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| CRBJ Home > November 2006 | |||||
Does choosing to live in Madison mean less money?
It's great to live somewhere so upscale and desirable, but it has its pitfalls for the job hunt and for career growth. In a Madison job transition, maintaining your prior compensation level can be a challenge. The chestnut about Madison having taxi drivers with doctorates is true; a colleague of mine got a ride from him after my colleague's bike got a flat tire. That may be a student phenomenon, but the same forces of downward mobility apply to executives in Madison: there are too many remarkable people and not enough jobs for them. One result is lower salaries. The fact is that experienced professionals often take a pay cut to move here for a new job, or to stay here rather than look for a job elsewhere. Madison's cost of living, while high compared to other Midwestern cities its size, is low enough to cause reverse sticker shock among people relocating here from other "talent magnet" cities like Chicago, New York, and San Francisco. So when Madison employers hire people from places like that, they often come here for salaries that are locally attractive, but less than what they were earning before. And someone who was recruited here for a job often learns that we don't have a big-city job market, and it can be hard to find a next job in Madison that will pay as much. What to do? Manage your expectations, and manage your career. For many of us, the decision to live in Madison is not about the money. We chose Madison without regard for -- or even going against -- our best financial interests. Most of us could earn more if we were willing to relocate for a higher-paying job. So remember why you decided to live in Madison, and live with it. But does settling down in Madison have to mean settling for less financially? Not necessarily. The best way to make more money is to get approached about a job opportunity when you weren't looking for one. In that situation, an employer needs you more than you need them, and they know they will need to pay you more to attract you. How do you increase your odds of getting recruited? Network. Mad-ison is a small professional community. In a bigger city or a nationwide job search, there are plenty of companies you've never heard of that you'd approach as a potential employer. Here, you're more likely to know the relevant organizations. You need to make them more likely to know you when you are not looking for a job. So figure out who your "employers of choice" would be. Identify and meet the key decision-makers there. Get active in your industry's professional associations, perhaps taking a visible leadership role. Go to the conferences and panel events. If you network among the people and companies in your professional niche, you may not need to find your next job -- it just might find you first. Peter Gray is the head of executive recruiting at QTI Professional Staffing in Madison. madison.com ©2009 Capital Newspapers. All rights reserved. |
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