Hello everyone
An oddly specific question but I know now several people who earn around 92k a year while only having an IT apprenticeship and working in "designing" network infrastructures or other IT structures. Then there is me finishing with my bachelors degree in electrical engineering this year, having worked 5 years 60% while doing my degree and finisihing with around a 5 mark and i had to even fight to get a salary of 90k a year. All 3 companys i applied to wanted me but 2 of them wanted to pay around 80k even though all 3 are big companys in the canton zurich. Looking at a salary calulator https://www.lohn-sgb.ch the median with 3 years of experience(because of parttime i only did 3 not 5) i should earn a median of 109k…
Should I be more picky and just apply until someone pays me more? Is electrical engineering just paid worse overal? Do i just have to do job hopping by going into companies i don't really like and switch after 2 years?
by kappi1997
11 comments
Do you speak swiss-german?
Yup IT get paid dummy much to do less challenging work.
IT salaries are notoriously hard to estimate because your average IT networking dude may very well be a specialist with 20 certifications in the relevant things who can do stuff few others can. Or they may simply work at a helpdesk for 6k a month and not do more than tell others to restart their laptops.
Desinging IT infrastructure is qualified work with specialized skills and a rather high importance in many companies. Not every highly specialized skill needs a uni degree.
Yes, my background is electronic engineering and I switched to software because it pays waaaaay better. I have other friends doing the same unfortunately 🤷♀️
First of, don’t compare IT salaries to the “old” engineering salaries or you never will be happy. If you like to work in IT start doing so, your degree is not stopping you. I know lots of electrical engineers that work IT.
Based on your Nickname i assume your are born 1997 and are therefore “only” 27 years old. You have, if i understood correctly, 0 years of work experience as engineer if you just finished degree so your 3 years of experience “don’t count”. I am not saying i agree with this view, but most swiss employers will look at those 2 things and will offer you around what you got offered. I had the same problem, same age, 3 years experience in the roles i was applying for, same results. Just 10 years ago (and mechanical engineer).
You will find it very hard to get >100k before 30 in most companies that are not Pharma, IT, or maybe Banks with bonuses.
I would take the 90k, try to do projects / tasks that get you noticed inside the company and if they dont give you 5% raise each year start search after 2 years, if they do look around after 3 years.
I would not care too much about the salary in the first job after uni. Find a company where you can learn (assuming that you can pay your expenses). Join a company that lets you explore engineering, project management, team leder (deputy), sales, whatever. After 2-3 years you you assess the situation and choose a career path. Maybe it is engineering, maybe you want to pivot. Flexibility and broad skills are required to build a future proof career.
Salary will increase substantially in the first years. Aim to earn 30-100 % in the first 5-10 years. Of the group of friends I studied with, nobody increased by less than 30 %. Most are well above 50 %.Then the first two years do not matter too much in terms of money.
If you speak German please read: Geheime Tricks für mehr Gehalt by Martin Wehrle. A great book about salary.
Join Swiss Engineering or take part in their yearly salary study to gain free access to real salary numbers.
Average IT support person at most banks here are making like 110k-150k depending on tenor
After finishing my Master degree in EE with good grades I went to my first embedded software dev interview and when they said 80k absolute max the first year i immediatly applied for pure software dev where i got a job at 90K a year. I worked there for 5 months and got a job offer as sys specialist (with one year of payed training!) at 100K a year. Now i’m trying to shoot for a 110K DevOp job in the same company next year. So yeah… despite being very challenging, EE does not pay much compared to IT. IT is very memory based though. Deep down, I would still prefer to program FPGAs or code in C. That’s life, I’m clearly not unhappy with my decisions.
It’s less and less the case that IT have it better. This year the market is more congested. People do and will more and more higher internationals. It’s a field where you need constant improvement and be able to change multiple time your actual skills.
I don’t think it’s comparable and electrical engineering is a far more stable and robust work. Not counting you have some actual engineering skills.
You have to tell them straight up, you are applying to multiple companies, and the other company already offered you x. You have to pretend like you were offered a bit more than you actually were, otherwise everyone will just match the same number.