I want to see for comparison sake.
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Living over here in Seattle and working in this industry, I know about a bazillion H1Bs. They are not underpaid as you seem to be trying to imply.
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Is this document in this story a list of prevailing wages or starting wages? What happens to native starting wages as more and more H1B's set the minimum prevailing wage?
https://flag.dol.gov/programs/... [dol.gov]
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Of course, they're not underpaid... they just live cheaply and send the majority of their money home. And, of course, M$ (I'm sure) has ways of extending those H-1Bs longer, and because of EEO, they have to bring in H-1Bs if they hire other groups of people. H-1Bs might get paid less than a non-H-1b would, but it's still more money in a week than they've had their entire life, so... "they're not underpaid".
But... they prefer the H-1Bs because they can't stay for years, so no need for paying out benefits a
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Of course, they're not underpaid... they just live cheaply and send the majority of their money home. And, of course, M$ (I'm sure) has ways of extending those H-1Bs longer, and because of EEO, they have to bring in H-1Bs if they hire other groups of people. H-1Bs might get paid less than a non-H-1b would, but it's still more money in a week than they've had their entire life, so... "they're not underpaid".
Incorrect. They are not paid less than non-H1Bs.
But... they prefer the H-1Bs because they can't stay for years, so no need for paying out benefits and paying into life insurance and retirement and all that jazz, though I'm sure the company will "find a way" to hang onto the employee if they're worth a crap.
They get full benefits.
They hire them because they're better than you. It's a tough pill to swallow, but the sooner you do, the sooner you can do something about it.
level 10 VP with two ranks in HR (Score:2)
"For entry-level engineers at Level 57..."
So the higher the number, the lower the level? Like dungeon levels? Kinda weird, but okay. But even for a massive conglomerate, that seems like a lot of lev--
"At Microsoft's highest tier, Level 70..."
What the fuck? They have 56 levels they don't even use? Is level 5 for newborn children? Is level 1 for extraterrestrials?
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Those levels cover the entire enormous Microsoft organization. The engineers may start at 57, but you can bet the retail and call center staff do not.
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Do you believe an engineer should be paid the same as a call center operator?
A pittance (Score:4, Insightful)
$145,000 for a senior engineer living in Seattle is not great pay.
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$95,800 to $124,600 in San Francisco? That's hard to believe too.
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I make $133K in Pittsburgh, for doing virtually nothing but having meetings all day.
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It's not the best- and senior pay at MS goes up to $220k or so with another $200k in RSUs.
Like all things, it's a spectrum.
That much? (Score:2)
For all the slop we see coming out of that company on a weekly basis, that these people are getting that amount is a travesty. How many ongoing issues does the 24H2 patch STILL have a year later?
I was Level 64 Microsoft London (Score:2)
So... (Score:3)
They pay a lot for top tier and somewhere in the middle for junior snd untested folks, and progression has some notable jumps along the way.
That's not bad. Sure you could complain about some regional differences and whether the ranges make sense in every case... but this is pretty mature and standard for large companies. Nothing to see here.