Can graduating from university and reaching 1 year help justify a significant (>10%) pay raise?

Question

I was hired by my current company while I was in the final year of my Software Engineering degree. It has been a year since then and I have graduated and work has been going swimmingly.

I believe I have picked up our tech stack quite well and am also much quicker and proficient at performing other tasks that I am sometimes responsible for (general IT[support, builds, etc])

I've also received a Cisco certification and completed optional training directly related to our product.

I understand that no-one else knows the specifics of my role as I do. But does my recent graduation and experience so far coupled with what I've listed generally lead to a significant raise?

Answer 1

Graduating from University isn't likely to be a reason to increase your pay. After all, the company likely hired you on, knowing that you would continue to work for them after you graduated.

What you should focus on is your skills and completed tasks. The certification is certainly a big deal because that's time, money and effort you and the company sank to make sure you were qualified.

The biggest issue with expectations of a high raise, is that it really depends on the company and your manager. Your manager/you needs to create a compelling reason that you deserve a pay raise. Showing you are generating them lots of value, or you are valuable to them for your skill set/work completed.

However, don't get your expectations up too fast. Some companies provide fixed pay raises at scheduled times, or limit pay raises/normalize/pool it to help keep their costs down. You might also have a passive manager who isn't good at getting you what you deserve.

At the end of the day. No one can tell you for sure how to get that pay raise you want. You just have to do your best.

Answer 2

You are worth whatever you can negotiate for yourself in the job market.

Go job hunting, get yourself a written offer somewhere else, and that will tell you what you're worth. Once you have that offer, what you do with it is up to you.

If you're willing to take the other job, you probably should. If you want to keep your current job, you should turn down the other offer, take it to your boss (while making it very clear that you are not threatening to leave, you already turned down the other offer, and this is just market research) and have a conversation about what the market rate for your skills and experience is.

Answer 3

No. You haven’t reached the next Award yet.

You mentioned in a comment that you’re from Australia, and the job offer you accepted was standard for university graduates. This means that it is most likely an Award.

For our international readers, the minimum wage in Australia varies depending on the field of work, the highest qualification you possess (e.g. high school vs university graduate), and the amount of experience you possess. These minimum wages are referred to as Awards.

Fair Work Australia has an online calculator that can help you determine what yours is; judging by what you’ve stated, your Award should be “Graduate Professional 1.1”, which entitles you to a full-time wage of $25.98/hour for a 3-year degree, or $26.64/hour if you have a 4- or 5-year degree. The next step up is “Graduate Professional 1.2”, which requires no more than 1 year of experience after graduation for pay scale progression to be mandatory; it would entitle you to a wage of $27.09/hour.

Answer 4

Graduating doesn't entitle you to a pay rise, and neither does working for any number of years.

Becoming proficient in the tech stack and gaining certification are important, because they make you more useful. The question is then whether you're being paid the market rate. It may be that you were recruited with the assumption that you'd do these things, and are already paid the market rate for a useful engineer. Alternately you may have been hired on a lower 'trainee' rate, in which case you should ask for a raise.

Some organisations can be caught out by bright young programmers, who go from 'useless trainee' to 'as good as anyone else on the team' in a year. If that's you, it's worth asking for equal pay and discussing your career path with your boss.

In any case, you should be regularly checking job adverts in your area to get a feel for the market. It really helps your case if you can show your boss a few relevant adverts.

Answer 5

The Monday morning after attending my graduation ceremony, I was suddenly 30% more valuable to my employer than I had been the Friday before. The degree doesn’t guarantee you’re worth more, but having that diploma and a huge amount of experience in comparison to where you were a year ago, does make you more marketable. From there, Kaz lays out sound advice. I underscore Kaz’ point that you should be very clear it is not a threat to leave. You may even consider presenting it solely as having done some research.