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Joanne asked:
>I'm curious: Is such a thing commonplace when recruiting technical writers?
>And if so, how much was the "fee", and was it paid to you once the new
>employee was there a certain amount of time?
Every permanent job I've worked at in the Silicon Valley (all high-tech but
gobs of different industries and one not-for-profit) since 1984 has had some
kind of referral bonus plan. One equipment manufacturer paid $400 for
non-exempt referrals and $2k for exempt referrals (assuming that you were an
employee, and both you and the new hire stayed through the 90 day probation
period)...those numbers are doubtless bigger now, I left there in 1996.
These days, my current startup just doubled their referral bonus from $2k to
$4k AND your choice of high-end office chair. Every contract agency I
work/have worked through has some kind of referral bonus plan (I've seen
numbers from $50 to $500), even if you aren't otherwise working for them;
they base the payout on when the referral has worked a certain number of
hours. A big financial firm had a $3k referral bonus but also posted
periodic high-level big-ticket referrals of $10K or so (for director level
and up referrals, mostly).
Now, I suspect that these numbers are inflated in this region almost as much
as the local housing prices are. Nationwide firms mostly likely have a lower
baseline and perhaps a regional special-price. But that's a guess.
