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| Should I keep my current job or take the new one? |
| Current Job |
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83% |
[ 10 ] |
| New Job |
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16% |
[ 2 ] |
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| Total Votes : 12 |
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forgetmyusername
Joined: 20 Feb 2012
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 Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2012 2:22 pm Post subject: Should I Keep My Job or Take My Chances With A New One? |
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I'd like to hear your opinions about my job situation.
I currently teach at a test-prep hagwon in Gangnam. I teach a wide age range of students, from elementary school to high school, nearly all of whom have excellent English skills. I teach a maximum of 30 hours a week and am required to stay at the academy 8 hours each day, for a total of 40 hours of work per week. I'm in negotiations for my second contract. They are willing to bump my pay from 5.0 million a month to 7.5 million while keeping the other conditions the same. It's a decent raise, but ideally I'd like fewer teaching hours as well as more vacation time. But my decision isn't so straightforward.
Another academy has made me a very interesting offer. They want me to be one of the initial teachers who will help them establish their test-prep program. The overall academy itself is quite large -- 4 locations in Seoul and 4 locations abroad -- but until now they haven't had test-prep classes. The owner agreed to pay me 65,000 won per class hour, with, during the first month, a guaranteed 20 hours a week of classes. He said that during the summer intensive I should be able to teach around 40 hours a week at the same pay rate. After the intensive, if our program shows strong results, we should get considerably more students, and thus I would teach more classes, probably around 25 to 35 hours a week. The owner promised that I would get pay raises when the program reaches 100 students, 200 students, and so forth. Eventually, if the program is really successful, I could get paid a percentage of the students' tuition fees. In short, I could make much more than 7.5 million won a month at this other academy.
Still, the new program is hardly guaranteed. Maybe we will be hugely successful, maybe we won't. So my question is: Should I stay with my current, more stable job or should I venture forth into the riskier, but potentially far more rewarding, unknown with the new school?
Thanks. |
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ttompatz
Joined: 05 Sep 2005
Location: Kwangju, South Korea
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| Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2012 3:47 pm Post subject: |
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Play poker much?
Moving to a start up venture in a weak economy?
It all depends on the marketing skill of the new boss.
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thegadfly
Joined: 01 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2012 9:29 pm Post subject: |
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I would say it depends on how much you trust your potential "new" boss.
In 2000, I had a similar deal from a hakwon owner in Gangnam, too (well, I offered it to him). My salary was to be based on the number of students enrolled in the school, increasing with every enrollment increase of 100 students. I worked my arse off, and the programs took off, and the school grew from 500 students to 1500 students within 6 months....I went from directing 5 foreign teachers to directing 15 foreign teachers...and the boss simply refused to honor our agreement. I got paid my flat rate of 65k an hour (funny, how similar these offers are), but I didn't get any of the salary bumps we had agreed upon....
I sent a PM about my own, eerily-similar offer, and experience with it.... |
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ren546
Joined: 17 Dec 2010
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| Posted: Wed Feb 22, 2012 1:19 am Post subject: |
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How long are you planning on staying in Korea? If you're only staying for a few years, then it hardly seems worth the added investment.
You may be getting paid 65k per class hour, but my guess is that there is going to be a lot of extra uncompensated work that you will have to do. You say that you want less teaching hours and more vacation time, but it seems like the new job is even less likely to give you that than the one you're currently at.
If it were me, I would renew for another year (in Korea, a sure 7.5 is better than a risky +7.5 with a new program, especially since it seems like you will only be making around 5 at first with no guarantees), but let the director of the new program know that you might be willing to jump ship after the program gets off the ground. If you stay at the job you have now, you may be in a better position to negotiate for better terms next year (seeing as they're already giving you a 50% raise).
Also, teaching 40 hours a week is just plain hard, and in my view, not worth the extra money. |
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purplemonkey
Joined: 27 Feb 2012
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| Posted: Tue Feb 28, 2012 12:31 pm Post subject: |
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Did I read that right? 5 million a month? That's pretty high, is that because it's a test-perp hakwon? What does one require for a job like that and does that mean you don't get housing allowance, etc...? Is it an E2 visa job?
Oh, and I voted new job because I'm a bit of a gambler, especially with other people's money (consider that when looking at your poll results). Also, consider how you would go about turning whichever boss down without doing any bridge burning.
Let us know what you do 
When do you have to decide by? |
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proverbs
Joined: 28 Apr 2009
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| Posted: Tue Feb 28, 2012 10:19 pm Post subject: |
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7.5M!?!? GOOD GOD!!!
Did you graduate from Harvard and win the teacher of the year award?
