How to estimate a reasonable amount for a signing bonus?
"So you've already considered relocation. Here are a few additional things to consider with respect to negotiating a signing bonus (if any): Would you be leaving a position where you are eligible for an upcoming bonus, profit-share, or other special incentive payout, such as a stock option or RSU vesting date?  A signing bonus can help offset the opportunity cost of leaving a previous job when an incentive payout date is near. At the new company, would you be required to wait some pre-defined period to be eligible to participate in the pension or retirement savings plan with employer basic or matching contributions? If you were receiving ongoing employer contributions in your previous company's plan and would need to wait, say, six months before participating in the new company's plan, a signing bonus can offset lost employer contributions in the interim. Consider funding your own IRA in that time. Would you be required to give up something else of value to you that your previous employer was providing, such as an expensive laptop, that is not expected to otherwise be replaced by the new company? Whether they offer a signing bonus and how much you can expect to negotiate is based on a lot of factors and you'll need to ""play it by ear.""  Remember what bonus means: ""A payment or gift added to what is usual or expected, in particular."" Remember also that a signing bonus is a one time thing.  In general, it's more important to consider the overall ongoing compensation package – salary and incentive plans, vacation, retirement benefits, health benefits, etc. – and whether those meet your long-term needs." "Signing bonuses are probably the most variable of all, as there is a general understanding that more personal factors are taken into account. As a result, HR isn't under a huge obligation to explain away the differences. In comparison, for salary there's the wide expectation that same job = same pay. Since there's so variable, but also fairly rare, ""budget"" isn't a main concern for many HR departments. And they certainly won't have a finely grained budget breakdown. ""This year we'll pay $250.000 for headhunters, $50000 for relocation payments, $100,000 for pension transfers, $150.000 for stock option losses..."". It's generally tossed on one big heap, ""cost of hiring"". So, what can you ask for? That's really a market question. What's your value to the company? How much of that is already reflected in salary and other benefits? The main downside to signing bonuses is that a company won't know how long you'd stay. Your value to the company is probably your monthly work. Therefore they cannot amortize that bonus over a fixed amount of months. What if you leave after 3 months? For that reason, a ""conditional"" signing bonus is a reasonable offer from your side. E.g. ask for one month salary, conditional on you staying for 24 months, and otherwise you'll repay them from your last salary."
How do I determine what to pay the person? You pay them either what you believe the work is worth to have done for you, vs doing it yourself, or how much they ask for after negotiation. There's no rule of thumb because it's driven by the market.  There will always be people who are willing and able to do the work for less than you, but can't always get work (which is the reason they are charging less) just as there will always be people who charge much more than you and have to turn work away. You are at a comfortable medium where you have enough work to charge a moderate rate, and can amplify your reputation/network/client by subcontracting the work out. As an example: If I charge $120/hr to do engineering work, but I want to subcontract it out, then I have to take into account that: So, let's say I have a contract for 20 hours of work at $120/hr ($2,400), and I figure that I can subcontract out all of it.  However it's going to cost me about 4 hours of work to: review their 20 hours of work, deal with administrative overhead, interpret and pass along requirements, etc. So if I work 4 hours, then the maximum I can pay the contractor for 20 hours of work is the remaining 16 hours x $120 (the contractor would be doing 20 hours for $96/hr) to break even on cash, and I only make 4x$120 worth of profit for 4 hours worth of work.  That's actually a net loss, unless you can already fill those other 16 hours with paying work. I don't think that would be worth it. But if the contractor only required $60/hr, then you're paying him $1,200 for 20 hours of work, and you get to keep $1,200 for only 4 hours of your time.  The subcontractor has turned your $120/hr rate into $300/hr. Now, you still only net $1,200 rather than the full $2,400, so your revenue is down, but if you can find work for that other 16 hours at your normal rate, then you're still ahead.  Alternately you might find that working only 12 hours a week is a fine way to live, and choose to forgo that revenue for personal time. The costs and break-even point vary greatly from situation to situation, but hopefully this gives you a framework to evaluate the decision for yourself. So thinking on this a little more, I guess it's not completely cut and dried. For example, if the sales position was commission only, a bonus might be a way to ensure the sales team earn a base minimum income. This would allow them to have some level of comfort that they would be able to meet financial obligations like mortgages, kids school etc. There is one edge case that may be of value to you. If you declare a bonus (probably to yourself given a very small company) you can deduct it from your year and then have up to 6 months to actually write the cheque and give it to the person. Say your year end for the corporation is