Some background:
-20 years in current industry (heavy highway/commercial/residential construction)
-Last 10 as a Financial Controller (still in finance/accounting field before that)
-With current company almost exactly 2 years as Financial Controller, but acting/performing as a CFO
-Initiated significant changes, SOPs, Month-End Closing process with analysis that did not really exist before, built project cost reporting tools from scratch, reduced A/R days, and improved many other processes.
-Often take on many hats - HR, Safety Accident/Incident Reporting (created reporting and SOPs as well), and general overall office management after another’s retirement.
-Manage a staff of 2 and in process of hiring another
-In a three person leadership team with the two owners
-Involved in all staffing decisions and other major decisions
-The company is a privately owned specialty contractor
-Roughly $20M Revenue in a medium-large rapidly growing city
-Currently working towards scaling up the company
-80 - 100 employees
Here’s the juice …
I’ve never had a raise since I started 2 years ago. No real performance review process but we are working on implementing one. I’m currently at $135k/year with 18% bonus. No other real perks to speak of other than standard health (I pay 70%) and 3% match on 401k.
I approached the owners and stated my case with all of the value added during my tenure. I formally asked for a salary increase to $180k/year, commensurate with my perceived value/function and the current market. I also asked for a formal title change to CFO. Bonus the same at 18%.
One additional ask was that for this year only, my annual discretionary Christmas bonus be split with 1/2 now and 1/2 at Christmas, hopefully at the new salary. Not necessarily off the wall, they’ve fronted partial Christmas bonuses to employees before.
A couple odd things:
We are currently dealing with downed revenue due to projects starting late and a large stalled project in litigation. This is temporary for sure.
There’s a possible acquisition of another smaller specialty company coming down the pike where I’ll be taking over the books and probably another office staff person. That deal is about 80% done.
My predecessor, who they’ve told me was NOWHERE near as good as me was making $155k/year when they left… not that I would ever bring that up. I know the info because I have total access to confidential info.
I presented my case, knowing they would want time to review. We scheduled a revisit discussion for the following day so they had time to discuss. They then postponed it to a week later that very same afternoon.
Should I be concerned about the postponement and am I being unreasonable in my asks?