I vote for both -- you can't go wrong either way. |
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The Floating World
Joined: 01 Oct 2011
Location: Here
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| Posted: Wed Feb 29, 2012 2:10 am Post subject: |
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| I smell something.... |
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forgetmyusername
Joined: 20 Feb 2012
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| Posted: Wed Feb 29, 2012 11:16 pm Post subject: |
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Well, I've talked with my current academy again. The owner is backtracking from his original pay raise offer. Now he is only willing to bump my pay to 6.0 million. That's still good money, but not as much of a raise as I'd like.
The other academy is still offering 65k an hour, starting, which would amount to 5.2 million a month for about half as many work hours as I have now. The other academy would also allow me to teach only middle school and high school students and let me play a major role in designing the curriculum, which is awesome. Yes, the test-prep program is new and fairly small, but the overall academy is very large with a few thousand students in schools across four countries. This academy also has some teachers who make really big money. The top-paid teacher makes around 25 million a month thanks to his large classes and percentage-based pay scheme. At my current academy, I doubt I could ever make more than 10 million a month, regardless of how much we expand.
So right now, I'm leaning toward taking the new job, but I'll give my current school another chance to try and keep me.... |
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sbp59
Joined: 01 Apr 2009
Location: Somewhere in SK
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| Posted: Wed Feb 29, 2012 11:42 pm Post subject: |
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| The Floating World wrote: |
| I smell something.... |
I smell it too. |
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forgetmyusername
Joined: 20 Feb 2012
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| Posted: Wed Feb 29, 2012 11:51 pm Post subject: |
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| sbp59 wrote: |
| The Floating World wrote: |
| I smell something.... |
I smell it too. |
Your thinly veiled skepticism is amusing, but it certainly doesn't help me decide my current job situation.
If I were still single, I'd probably be willing to take my chances with the new job. But, seeing as how I'm married now, I have to consider the fact that I must be a provider for my wife and be able to save money for our future family. Having a good paying, stable job is central to doing both these things. |
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isitts
Joined: 25 Dec 2008
Location: Korea
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| Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2012 4:56 am Post subject: Re: Should I Keep My Job or Take My Chances With A New One? |
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| forgetmyusername wrote: |
I'd like to hear your opinions about my job situation.
I currently teach at a test-prep hagwon in Gangnam. I teach a wide age range of students, from elementary school to high school, nearly all of whom have excellent English skills. I teach a maximum of 30 hours a week and am required to stay at the academy 8 hours each day, for a total of 40 hours of work per week. I'm in negotiations for my second contract. They are willing to bump my pay from 5.0 million a month to 7.5 million while keeping the other conditions the same. It's a decent raise, but ideally I'd like fewer teaching hours as well as more vacation time. But my decision isn't so straightforward.
Another academy has made me a very interesting offer. They want me to be one of the initial teachers who will help them establish their test-prep program. The overall academy itself is quite large -- 4 locations in Seoul and 4 locations abroad -- but until now they haven't had test-prep classes. The owner agreed to pay me 65,000 won per class hour, with, during the first month, a guaranteed 20 hours a week of classes. He said that during the summer intensive I should be able to teach around 40 hours a week at the same pay rate. After the intensive, if our program shows strong results, we should get considerably more students, and thus I would teach more classes, probably around 25 to 35 hours a week. The owner promised that I would get pay raises when the program reaches 100 students, 200 students, and so forth. Eventually, if the program is really successful, I could get paid a percentage of the students' tuition fees. In short, I could make much more than 7.5 million won a month at this other academy.
Still, the new program is hardly guaranteed. Maybe we will be hugely successful, maybe we won't. So my question is: Should I stay with my current, more stable job or should I venture forth into the riskier, but potentially far more rewarding, unknown with the new school?
Thanks. |
Keep the job you have. There is nothing good about that second job. Guaranteed hours are not as good as they sound. I did that in Taiwan and while it's all well and good that the employer pays you for 20 hours even if they don't actually have 20 hours of classes for you, they expect you to earn that money that they had paid you for nothing. In other words, they'll have you work make up hours.
Even if that we're not a problem, why would you drop a bird in hand (and a damn good bird at that) for mere speculation that doesn't even promise much? Unless there's something I'm missing, it doesn't look like the job description is any more rewarding than what you're doing now.
I can't even see why you bothered posting this unless you just wanted to announce your salary to all of us. But I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you really felt this was a difficult decision. Keep the job you've got. |
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isitts
Joined: 25 Dec 2008
Location: Korea
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| Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2012 5:10 am Post subject: |
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| forgetmyusername wrote: |
| sbp59 wrote: |
| The Floating World wrote: |
| I smell something.... |
I smell it too. |
Your thinly veiled skepticism is amusing, but it certainly doesn't help me decide my current job situation.