July 31st. You could declare the bonus July 30th and deduct it from that year, lowering your corporate tax. You could then wait until January 30th to actually write the bonus cheque. The person would then have that taxable income in a later calendar year, deferring paying the tax. Depending on the size of the bonus, this would possibly matter, although if you did large bonuses every year it would only matter the first time. The other issue is the availability of your bookkeeper or accountant. They are sometimes very busy during personal income tax season. They often like a vacation immediately after that. They may go away in the summer when their kids are out of school. The nice thing about a July 31st year end is that you can probably count on a quick turnaround from your accountant in September. The possible downside is that you won't enjoy reconciling your credit card statements and the like in August as part of getting your year end stuff together. You can avoid that by keeping your books in a decent shape all the time. I was looking for ideas on what the usual figures are in such positions. Something like market value, or other terms such as changing slab percentages in compensation. Not sure what the best practices are in this situation.  Not sure what you are referring to. "Yeah I'm not too sure either, but in response to your edit, this is what got me wondering even more, enough to post this question. Last year was a rough year. Growth was flat in many regions. Still, I heard salesfolks complaining about bonuses. I had the same reaction as you-- ""why would you get a bonus?"" But then I started thinking perhaps some amount is guaranteed." I don't see how that would be an issue in any way.  Referral bonuses are very common.  I'm a little confused as to why you think this might be an issue (or why there would be advice to get a lawyer)... this is called networking.  Growing a business requires contacts you can rely on.  Make sure you're confident in his work, as your clients will likely not be happy with you if he doesn't perform well. The product you seek is called a fixed immediate annuity.  You also want to be clear it's inflation adjusted. In the US, the standard fixed annuity for a 40year old male (this is the lowest age I find on the site I use) has a 4.6% return. $6000/ yr means one would pay about $130,000 for this. The cost to include the inflation adder is about 50%, from what I recall. So close to $200,000.  This is an insurance product, by the way, and you need to contact a local provider to get a better quote. "I think the problem is that you've made a math error. This child would not be costing you 300 per month, it will be costing you 1400 per month.  1100 of this is in a donation of salable hours rather than cash, but helpfully you have a number right there as to how much someone is willing to pay for these hours so the math is still doable. So, if you are indeed splitting your expenses fifty-fifty, you should chip 1100 into the pot to match your wife's contribution.  It would make the most sense, I think, to have your part of this contribution cover some of your mutual expenses, and if any is left over, save it up for the day that your child would cost more than that 300 in a month - when you need extra clothes, or have to replace something they destroyed, or want to pay for extra opportunities (camps, educational games, lessons), or a a savings that can be used for major future expenses (higher education, first car, milestone celebrations, safety net when starting out). Of course, if your family is indeed a priority, you might consider making an equal investment in your family - say, half your income (1800) to match half her time going into the building of the family.  After all, the decision to start a family should be an investment of time and value, not just a minimum bid for expenses.  And again, any extra can be spent on mutual expenses, saved up for future costs, or left as your child's ""savings"" for major expenses or safety net. I suppose I should mention that you perhaps could get away with covering half her contribution (550 per month, on the face of it), as that should also ""balance"" out the monthly expenses.  Even this much would be enough to put her back into the green on her covering her own costs.  Of course, in this case you might want to take into account that while she's working 38,5 hours per week now, running a household is, I've heard, more closely equivalent to a 60-hour week, plus or minus being ""on call"" for a further 100 hours a week.  Trying to calculate the absolute minimum payment on your part to match the investment of hours on hers is likely to be a bit more tricky than just matching the salable hours not worked, if you're set on income ratios and splitting costs ""as they are"". Also, you might want to rethink your criteria for sharing income completely or what makes certain divisions of costs ""unfair"". You mention one reason it would be unfair is that you have a ""more stressful job"" - well, your job may well be more stressful than her job now, but it is likely to be less so than raising a child (her new job).  As for investment of time and energy for your education entitling you to a larger amount of pay, again, raising a child is likely to be a larger investment of time, money, and anxiety than your education, but her pay (or even share of the costs) doesn't seem to be balanced in response.  I'm not gonna tell you what is fair, that's for you to work out, just suggesting you really think it through before deciding what would be fair or not." "Comission is a must when doing sales. That is the best (and only good) incentive to sell more. How much you want to give all depends on margins, the salary level that is accepted in your state/country and what sellers you have (young or old).  