Hi all, I recently applied for and received an offer for a position at a shop that provides power plant management services. The issue is that the HR guy comes from their retail load subsidiary, whereas I would be working in the wholesale load and power plant management subsidiary and he is using an operations salary scale for the position, which has range of $50,000-$70,000, which seems low for given the duties and job function. I am currently working as a gas scheduler at a competitor, with an upcoming promotion that puts my base at that high end, and I have some rotational experience working on a power desk in a power scheduler/trader capacity. When I received the offer I countered that the responsibilities listed are not operations, but a mix between operations and trading and the salary should reflect that. The offer is generous if I'm doing gas scheduling, but this is a different beast, with significantly greater responsibilities, and there should be an appropriate bump (I asked for something in the 80's). There's also the risk that I'm taking of going from a regulated shop to a deregulated one (you would expect that to be reflected in higher pay at a deregulated shop), and a premium for shift work. I need some guys with more power experience to weigh in here on whether I should drop the issue of base salary or if what I'm saying is fair and reasonable: Responsibilities: The analyst will be responsible for devising and implementing bidding, marketing, and fueling strategies associated with the power plants. The position requires shift work. Core Responsibilities: 1) Forecast daily generation unit commitments, balance and schedule power production and fuel usage, communicate with generation sites, gas pipelines, grid operators, keep log of plant status, give operating orders to power plants 2) Develop and implement trading and operating strategies to maximize plant profitability and schedule outages according to trading plan FYI: The portfolio is approximately 5000 MW's split between gas turbines and steam turbines with about 1000 MW's of cable scheduling in addition. That description seems, at least to me, to be much closer in terms of duties and job functions to: Utilities Power Scheduler / Trader https://cityjobs.riversideca.gov/hr/PrintableVersion.aspx?PageName=JobDetails.aspx&Postings=4368 than Power and Gas Operations Analyst http://careers.peopleclick.com/care...iewFromLink&jobPostId=218779&localeCode=en-us
I forgot to mention, the rotational experience was managing the same portfolio of plants (current company used to manage this portfolio). i.e. I'm the only applicant with experience managing this portfolio.
Bear in mind, if I take the straight offer and renegotiate later I will have a much much weaker best alternative to negotiated agreement and theirs will be much stronger. Right now my batna is to stay at my current position, receive nearly the same level of pay with hours from 8-5 and limited on call. Their batna is to spend more time filling this position (it is a time sensitive position) with someone who has no experience managing this reasonably large and complex portfolio. If I renegotiate at the end of the year, I will have already helped train the internal people they're reallocating to this desk. I also will have no alternative in hand in terms of employment. I see that as a much weaker negotiating position.
I would make sure I got what I believe to be a better deal. A lot of IPPs/unregulated companies are not doing that well with the big drop in energy prices, so they may being trying to keep the salary as low as possible. There is no perfect way to play it, so go with your gut. There should be several people on ET that can give good feedback, so keep bumping the thread this weekend. Good luck.