If I were still single, I'd probably be willing to take my chances with the new job. But, seeing as how I'm married now, I have to consider the fact that I must be a provider for my wife and be able to save money for our future family. Having a good paying, stable job is central to doing both these things. |
I take back the severity of the last thing I said. I can see how the new offer would have some appeal. But I think you answered your own question here. You have a wife and are planning for a future family, so you don't just have yourself to consider anymore. It's a rude awakening, but...
That said, if you're able to make good use of the money you're making now, then it may afford you some financial buffer to pursue new personal ventures later.
Looking at your post again, I can see it as a tough decision. But, I think your question is answered. |
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forgetmyusername
Joined: 20 Feb 2012
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| Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2012 6:59 pm Post subject: |
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| isitts wrote: |
I take back the severity of the last thing I said. I can see how the new offer would have some appeal. But I think you answered your own question here. You have a wife and are planning for a future family, so you don't just have yourself to consider anymore. It's a rude awakening, but...
That said, if you're able to make good use of the money you're making now, then it may afford you some financial buffer to pursue new personal ventures later.
Looking at your post again, I can see it as a tough decision. But, I think your question is answered. |
Thank you for your response. Obviously, I haven't provided the whole picture, and this lack of information may have made my decision seem more straightforward than it really is. Essentially, I am still leaning toward the new job for a couple of reasons.
First, the new job would give me more responsibility. I'd have almost complete say over the direction of the test-prep program, from deciding the textbooks we'd use to the number of hours students spend studying each subject. This is the kind of responsibility that I would love to have.
Second, I'd be working with some really talented, dedicated, and ambitious people. I would not be the only teacher in this new program. There are already three other teachers on board, one of whom is a buddy of mine. They are all very dedicated to making this program work and have the experience and talent to ensure that it becomes successful. The academy also has teachers in other programs who have graduated from very prestigious universities, including Harvard, Stanford, and MIT. Having the opportunity to work with other people who see teaching, especially test-prep teaching, not as a temporary gig to help them pay for graduate school but as a long-term career is also very important to me.
Similarly, the owner of the academy is very ambitious and wants this program to be huge. He has a long-term, growth-oriented outlook, which I find appealing, and has already purchased advertising in many of the nation's largest newspapers to promote our new program. And as previously mentioned, he already owns eight academies, four of which are in Seoul, the others in foreign countries. The most recently opened location is in the US, my home country. If our program takes off, then maybe at some point in the future I could transfer to their location in the US and be back in my home country while continuing the career that I started in Korea.
The other academy is also better at promoting their teachers, helping teachers to boost their reputations and build their own brands. My current academy has featured my name and credentials in only one advertisement, and even then my information was not prominently displayed. The other academy often has full-page advertisements for their star teachers. I would love to be able to be featured prominently in one of their future ads to help better establish my name in the test-prep market.
Finally, the other job will pay better, at least in the long run. I'd probably make less money at first, but I'd also be working fewer hours. The owner has promised very substantial pay raises in the future, and my buddy, who worked with the owner very closely in the past, asserts that the owner will keep his word in that regard and that he is more than willing to share part of the pie with his teachers. This seems to be the case, as the other academy has several star teachers making well over 10 million won a month, with the top teacher making around 25 million a month. My current academy, while offering a steady paycheck, will probably never allow me to reach such lofty heights in terms of pay.
So as you can see, my decision isn't so straightforward. I still have another round of meetings and negotiations with both academies, so I will have to wait and see exactly which choice is better. |
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isitts
Joined: 25 Dec 2008
Location: Korea
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| Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2012 8:14 pm Post subject: |
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Fair enough. This doesn't change my stance regarding consideration of your family. However, I don't want to negate the importance of personal satisfaction with you work.
I'm not saying that the new job is a bad idea. I'm just saying make sure you're in a position where you can take the possible fall if it doesn't work out. Because it's not just you who suffers the consequences.
On the other hand, with great risk comes great reward. I invest in the stock market because I like getting 20-80% returns on investments that safe savings accounts don't offer. I've also gotten burned a couple times, but I could handle the downside.
Playing it safe with a stable job can take it's toll on us, too. It sounds like you might be ready for something else. I would just be cautious that you look at actual potential rewards and not get caught up with fabulous prizes and having your name in the limelight. You know?
Even if your situation doesn't end up like thegadfly's, I would still consider his warning. If you go into this new job, you are are going into a business venture. And in business, you have to make sure you can trust who you're going into business with.
You can present your case like you did above, but the big question is, do you trust this owner? Can you trust him? It's fine that your friends are on board, but I'm guessing they aren't fronting any cash.
I've met people with a good chunk of change, but there's no way I'd ever do business with them if I didn't trust them.
You've talked with these teachers with the success stories? And they'd worked with this owner?
Again, I'm not saying don't do this. Just make sure you cover your bases. Good luck to you! |
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