Salary costs at 30 - 35% of total order value is normal including salary tax and all tax oriented costs around that employee.   There are 2 ways of doing it. Only high commission and fixed salary + lower commission. Even if you use fixed salary + commission you can have ""restrictions"" so they have to sell above a certain level to get that commission. That means that you don't take any risks.   An example of a salary model that I found was popular. (The numbers are just made up according to what is normal to have in Sweden). It's a step-model. If you sell for:  Step 1: 0 - $3000 you get high commission 20% of everything you sell  Step 2: $3000 - $4000 you get fixed salary of $1000 + 10% commission  Step 3: $4000 - $6000 you get fixed salary of $1700 + 15% commission  And so on.  Your weakest points are when going to a higher step. You have to change the steps so it works with your salary statistics so you have most people under a step to motivate them to go to the next instead of having them exactly above one step. As you can see, with a step model, you just put a disquise on the commission model but make it more attractive. What the seller think is that they have a fixed salary. If a seller is happy, he/she is selling a lot.    I have also had a criteria saying that if you can keep youself at 1 step for more than 3 months you will start there each month. Then it's up to the team leader to warn if that seller IS good or just LUCKY." In general the other party will expect you to keep your promises. If you promise to do something for a fixed amount of money, you take on a risk and it is no longer their problem if you work slower than you planned. In principle it could even be the case that you take on a project and fail, after which the company may not have to pay at all. So regardless of how things should be written in your books (For example a theoretical pay above minimum wage but a loss for your private company): An important thing to note is that if you are worried about ending up below minimum wage, you are definitely asking a fee that is too low. You should keep in mind that your fee should include a fair compensation for the expected work, and a fair compensation for the risk that you have taken on. "Start by going to Salary.com and figuring out what the range is for your location (could be quite wide).  Then also look at job postings in your area and see if any of them mention remuneration (gov't jobs tend to do this).  If possible go and ask other people in your field what they think the expected range of salary should be. Take all that data and create a range for your position.  Then try and place yourself in that range based on your experience and skill set.  Be honest. Compare that with your own pay.  If your figures indicate you should be making significantly more, schedule a meeting with your boss (or wait for a yearly review if it's relatively soon) and lay out your findings.  They can say: Be ready for curve balls like benefits, work environment and other ""intangibles"". If they say no and you still think your compensation is unfair, it's time to polish up your CV.  The easiest way to get a job is to already have one." You just need to average out the weekly hours and income over the year. So if his yearly income is $100,000 p.a. then this would average out to $2000 per week of which 15% would be $300 per week. It does not have to be exactly 15% per week as long as over the long run your saving your target 15%. If he gets a pay rise you can include this in the saving plan. Say he gets a 5% increase in pay you would increase the $300 per week by 5% to $315 per week. It's hard to say for smaller cap firms because they are all so different. Take a look at SandP or other rating agencies at about the BB range. Then decide how much of a buffer you'd like. If all goes to hell, do you want to be able to cover all you salaries, debt etc for three months? Six? What kind of seasonal volatility does your industry face? Do you plan on any significant investment or FTE uplift any time soon? This will all play into how much retained earnings you will chose to have. I'm staring at this chart and asking myself, How long a period is enough to have an average I'd be happy with regardless of the direction the market goes?  3 years? 4 years? Clearly, a lump sum investment risks a 2000 buy at 1500. Not good. Honestly, I love the question, and find it interesting, but there's likely no exact answer, just some back and forth analysis. You're investing about $40K/yr anyway. I'd suggest a 4 year timeframe is a good time to invest the new money as well. Other folk want to offer opinions? Edit - with the OP's additional info, he expects these bonuses to continue, my updated advice is to DCA quarterly if going into assets with a transaction fee or monthly if into a no-fee fund, over just a one year period. Sorry to call you out on this, but your numbers are definitely off. If someone takes you seriously you'll be misleading them and I'd like to avoid that. Maybe you had this conversation with your friends many years ago when salaries were lower?  The big consulting firms all have set base salary and signing bonus for all entry level positions in the US. Everyone in the starting class out of undergrand has the same starting salary (across all geographic regions). Depending on the firm and your performance, you then receive a year end bonus (or no bonus at all). For MBB, you can expect close to a 6 figure salary in your first year. With an MBA, you're closer to $200k with bonus.  Source: I work for a top consulting firm, but here are some hard figures: http://managementconsulted.com/consulting-jobs/2012-management-consulting-salaries-undergraduate-post-mba/#