Hi All
First post on here - I'm sure that similar questions have been asked to death since the beginning of time.
Summary of situation:
- Been contracting on an inside IR35 in local government since July 2020 - originally 1 year contract, extended by another year, likely to extend again until approx. April 2023
- I'm a project lead/project manager responsible for two major construction projects within a Borough in London - at a level between say Senior Project Manager and Associate
- I used to report to the Director of Property, but as my projects became less problematic after I'd been working on them for a year, I'm now reporting into the Assistant Director of Property
- Base Day rate of £600 with paid overtime & notice period of 6 weeks - I've negotiated the paid overtime and longer notice period after about two months of starting, given they asked me to take on an extra project to the original project I was due to lead
- Gross in 2021 was £170K & Net was £90K
- The role is very stressful and the place shambolic - I've considered resigning about 3 times since I've been there, for various reasons: bullying, people questioning my authority, having all the responsibility but no authority, my Director effectively not speaking to me as they've received 4 written complaints about my leadership/way of working: I don't believe I am a bully with people, but I don't tend to take any prisoners and am quite hard on people when they take the piss or disrespect me or my team
- Within the next 6 months or so, I'm looking to start fertility treatment to hopefully start a family
- In view of this and the umpteenth disaster on the project a couple of months ago that involved a H&S incident that could have been very serious and was caused by lack of proper site management, which I'd been complaining about for months to the main contractor - I've been looking at the market a little and have had two really good informal interviews for two permanent Associate roles
- The likely salary I seem to be able to get for an Associate role is between £70K - £90K gross.
I don't tend to share my salary either with headhunters or prospective employers, but I have told one headhunter I know well how much I've earned last year - and they're telling me that the salary is at the level of what an Equity Partner would make in my industry. The headhunter who got me the role I'm in told me that the Borough was struggling to find a competent person to properly lead the project after a string of managers who messed things up really badly, so they raised the day rate to effectively a Director-level salary to attract a higher calibre candidate, and they chose me.
The money I'm bringing in each month is the most I've ever been paid in my career, and is enabling me to clear debts that one of my parents left behind after they died last year, provide for my other parent, save for a mortgage deposit and also open the doors to private fertility treatment.
So what would you do if you were in my shoes?
Try to ride it out until the contract ends approx. April 2023 to maximise earnings as much as possible for the future, despite the stress and issues? Go into a permanent position so that I can start the fertility treatment journey with lower stress levels hopefully and have more stable life & income, be it much lower?
It seems that going permanent will mean an effective halving of my net take home, although obviously I have to consider the security, package & benefits value, holidays, sick leave, etc.
The Contractor calculators are telling me that for my day rate (which, considering overtime, hovers in reality around £820/day), my permanent salary should be around £150K. From what the headhunters are telling me, there's no way I'd get that type of permanent salary for a Senior PM/Associate role, and I'm not sure I'm professionally ready for an AD/Director/Director/Partner role which would command higher salaries.
Any thoughts? Given I'm writing at 03:30 in the morning, this stuff is keeping me up at night!
Thanks much.
First post on here - I'm sure that similar questions have been asked to death since the beginning of time.
Summary of situation:
- Been contracting on an inside IR35 in local government since July 2020 - originally 1 year contract, extended by another year, likely to extend again until approx. April 2023
- I'm a project lead/project manager responsible for two major construction projects within a Borough in London - at a level between say Senior Project Manager and Associate
- I used to report to the Director of Property, but as my projects became less problematic after I'd been working on them for a year, I'm now reporting into the Assistant Director of Property
- Base Day rate of £600 with paid overtime & notice period of 6 weeks - I've negotiated the paid overtime and longer notice period after about two months of starting, given they asked me to take on an extra project to the original project I was due to lead
- Gross in 2021 was £170K & Net was £90K
- The role is very stressful and the place shambolic - I've considered resigning about 3 times since I've been there, for various reasons: bullying, people questioning my authority, having all the responsibility but no authority, my Director effectively not speaking to me as they've received 4 written complaints about my leadership/way of working: I don't believe I am a bully with people, but I don't tend to take any prisoners and am quite hard on people when they take the piss or disrespect me or my team
- Within the next 6 months or so, I'm looking to start fertility treatment to hopefully start a family
- In view of this and the umpteenth disaster on the project a couple of months ago that involved a H&S incident that could have been very serious and was caused by lack of proper site management, which I'd been complaining about for months to the main contractor - I've been looking at the market a little and have had two really good informal interviews for two permanent Associate roles
- The likely salary I seem to be able to get for an Associate role is between £70K - £90K gross.
I don't tend to share my salary either with headhunters or prospective employers, but I have told one headhunter I know well how much I've earned last year - and they're telling me that the salary is at the level of what an Equity Partner would make in my industry. The headhunter who got me the role I'm in told me that the Borough was struggling to find a competent person to properly lead the project after a string of managers who messed things up really badly, so they raised the day rate to effectively a Director-level salary to attract a higher calibre candidate, and they chose me.
The money I'm bringing in each month is the most I've ever been paid in my career, and is enabling me to clear debts that one of my parents left behind after they died last year, provide for my other parent, save for a mortgage deposit and also open the doors to private fertility treatment.
So what would you do if you were in my shoes?
Try to ride it out until the contract ends approx. April 2023 to maximise earnings as much as possible for the future, despite the stress and issues? Go into a permanent position so that I can start the fertility treatment journey with lower stress levels hopefully and have more stable life & income, be it much lower?
It seems that going permanent will mean an effective halving of my net take home, although obviously I have to consider the security, package & benefits value, holidays, sick leave, etc.
The Contractor calculators are telling me that for my day rate (which, considering overtime, hovers in reality around £820/day), my permanent salary should be around £150K. From what the headhunters are telling me, there's no way I'd get that type of permanent salary for a Senior PM/Associate role, and I'm not sure I'm professionally ready for an AD/Director/Director/Partner role which would command higher salaries.
Any thoughts? Given I'm writing at 03:30 in the morning, this stuff is keeping me up at night!
Thanks much.
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